Hollywood star Jussie Smollett has no intention of accepting the guilty verdict lying down, his defence attorney revealed.
Jussie Smollett guilty of staging hate crime
After weeks of registering evidence from both sides of the bench, a Chicago jury determined Smollett was guilty of five out of six charges of disorderly conduct, as well as staging a hate crime.
“The jury in the case of Jussie Smollett have found Mr Smollett guilty of five of six counts of disorderly conduct,” Cook County Circuit Court spokesperson Mary Wisniewski said in a statement to reporters.
Reacting to the verdict, Smollett’s defence attorney Nenye Uche informed the press that his client was irreparably disappointed in the outcome of his trial and the next move from here onwards was to lodge an appeal.
“The verdict is inconsistent. You can’t say Jussie is lying and say Jussie is not lying for the same exact incident. We are confident in our appellate system. We are confident in our Illinois Supreme Court, and we’re confident that at the end of the day, what’s out there in the news media and in the gossip forums are not going to stand a chance in court,” Uche exclaimed.
With no sentencing date announced as yet, Smollett faces the prospect of three years direct imprisonment or probation. The question that will weigh on the judge is the amount of hours in community service he will hand down to the Empire actor.
In January 2019, Smollett sent shockwaves across the globe when he filed a police report, claiming he was attacked by two masked, MAGA-hat-wearing assailants for being homosexual.
However, weeks later, the actor’s story was torn apart by developments that suggested he lied about the entire ordeal.
In a bid to skirt prosecution, Smollett agreed to hours of community service and a penalty totalling more than R144 000 ($10 000).
Except, as it turns out, this was not enough to avoid accountability .