Chicago prosecutors may have let actor Jussie Smollett off the hook for fabricating a hate crime, but federal investigators aren’t giving up so easily.
The Empire star could still face criminal charges as the FBI looks into the circumstances surrounding a racially charged letter Smollett allegedly sent to himself a week before his bogus hate crimes hoax.
Not out of the woods yet
In a decision that shocked the nation, the Illinois State Attorney’s Office dismissed 16 charges of disorderly conduct and filing a false police report against the 36-year-old actor. Smollett, an openly gay African American, alleged that two men wearing red MAGA hats and using racial and homophobic slurs assaulted him during the early morning hours of Jan. 29.
The actor’s story began to unravel when brothers Abimbola and Olabinjo Osundairo were identified in security video near the scene of the purported hate crime. Officers who interviewed the brothers learned that Smollett paid them $3,500 to help stage the assault.
Hateful letter
Before this incident, however, Chicago police say Smollett attempted to gain notoriety by sending a threatening letter to Empire’s Fox studio in Chicago that stated, “You will die black f*g” in cutout magazine letters and included a crude, stick figure rendering of a person hanging from a tree.
“MAGA” was scrawled in bold red letters across the envelope, and the sender included a crushed white powder in the package that was later identified as aspirin.
The Osundairo brothers told police that they were willing to testify in court that Smollett staged the attack after the Jan. 22 letter failed to garner enough attention in the press. He hoped that his fabricated hate crime would catapult his career to super-stardom and help him negotiate a larger salary on Empire, which some sources estimated sat around $125,000 per episode.
In a February press conference, Chicago police seemed certain of Smollett’s ties to the mystery letter.
“First, Smollett attempted to gain attention by sending a false letter that relied on racial, homophobic and political language,” Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson said. “When that didn’t work, Smollett paid $3,500 to stage this attack and drag Chicago’s reputation through the mud in the process.”
In February, Chicago police executing a warrant on the Osundairo brothers’ property took magazines from their home. Police were investigating whether the material could be tied to the threatening letter, according to the gossip publication TMZ.
With help from the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, the FBI will continue to investigate the circumstances surrounding the hate-filled letter. Federal law enforcement officials who spoke to TMZ said Chicago police may have overstated their case by suggesting that Smollett is definitely tied to the letter.
“I think [Johnson] went too far. We’re not there yet,” an unnamed official said last month.
Fox News legal analyst Judge Andrew Napolitano said after the state dropped its case against the actor: “If he mailed that threatening letter to himself by using the post office, he engaged in postal fraud. That’s five to 10 years in jail — that’s three times what he’s facing for filing a false report if the feds want to go there.”
Whitewashing justice
In a backroom deal brokered between Smollett’s attorneys and the state prosecutor, the actor was ordered to forfeit 10 percent of the $100,000 bond he paid after his arrest. In addition, first assistant state attorney Joe Magats said the prosecution took into consideration community service Smollett voluntarily completed after it became clear he could face felony charges.
Still, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel isn’t convinced that Smollett paid the price for his publicity stunt.
“This is without a doubt a whitewash of justice,” Emanuel said at a news conference Tuesday afternoon. “There is no accountability. It is wrong, full stop.”
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