Justice was not served when the Illinois Supreme Court tossed out actor Jussie Smollett’s conviction for staging a 2019 hoax, according to the two Nigerian brothers who helped him stage it.
Smollett became the focus of national attention in 2019 after he claimed he was set upon by attackers who pelted him with racist, homophobic slurs.
The story eventually fell apart.
After Smollett was hit with 16 charges related to his false claims, Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx dismissed them in exchange for a $10,000 fine and community service, as noted by ABC News.
A new prosecutor then entered the picture. Smollett was convicted in 2021 on five charges released to the incident, but the conviction was overturned by the Illinois Supreme Court, citing Foxx’s deal.
Abimbola ‘Bola’ and Olabinjo ‘Ola’ Osundairo, the two brothers, said the deal was a sour end to a sad episode, according to Fox News.
“We were taken back initially, not because of the Supreme Court’s decision, but because Jussie never admitted guilt,” Abimbola Osundairo said.
“We understand that he has due process rights and double jeopardy should not be and is not allowed in America. However, Jussie should have admitted guilt.”
“The real injustice here was the sweetheart deal that [Smollett] was given by Kim Foxx’s office at the beginning of all of this,” Olabinjo Osundairo said.
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Abimbola Osundairo said Foxx cut a deal because Smollett was a star of “Empire” at the time and used his fame to get out of paying for his actions.
“Jussie got that deal because he has influence and power,” Abimbola Osundairo said. “So it shows that there are two different citizens in America. One with power and one without. And that’s why he got that sweetheart deal.”
Foxx said the court did the right thing, according to CBS News.
“I find it unfortunate that five years and millions of dollars later, we’re back to where we were back in March of 2019,” she said.
Foxx said her actions in dismissing the charges were just routine.
“Mr. Smollett’s guilt, in the minds of the Cook County State’s Attorney’s office, was not an issue we believed that we could meet our burden,” Foxx said. “We offered him a disposition that we would offer anybody with the same offense.”
Dan Webb, the special prosecutor who secured the conviction, was outraged at the decision.
“Make no mistake—today’s ruling has nothing to do with Mr. Smollett’s innocence,” he said.
“The Illinois Supreme Court did not find any error with the overwhelming evidence presented at trial that Mr. Smollett orchestrated a fake hate crime and reported it to the Chicago Police Department as a real hate crime, or the jury’s unanimous verdict that Mr. Smollett was guilty of five counts of felony disorderly conduct.”
“In fact, Mr. Smollett did not even challenge the sufficiency of the evidence against him in his appeal to the Illinois Supreme Court,” Webb said.
The ruling stressed that Smollett should never have been charged after Foxx’s deal took place.
“We hold that a second prosecution under these circumstances is a due process violation, and we therefore reverse defendant’s conviction,” the ruling said, according to a copy of the ruling posted by the New York Post.
“Because the charges were dismissed in exchange for defendant’s community service and forfeiture of his bail bond and because defendant fully performed his end of the agreement, the State is bound by the agreement,” the ruling said.
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