Jussie Smollett told jurors on Monday that he did not orchestrate a fake hate crime against himself in January 2019, according to local reports.
Jussie Smollett, the former “Empire” star, took the stand in a Chicago courtroom on Monday and denied that he staged a hate crime against himself nearly three years ago, according to local reports. Smollett,39, walked the jury through his version of the events of Jan.29,2019, when he alleges he was attacked by two men who uttered homophobic and racist slurs and put a rope around his neck. And he denied that he had paid two brothers, Olabinjo and Abimbola Osundairo, to stage the attack. “There was no hoax,” Smollett told the jury, according to the Associated Press and reporters in the courtroom. Smollett is facing six counts of “disorderly conduct,” a Class 4 felony in Illinois. He is accused of lying to the police about the incident, leading to a massive police investigation. Several reporters tweeted live coverage of Smollett’s testimony from the courtroom, including Jason Meisner and Megan Crepeau of the Chicago Tribune, Charlie De Mar of CBS News in Chicago, Sam Charles of WGN, Jon Seidel and Andy Grimm of the Chicago Sun-Times, Dane Placko of Fox 32, and Dave Byrnes of Courthouse News.
