Jussie Smollett attacked with bleach and noose

[CharlesPhipps]

Mind you, were I someone like Smollett and my livelihood depended on my public persona and had already lost my job because of this and gone through potential criminal charges that I knew to be unfounded.

I might just want to keep my head down if it saved me.

Perhaps not the idealistic courageous option but might be the practical one.

[Madner Kami]

Oh. I should have realized. It's right there in the article.

But in an interview Tuesday afternoon, First Assistant State's Attorney Joseph Magats, who took charge of the case after State’s Attorney Kim Foxx stepped aside because of a conflict of interest, said the office reached a deal with the defense behind the scenes in recent weeks that prosecutors would drop the charges if Smollett performed community service and forfeited his $100,000 bond.

Yeah, he did absolutely nothing wrong, so he's going to donate $100,000 to the court. That's the reaction any of us would have to be being falsely accused, I'm sure.

Wow. I mean... Wow. Thanks to the services linked above "currently" being unavailable in the EU, I couldn't scan the texts without jumping through some hoops and it didn't seem necessary. CharlesPhipps, I'm a bit miffed about you omitting this detail when quoting the news. I expected better from you.

[Antiboyscout]

Mind you, were I someone like Smollett and my livelihood depended on my public persona and had already lost my job because of this and gone through potential criminal charges that I knew to be unfounded.

I might just want to keep my head down if it saved me.

Perhaps not the idealistic courageous option but might be the practical one.

Right, it;s definitely that and not another case of a rich and famous person getting away with a fine and community service where a normal person would do time.

That is what privilege looks like

[Robovski]

Mind you, were I someone like Smollett and my livelihood depended on my public persona and had already lost my job because of this and gone through potential criminal charges that I knew to be unfounded.

I might just want to keep my head down if it saved me.

Perhaps not the idealistic courageous option but might be the practical one.

Right, it;s definitely that and not another case of a rich and famous person getting away with a fine and community service where a normal person would do time.

That is what privilege looks like

It is indeed. The police are pissed off, the outgoing Mayor is not happy either. I would like to think they are not in the minority with this opinion.

[CharlesPhipps]

Right, it;s definitely that and not another case of a rich and famous person getting away with a fine and community service where a normal person would do time.

That is what privilege looks like

Yes, when a man is beaten and then accused of his own hate crime I tend to assume there's police malfeasance.

The "he faked it" argument was always an incredibly questionable violation of Occam's Razor.

Wow. I mean... Wow. Thanks to the services linked above "currently" being unavailable in the EU, I couldn't scan the texts without jumping through some hoops and it didn't seem necessary. CharlesPhipps, I'm a bit miffed about you omitting this detail when quoting the news. I expected better from you.

A lot of people are jumping on the detail that leaving the 100K bond meant anything. I'm not so much unconvinced as actively eye rolling at the ass covering by the people who want to look like they didn't jump on an innocent man.

But where I stand on this case has never been unclear.

[LittleRaven]

But where I stand on this case has never been unclear.

It's not unclear. It's just incoherent.

Let's review: You believe that there has been severe police malfeasance in this case - that they have, at minimum, falsely extracted confessions from at least 2 men, while publicly treating a victim as a suspect due to their incredibly racist and homophobic tendencies. You also believe that this has left them with an amazingly weak case that no sane prosecutor would touch with a 10 foot pole, which is quite logical given your starting assumption.

But you simultaneously believe that Mr. Smollett, now having been twice wronged by the city of Chicago, and having suffered incalculable damage to his image, has decided to pay the city $100,000 for the immense privilege of...never being exonerated from this in public eye. After all, if Mr. Smollett had taken this farce of a case to court, and shown that the police framed him while grossly violating the civil rights of at least 3 black men...he would be the toast of the town. He would be completely vindicated in the eyes of the public, the city of Chicago would be writing him a check with many, MANY zeros on it, and not only would Hollywood be tripping over themselves to cast him, he would go down in the history books as a civil rights icon. But as it is, while this deal means that he won't go to jail for anything, it also means that he will never clear the cloud of suspicion hanging over his head, which for someone who makes his living in the public eye, is all but the kiss of death.

I have no idea how you've come to the conclusion that Occam's Razor supports this bizarre scenario, but hey...you do you.

[CharlesPhipps]

I believe Smollett left his 10K bond and other material because it's easier than trying to challenge this whole thing given he's already had his professional reputation destroyed and his freedom threatened by police who have shown a willingness to arrest him for an attack against himself.

This is not a particularly incoherent position.

[ChiggyvonRichthofen]

The story as told by Smollett was prima facie absurd, something that people recognized on the first page of this very thread. White nationalists roaming the streets of Chicago wearing MAGA hats in subzero weather? Throw in all the evidence accumulated since then, including a confession and video of his friends actually buying the robbery stuff, and yeah, figuring out what happened is not rocket science. And from everything I have seen, there is no new evidence to suggest that Smollet is innocent. Even the DA's office stated that he was not exonerated and that the Chicago PD did not mishandle evidence.

What's disgusting is this B-list actor trying to profit from the racial divide in this country, getting caught, and still playing up his righteous indignation/sympathy card, all while continuing to divide the country and causing immeasurable harm to real hate victims.

One thing I'm not clear on still- There are texts floating around the internet between country DA Kim Foxx and a "family representative" with her promising to do everything she can to help. So Foxx ended up recusing herself, and then almost immediately afterward her office comes out and drops the charges anyway? This could easily end up worse for them than it already was.

[LittleRaven]

I believe Smollett left his 10K bond and other material because it's easier than trying to challenge this whole thing given he's already had his professional reputation destroyed and his freedom threatened by police who have shown a willingness to arrest him for an attack against himself.

This is not a particularly incoherent position.

It wouldn't be, except you've also made this argument.

But just starting with the fact their two primary witnesses were arrested for 48 hours without a lawyer means that the case would have been thrown out by any decent judge.

Because, you know, that's ''illegal.''

Smollett can either be the staring down a corrupt justice system that will stop at nothing to throw an innocent man in jail, or he can be facing a prosecutor with a case so flimsy that he cannot dare bring it to trial without the entire house of cards collapsing...but he can't be both.

[Antiboyscout]

Being held without arrest longer than 24 hours is illegal and a lawyer may be requested. So long as Miranda was read to them, this is above board.