Court Order Jussie Smollett Be Released From Jail During Appeal
Court officials ordered Jussie Smollett to be released from jail pending the appeal of his conviction for filing a police report about a racist and homophobic attack.
As we previously reported, Smollett was sentenced last week to 30 months felony probation, and also 150 days in jail, for lying to police about an alleged hate crime in 2019.
“The wheels of justice turn slowly but sometimes the hammer of justice has to fall and it’s falling right now,” Cook County Judge James Linn said. “I’m not staying this.”
In court, the Judge expressed how much attention his case has got and said he has only seen a such thing for murder trials.
“Let me tell you Mr. Smollett, I know that there is nothing that I will do here today that can come close to the damage you’ve already done to your own life,” he said. “You’ve turned your life upside down by your misconduct and shenanigans, you’ve destroyed your life as you knew it, and there’s nothing that any sentencing judge could do to you that can compare to the damage you’ve already caused yourself.”
The judge spoke on Smollett’s behavior, saying, “You’re just a charlatan pretending to be a victim of a hate crime, and that’s shameful.”
Linn also called Smollett “profoundly arrogant and selfish and narcissistic,” saying he had done “real damage” to real victims of hate crimes. But he repeated that his sentence was not chosen to satisfy public outcry but was based on Smollett’s priors, testimony and the reaction from social justice leaders who spoke on Smollett’s behalf.