Jussie Smollett at the 2017 BET Awards (Danny Moloshok/Reuters)

Recall that when the Chicago state’s attorney Kim Foxx dropped charges against Jussie Smollett, her office announced that he had been punished enough for perpetrating his hoax, not that he was innocent: “After reviewing all of the facts and circumstances of the case, including Mr. Smollett’s volunteer service in the community and agreement to forfeit his bond to the City of Chicago, we believe this outcome is a just disposition and appropriate resolution to this case” was the statement at the time. But why would Smollett have accepted any penalty whatsoever if he was the blameless victim of a horrendous attack?


Now under the mayoral leadership of Lori Lightfoot, the City of Chicago is continuing to sue Smollett to recover costs related to investigating his false, indeed ludicrous, claims of a hate-crime attack. Last week a special prosecutor, Dan Webb, was appointed to investigate the odd circumstances of how the case was dropped without securing a guilty plea from Smollett while the city seeks to recover some $130,000 in overtime costs from the actor.

Smollett himself, previously voluble about the alleged attack, has gone completely quiet, but this week his PR firm released a statement claiming that “regardless of what is said by the city, every iota of information Jussie Smollett has stated has been fully corroborated by the police documents.” “Not documents from his PR or legal team but documents generated by the very people who continuously claim it as fact that he is guilty,” the statement continued. “But this requires people to look at the actual evidence which nobody seems to want to do.”


Looking at the evidence a bit more is exactly what Chicago is doing. Cook County Criminal Court judge Michael Toomin backed the appointment of a special prosecutor because of “unprecedented irregularities” in the case. Because Smollett was not acquitted of the charges against him, re-charging him with a crime is a possibility. It would not be double jeopardy. Even worse, comic Dave Chappelle is mercilessly ridiculing Smollett, whom he derides as “Juicy Smoo-yay,” in his new Netflix special.