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Actor Jussie Smollett, who has strong ties to Democrats, currently faces felony charges and faces up to three years in prison.
“We are with you, Jussie,” then-candidate Joe Biden told Smollett leading up to the 2020 presidential elections.
“Homophobia and racism have no place on our streets or in our hearts,” Biden added.
Kamala Harris, the Obama’s, Nancy Pelosi and other top Democrats have also publicly supported Smollett.
The 39-year-old actor is accused of lying to police about being the victim of a racist and homophobic assault in Chicago, which never actually occurred.
He allegedly faked a hate crime back in order to politically attack Republicans and Trump supporters. He is charged with 6 counts of felony disorderly conduct.
Smollett went to the Chicago police in January 2019 and falsely alleged he had been assaulted by two people he described as white men who wearing MAGA hats.
This class 4 felony carries a sentence of up to three years in prison.
“[The prosectution] has a really strong case,” legal expert and former federal prosecutor Neama Rahmani told Fox News.
The detailed evidence “includes phone records and texts between Smollett and his alleged hired attackers,” the report adds.
Smollet told police that his attackers shouted racial and homophobic slurs and poured an unknown chemical substance on him, which was possibly bleach.
If this wasn’t bad enough, Smollet also claimed they tied a noose around his neck.
The only problem is that police discovered that Smollett paid his attackers $3,500 in order to carry out the fake hoax.
In February 2019, Chicago police raided the home of the two alleged attackers. They had actually worked with Smollett as extras on his television show’s set.
The two alleged attackers, identified Abimbola and Olabinjo Osundairo, are African American and not white, as Smollett claimed. They had purchased the rope found around Smollett’s neck at a hardware store in Ravenswood over the weekend of January 25.
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“The prosecution is strong because of corroborating, independent evidence that is consistent with Smollett making a false police report,” Rahmani explained. “What type of explanation can Smollett’s attorney have to justify him contacting the brothers?”
Rahmani admitted he “expects a guilty verdict” and thinks Smollett is “someone who doesn’t deserve any type of break.” In fact, the legal expert believes the trial only “brings more attention to Smollett’s misconduct” which the public was starting to forget about since the incident occurred before the pandemic.
Whether Smollett, who is Black and gay, testifies remains an open question. The brothers are expected to testify at trial and repeat what they told police in the past, that Smollett paid them to carry out the attack in order to raise his public profile.
The selected jurors will likely see surveillance video from more than four dozen cameras that police reviewed to trace the brothers’ movements before and after the reported attack, as well as a video showing the brothers purchasing a red hat, ski masks and gloves from a beauty supply shop hours earlier.
Silva Megerditchian, a criminal defense attorney based in LA not working on the case, told Fox News, “Smollett is facing 6 counts of essentially minor class 4 felonies that carry a maximum sentence of three years in State prison. If the jury finds him guilty of any of the charges, it is unlikely Smollett will serve any prison time.”
“The judge will consider that Smollett has no history of any arrests nor convictions–and thus will likely give him a probationary sentence. Keeping that in mind, however, this was a case that got national attention, and stirred a lot of anger that Smollett would stage this kind of grotesque racial attack. As well, the City of Chicago spent a lot of money investigating these false charges. Thus, I would not be surprised if the Judge imposes some kind of sentence, considering the nation is watching.”
