Chicago police arrest 2 suspects in actor’s attack
CHICAGO — The investigation into black actor Jussie Smollett’s account of being beaten in a racist, anti-gay attack took another turn Friday when Chicago police said two men arrested in the case are also black.
Police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi said the two were arrested for probable cause of committing assault and battery on the “Empire” cast member. Smollett, who is gay, has said two masked men beat him after shouting racial and homophobic slurs and tied a rope around his neck on Jan. 29.
The two suspects — whom police previously had identified only as Nigerian brothers — were picked up at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport on Wednesday and taken into custody after returning from Nigeria when police learned that at least one of the men worked on “Empire,” according to Guglielmi. He said he did not know what the man’s job was on the television drama.
He confirmed that a search warrant was executed at the Chicago apartment where the men lived but did not have any information about what exactly what police found.
Guglielmi’s comments followed a furious 24 hours that included local media reports that the attack was a hoax. Police say those reports are unconfirmed. Producers of the television drama also disputed media reports that Smollett’s character, Jamal Lyon, was being written off the show, calling the idea “patently ridiculous.”
Guglielmi reiterated Friday that there was “no evidence to say that this is a hoax” and that Smollett “continues to be treated by police as a victim, not a suspect.”
Smollett told ABC News in an interview that aired Thursday that the men police took into custody on Wednesday were the ones who hurled racial and homophobic slurs at him, beat him, threw an undetermined chemical substance and looped a rope around his neck before running off. Smollett has said he was attacked while out getting food at a restaurant in downtown Chicago.
Guglielmi said police have not found any surveillance video showing the attack itself.