Jussie Smollett speaks on a panel during Black Owned Media Weekend at The Beacon Detroit on June 07, 2024 in Detroit, Michigan. Aaron J. Thornton/Getty Images
The Illinois Supreme Court has overturned Jussie Smollett’s 2021 conviction for allegedly staging a racist and homophobic attack on himself in 2019, ruling on Thursday (Nov. 21) that his rights had been violated when a special prosecutor stepped in to retry him despite the Cook County State Attorney’s Office initially dropping all charges against him.
“We are aware that this case has generated significant public interest and that many people were dissatisfied with the resolution of the original case and believed it to be unjust,” the court wrote in its decision, according to The Chicago Tribune. “Nevertheless, what would be more unjust than the resolution of any one criminal case would be a holding from this court that the State was not bound to honor agreements upon which people have detrimentally relied.”
The decision comes more than five years after the singer-actor first reported that two men had assaulted him, yelled racist and homophobic slurs and placed a noose around his neck in downtown Chicago. Two years later, a jury found Smollett — who is Black and gay — guilty of five of six counts of disorderly conduct for allegedly lying to police about the incident, with the prosecution accusing him of hiring the two men to attack him because he was unhappy with his employer’s response to hate mail he’d received, according to the Associated Press.
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In addition to 30 months of probation, Smollett — who has maintained his innocence — was ordered to pay $130,160 in restitution and sentenced to 150 days in jail, which he never served due to the lengthy appeals process that has played out in the years since. A lower court previously upheld the convictions in a split 2-1 decision, but the Illinois Supreme Court agreed to hear the actor’s appeal — and on Thursday, decided in his favor.
Of the decision, Smollett’s lawyer, Nenye E. Uche told Billboard, “This was not a prosecution based on facts,” calling it “vindictive.”
“Ultimately, we are pleased that the rule of law was the big winner today,” the attorney added. “We are thankful to the Illinois Supreme Court for restoring order to Illinois’ criminal law jurisprudence.”
According to the Tribune, at the heart of the court’s ruling was the fact that Cook County had originally dropped the charges against the singer-actor — despite brothers Abimbola and Olabinjo Osundairo testifying that Smollett had indeed paid them to carry out the attack — citing that the star had forfeited his $10,000 bond and done community service. The move sparked national debate over State’s Attorney Kim Foxx’s handling of the case, from which she’d recused herself.
As national outcry increased, former Cook County Judge Michael Toomin appointed former U.S. attorney Dan Webb as special prosecutor amid scrutiny around the decision. Webb eventually refiled the charges, which Smollett’s legal team has countered by arguing that double jeopardy was attached when he forfeited his $10,000 bail bond.
“It defies credulity to believe that defendant would agree to forfeit $10,000 with the understanding that [Cook County State’s Attorney Office] could simply reindict him the following day,” the court added in its opinion, according to the Tribune.
But in a scathing statement shared with Billboard shortly after the Illinois Supreme Court ruling, Webb blasted the reasoning and wrote that the court had “reached this decision notwithstanding the fact that the CCSAO dismissed the initial Smollett case via a nolle prosequi, which does not bar re-prosecution under Illinois law, and Mr. Smollett’s own lawyers told the public immediately following the dismissal of his initial case in March 2019 that there was ‘no deal’ with the CCSAO.”
“Make no mistake — today’s ruling has nothing to do with Mr. Smollett’s innocence,” Webb added in his statement. “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.”
The prosecutor added that “the City of Chicago remains able to pursue its pending civil lawsuit against Mr. Smollett in order to recoup the over $120,000 in overtime expenses the Chicago Police Department incurred for investigating Mr. Smollett’s fake hate crime.”
Despite Webb’s assertions, Smollett has insisted that he was not behind the attack. In 2021, he testified at his trial that “there was no hoax,” and in April 2022, he declared his innocence once again on his song “Thank You God….”
“Just remember this, this ain’t that situation/ You think I’m stupid enough to kill my reputation?,” he rapped on the track. “Just to look like a victim, like it’s something fun/ Y’all better look at someone else, you got the wrong one.”
