The Latest: Police: Smollett suspected of lying about attack

[Mr. Frost]

Source: Associated Press

CHICAGO (AP) — The Latest on the attack reported by Jussie Smollett (all times local):

4:30 p.m.

A police official says “Empire” actor Jussie Smollett is now considered a suspect “for filing a false police report” and that detectives are presenting the case against him to a grand jury.

Police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi tweeted the news on Wednesday after Smollett’s attorneys met with prosecutors and detectives.

Smollett told police he was attacked by two masked men while walking home from a Subway sandwich shop at around 2 a.m. on Jan. 29. He says they beat him, hurled racist and homophobic insults at him and looped a rope around his neck before fleeing.

Read more: https://apnews.com/0289f396dd7f4c98b1dc4d04d35f1c00?utm_campaign=SocialFlow&utm_medium=AP&utm_source=Twitter

[janterry]

1. Well, it's no surprise

n/t

[Beakybird]

2. Oh what tangled web we weave. When we practice to deceive.

That's Shakespeare. Whenever he comes out with a new book, I always buy it.

[jalan48]

8. ..

[greggrose]

14. Great Scott!

Walter, that is...

Oh, what a tangled web we weave,
When first we practise to deceive!
A Palmer too!—no wonder why
I felt rebuked beneath his eye:
I might have known there was but one
Whose look could quell Lord Marmion.

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/4010/4010-h/4010-h.htm

[Dave Starsky]

15. LOL.

That Billy Shakespeare certainly does have a way with words

[KWR65]

3. He is entitled to a fair trial by a jury. n/t

[BigmanPigman]

4. Do we still do that?

[RhodeIslandOne]

6. If he was smart he'd cut his losses now.

[jberryhill]

27. He is also entitled to plead guilty to a lesser charge and to pay a settlement

Which he should definitely consider.

The fact that someone is entitled to a trial in no way impacts what any individual is entitled to think or say.

[mikeysnot]

5. If true, what a dumb ass

career over.....

and this hoax will be sensationalized and the real acts of racist attacks will be swept under the rug.

[left-of-center2012]

7. What bothered me was ...

The guys who 'beat him up' hung a noose around his neck,
and he walked home wearing it around his neck (some news sources originally reported),
and he was still wearing it when the police showed up at his apartment to take a report of the assault.

[janterry]

9. as soon as I saw his face

and the relative lack of injuries (if there was a fight, it would have been much worse, I think).

I'm rarely suspicious of crimes - so my disbelief was surprising (to me). But that was my first thought.

[left-of-center2012]

10. This can not end well for him, or ...

He'll get a 'talking to'?

[Blue1963]

11. What angers me about this

is I have already had to go to war with the Cultist on social media as they clutched their pearls in faux outrage. I wondered how they can be so outraged at fake hate crimes but so silent about the real ones.

[Stuart G]

12. If all this is true, that this was made up..Smollett has indeed hung himself.

To get to be a "police detective" you got to have a certain amount of "experience." Over and over you
listen to this story and that story. Actually, after a long time, you can sense that someone is lying. But,
then you have to prove that this someone is lying. And you learn how to do that too. Smollett must have thought he could, "get away with it." For what ever reason. And he also thought he could "outsmart" the detectives. And guess what again. He was wrong again. Wrong on a lot of counts.

[totodeinhere]

13. I don't understand why he had to make this up (assuming he did) when there are so many

instances of real hate crimes against people of color happening all the time. This is going to make real victims of hate crimes hesitate to report it out of fear that they will be suspected of perpetrating a hoax.

[DrToast]

16. Who knows...people do crazy things

Remember the "B" girl from 2008?

[RhodeIslandOne]

19. Because he wanted publicity

He didn't give a rat's ass about true hate.

[SixString]

17. Remember when...

[jcmaine72]

18. If the charges against Smollett are true, he was wrong to have done this. No excuses. BUT....

Has anyone stopped to wonder why his story was so believable in the first place? Trump and his legion of MAG(a)GOTS have created a toxic atmosphere of fear and hate in this nation that's unprecedented in my lifetime. Hate crimes are way up. With that in mind, when a gay person, a person of color, or both, comes forward to report a vicious attack at the hands of a couple of Trump's deplorable MAG(a)GOTS, I tend to believe that person.

That's the sad reality of where we are in America right now. As long as we have a documented racist and white supremacist in the WH, all reports of racial violence perpetrated by the thugs inspired by said racist and white supremacist will sound entirely plausible, whether they're true or not.

With that in mind, even if Smollett's story turns out to be false, I will continue to give the victims of such attacks the benefit of the doubt and lean towards believing them first. In Trump's America, what other choice do people of good conscience really have?

[GulfCoast66]

21. Well, I can't speak for others but I did not find it believable.

Not looking for discord so I did not post my thoughts on DU. Things were understandably emotional. Figured the truth would win out.

But I have lived in the Deep South my entire life and shit like the reported crime does not happen even here. Sure, a noose is sometimes hung by a anonymous coward not wanting to lose their job.

With few exceptions the only people regularly killing innocent blacks in the south are cops.

But this was Chicago and a star most people have never heard of. I sure had not.

Seemed sketchy from the get go.

If Trump is able to gin up this kind of racial violence, which he may try, I expect to see it here before I see it in Chicago. And it will fail here if he tries it. We aren’t returning to the 40s despite a racist minorities wishes.

[oldsoftie]

23. It wasnt very believable at all. Its Jan. in Chicago. How you going to recognize anyone bundled up?

At 2am? And he's not a big star either.
This smelled bad from the beginning and many here pointed it out. Got savaged for it, but the oddities were numerous.

[Mr. Frost]

24. Sounds like from what you are saying

That this was a psudo-justifiable act to prove the MAGA civilians are capable of such acts.

That is pretty damned dangerous for the overall don't you think?

[JohnnyRingo]

20. Charged just a bit ago with filing false report

https://www.thedailybeast.com/empire-actor-jussie-smollett-suspected-of-filing-false-report-chicago-police?ref=home

He's screwed and his bullshit has set race relations back in the minds of too many. What an ass.

[GulfCoast66]

22. One disagreement.

The only people finding justification of this are going to find it no matter what. We aren’t losing voters over this. They are long lost to us.

[JohnnyRingo]

25. I'm not concerned with the politics

I get very upset when someone claims racism spurred an attack that never happened. Same when a person claims a sexual attack that didn't happen. It brings lasting damage to those who later file legitimate claims.

[No Vested Interest]

26. I had never heard of this person Smollett until a few days ago, and do not consider the story

worthy of my time, thought, or energy.
Please move on.

[onenote]

28. I think you're the one that is supposed to move on from a story that doesn't interest you

Not sure why you think your lack of interest should dictate what others do.

[NurseJackie]

29. Not a slam... but does he have mental problems? Substance abuse issues?

Any history of self-destructive behavior?