After Three Years of Delay, Jussie Smollett’s Criminal Trial Is Finally Beginning
Jussie Smollett will finally face a trial for his 2019 stunt in which he claimed he was the victim of a racist, homophobic attack in Chicago. Smollett claimed two masked men approached him as he was walking home on Jan…
Jussie Smollett will finally face a trial for his 2019 stunt in which he claimed he was the victim of a racist, homophobic attack in Chicago.
Smollett claimed two masked men approached him as he was walking home on Jan. 29, 2019, and made racist and homophobic insults, Fox News reported.
The actor, who was starring in the Fox Entertainment series “Empire” at the time, said his attackers yelled, “This is MAGA country” (a reference to former President Donald Trump’s “Make America Great Again” slogan), poured a liquid on him that he thought was bleach and placed a noose-like rope around his neck.
However, the account has since been discredited by the two men Smollett reportedly paid to conduct the “racist and homophobic” assault — brothers Abel and Ola Osundario.
The brothers will testify in the trial, which begins Monday, according to their attorney, Gloria Rodriguez, according to The Associated Press.
They will claim Smollett was the star of an “attack” designed to take place near a surveillance camera, Rodriguez said.
She said they will testify that Smollett had them conduct what she called a “dress rehearsal.”
“He was telling them ‘Here’s a camera, there’s a camera and here’s where you are going to run away,’” Rodriguez said, according to AP.