So this happened today:
Infuriating Chicago’s mayor and police chief, prosecutors abruptly dropped all charges against Jussie Smollett on Tuesday after the “Empire” actor accused of faking a racist, anti-gay attack on himself agreed to do volunteer service and to let the city keep his $10,000 in bail.
Authorities gave no detailed explanation for why they abandoned the case only five weeks after filing the charges and threatening to pursue Smollett for the cost of a monthlong investigation. Prosecutors said they still believe Smollett concocted the assault. Smollett insisted he told the truth all along.
The dismissal drew an immediate backlash. Mayor Rahm Emanuel called the deal “a whitewash of justice” and lashed out at Smollett for dragging the city’s reputation “through the mud” in a quest to advance his career. At one point he asked, “Is there no decency in this man?”
First off, Rahm Emanuel oversaw and oversees an out of control and ineffective police department, and he can just go fuck himself. Second, my opinion on this matter is that even if Smollett did fake all this, the number of charges and the seriousness of the potential sentences was absolutely absurd. If he were some regular jackass and not a celebrity, he would have been charged with some misdemeanor and it would have been pled out most likely without ever even making the news.
One of the weird things about our society is that there really are different tiers of justice for the rich and famous and the rest of us. Usually, this works in the favor of the wealthy, and in some cases they can literally get away with murder, but every now and then (and only when it is something completely inconsequential), a celebrity will just have the book and everything else thrown at them. And again, it’s usually for nonsense or low level shit that really does not matter.
When I watch shows like Game of Thrones and likewise and they are holding an execution and everyone shows up to gawk, I always think why the hell would people show up to watch that? “Thank goodness we are better than that these days.” Except, of course, we aren’t better than that. The mob still likes a head every now and then, so we give them one.
A perfect example of this was Paris Hilton, who appears to be no longer in the news, but back in the day was an entitled little shit jetting around the world being a drunken famous asshole, starring in amateur porn, and basically being a celebrity influencer before we had instagram and had descended into our current social media hellscape. Regardless, she ran afoul of the law, got a dui, then drove on a suspended sentence- all crimes, but not the end of the world, and then was sent to jail and given double the time and was treated like shit for no reason other than she was rich and a celebrity and they wanted to show how the justice system is fair for everyone. Equality under the law.
Except it’s bullshit. Also in 2007, Scooter Libby was convicted on five counts related to outing a CIA agent, sentenced to 30 months in jail. Bush commuted his sentence before he served his time, and Trump just pardoned him last year.
So yeah. Rock on with your bad self, Jussie. You probably did it, but it was bullshit what you were facing and I’m not going to be distracted and will keep my eye on the real fucking criminals.
Steeplejack
Dunno exactly why, but “Phrasing!” feels appropriate here.
Aleta
Lots more police hours, racist lies to police about made-up attackers, made himself out to be a hero and basked in the publicity he sought. Acquitted by a jury.
ETA Oh yeah, charges were a lot less I believe.
Btw, this is the same guy who was arrested in Haiti in Feb.
Major Major Major Major
Faking a hate crime is actually pretty bad for minority communities!
John Revolta
Rahm is acting the goddamn fool over this. I mean if I’m in his shoes I really don’t know WHAT the correct reaction is to this but I’m pretty sure this ain’t it.
He isn’t running for re-election so what’s wrong with “We don’t know for sure what happened so no comment?”
jackmac
Smollett is a celebrity jackass who managed to turn his career into a smoldering dumpster fire. Well-deserved obscurity ahead.
Miss Bianca
@Steeplejack: I was thinking the same thing.
Also, with regard to JC’s observation about celebrity justice, I’ve noticed that it’s hardly ever white male celebrities who get the smackdown. Martha Stewart? Sure. But the White Supremacist He-Man Woman Hater’s Club? Not so much.
HypersphericalCow
A theory I saw bouncing around Twitter: the police saw an open-and-shut case, but got overzealous, broke some rules (witness/evidence mishandling?) that make the case unprosecutable, and the DA decided to cut their losses so that the department won’t be embarrassed. Wouldn’t be the first time.
zhena gogolia
I missed the pictures of John’s dad brushing the puppehs earlier today. He looks great!
zhena gogolia
Okay, I’m going to finish watching Cold War on Amazon Prime. Watch it, everybody, it’s great! Fantastic music.
Major Major Major Major
@HypersphericalCow: would not indeed.
AndoChronic
You just have to read a little Ernest Becker to understand why!
Steeplejack
@Miss Bianca:
I was trying to think of white male celebrities who took a fall, and Mel Gibson was the only one who came to mind (although I wasn’t trying very hard). I don’t even know if he faced charges or was just shunned socially.
Note: I am sort of deliberately ignoring the basic drug/alcohol/idiocy-fueled episodes to which Hollywood celebrities are prone (e.g., Nick Nolte, Gary Busey, Robert Downey Jr.). I guess alcohol was involved with Gibson, but racism and anti-Semitism are worse than just being a garden-variety A-hole (see Baldwin, Alec).
I don’t know. I guess my conclusion is that there seems to be no rhyme or reason to it.
SiubhanDuinne
I never heard of Jussie Smollett until this story broke wide open a few weeks ago. Happy to return to that status ASAP.
mcguffin
Cole, you should be able to walk and chew gum at the same time. Smollett acted like an asshole and deserved the charges that were brought against him. I also hope Trump and his family are brought to justice one of these days.
HypersphericalCow
@Steeplejack: A bunch of white male celebs have been brought down by #MeToo-related stuff in their pasts. But even there, it seems to just be a matter of chance as to who gets exposed.
WaterGirl
@SiubhanDuinne: He was my favorite character on Empire, so I was sorry to see the whole situation.
B.B.A.
Fuck Rahm and fuck the police.
Details of the story don’t even matter, that’s my stance on anything.
WaterGirl
@HypersphericalCow: I think #MeToo is a different kind of animal altogether.
lamh36
@jackmac: I’m no Smollett defender, but let’s be clear alot of the folks who are interested in this from the beginning was because of the MAGA aspect of it.
Jussie Smollett wasn’t some mainstream household name. the folks who watch Empire and even those who know him for other than Empire means he’ll survive.
I mean how many of the folks who are commenting actually watche more than a clip or an episode of Empire?
HAL
Rahm can go fuck himself. The Chicago PD fucked up and took this case way too personally. Decades in jail was ridiculous. Next time an unarmed black man is gunned down let’s see Emmanuel get 1/10th as mad. Shit head.
lamh36
Mahn…some folks really going in on Jussie Smollett..you’d da think he did what R Kelly or Bill Cosby did…I mean I need some folks to have some fire for the CPD and their shitty handling of the entire thing?
I’m not saying faking a hate cirme isn’t disgusting, but you’d think Jussie killed a young child…or IDK..shot an unarmed man in the back multiple times…like CPD has done
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/1e64de4dd8f1cfa3d8cc47cedf1e0055e60f50ef7ee1b0fb9445d0ef9e192629.gif
Steeplejack
@HypersphericalCow:
Oh, yeah, I forgot about the #MeToo stuff. I don’t keep up with celebrity crime like I should. Or celebrity anything. When I accidentally see an intro to Entertainment Tonight or a similar show I am shocked if I recognize more than one celebrity name. And that’s usually “So-and-so died or turned 80 today.”
lamh36
@mcguffin: “deserved”???
16 counts was excessive…PERIOD!
A Ghost To Most
Seems like no one comes off good in this story.
khead
Thank you.
Steve in the ATL
@HypersphericalCow:
Clearly, sir, you know nothing about the Chicago police! //
Steve in the ATL
@lamh36: I concur
Major Major Major Major
@lamh36: A lot of people (the MAGAts, the “anti-SJW” crowd) are definitely playing this up for vile reasons, but Cole’s still being weird with this double-anti-backlash thing here.
lamh36
OT, but I’ve mostly been ambivalent on Biden running. If ya paying attention ya already know who my candidate is
But this answer on Anita Hill…from Joe.This ain’t it Joe…this ain’t it at all.
As if he was just a bystander on the committee…
ruemara
Let me be frank. We don’t know what was fake or not. We have no clue. We do have a CPD that’s known for black sites to torture confessions out of people. We have Rahm, who sat on info for the Laquan Mcdonald case. So… miss me with Jussie being a crook being clear or fucking CPD & Mayor Coverup having shit to say. The people who don’t extend the benefit of the doubt to hate crimes wouldn’t do so whether or not this case existed.
lamh36
@ruemara:
lamh36
@Major Major Major Major: Yup…the MAGA crew ain’t fooling nobody
rikyrah
A video about Jussie???
https://youtu.be/v7fa_4_pKc8
Ken
As Terry Pratchett said in Small Gods, sometimes it’s just relief that you’re not the poor bastard being executed.
Ken
@Steeplejack: I’ve noticed in the checkout line that there are a lot of magazines where the cover article is always about some decades-dead celebrity line John Wayne or Elizabeth Taylor. It’s like the magazine – or I guess more likely its readers – time-stopped in 1975.
lamh36
@Major Major Major Major: the MAJA idiots are even spreading a consipracry thery rumour about the prosecutor Foxx being guided by PBO and Michelle Obama…smh
HeleninEire
LOL Rahm commenting on someone else’s “decency.” STFU.
WaterGirl
@lamh36: I agree. I’m guessing that most of the people who are hating on him aren’t doing it for honorable reasons – it’s surely because that uppity black was supposed to “get what’s coming to him”. Could all the people who want to hate just go find another planet, or something?
zhena gogolia
@Ken:
There’s this magazine called Closer that I see in the checkout line (okay, I bought one once) that has people like that on the cover! I bought the Cary Grant cover issue. I guess I’m the target audience.
rikyrah
So much stuff to discuss:
I want to remind people that our States Attorney RECUSED HERSELF because she didn’t want any appearance of impropriety.
But, after those ridiculous charges, she had folks that she trusts look at the case ..
Realizing how bad it is…..she had them drop the charges.
The police are going to look at this as another instance where Foxx “didn’t have law enforcement’s back.’??
The case was SEALED???
If that isn’t a neon sign flashing
Chicago Police Department Phuckery Afoot
Then, I don’t know what would.??
Steve in the ATL
@zhena gogolia: hmmm…do you drive a Buick? How many cats do you own? What day of the week does your bridge club meet?
WaterGirl
@lamh36: The prosecutors absolutely overreached and I’m guessing he was called the N word and worse by the cops or the prosecutor’s office and/or was treated pretty badly physically, or something terrible happened to him in jail… stuff they probably get away with every day with black men who can’t afford a high priced attorney. I am pretty sure it ended up being in THEIR best interests to just make this go away.
delk
Never saw the show, but they did turn my street into ‘London’ to film an episode.
zhena gogolia
@Steve in the ATL:
1. No, but my husband only recently gave up his Olds. 2. Zero at the moment but I will change that. 3. I never could learn to play bridge. But I do a s–t-ton of word puzzles every day.
Steeplejack
@Ken:
Probably because the magazines are in a dwindling market with an aging audience. Hit the old reliable tropes.
lamh36
@WaterGirl: the CPD is the darn key to it all. they did not conduct themselves well in all this at all.
Like rikryah said…they EXPUNGED the entire record…that tells ya CPD FUCKED UP ROYALLY!
and Rahm w/his crocodile tears…he didn’t cry that much bout injustice for LaQuan McDonald
encephalopath
Charges dropped, court records sealed, bail forfeit.
It’s been interesting to watch the response to this where nobody really knows what happened. Some people think all this hidden stuff means that Smollett did something shady.
My inclination is to align with those who think that charges in a high profile case don’t just evaporate for nothing. The records are sealed because the prosecutors or the police seriously effed this thing up.
Barbara
@John Revolta: Emmanuel seems incapable of understanding the role of proportionality in the concept of justice. I mean, this is the the mayor who basically participated in the cover up of the shooting of an unarmed man by the police. Smollett deserves to be mocked and ridiculed but he doesn’t deserve jail time.
lamh36
FUQ’N EVIL!!!
WaterGirl
@rikyrah: Interesting to see Michelle Obama’s former chief of staff’s name come up in connection with this story AND she is the one being brought in to work with the staff at the Southern Poverty Law Center for whatever hush-hush problem they had there that led to the two top people whose names I knew leaving the organization within just a few days of one another.
Is this Tina T. some new high powered fixer or a really well respected person in certain circles? I had never heard her name and now twice in one week.
Major Major Major Major
eemom
Really excellent article in The Atlantic today about how fucked the Franken thing was. And more broadly, exactly what I’ve been saying all along about how irresponsible and dangerous the “believe the woman” schtick is…and how there IS a better way.
Just in case anybody wanted something to fight about. Take our minds off the Barr lies, etc.
Also too, fuck Gillibrand. Fucking hypocrite.
lamh36
@Major Major Major Major: sounds to me like Chris is trying to clean the answer up for Bernie
lamh36
this is some bullshit…Rahm is full of shit.
The DA trying to save face for the state, the city and CPD…and this is what Rahm’s thinking?
sukabi
@Major Major Major Major: don’t know if he did it or not. Part of the evidence against him was a check he wrote to pay the brothers…what millenial uses a checkbook?
Kay
Guffaw. Just the threat of a letter should be enough, don’t you think? Don;t make her write that letter, Mr. Barr. She just might!
Amir Khalid
Public hangings were a popular entertainment in Britain until 1868.
SenyorDave
@ruemara: We do have a CPD that’s known for black sites to torture confessions out of people.
I wondered about that because when I go to the gym and get on cardio and watch TV, I occasionally watch Chicago PD. Pretty bad but you can only watch Sportscenter so often. A running part of the show is that the squad apparently does on occasion resort to torture to elicit confessions. From your comment, I gather this is based on reality?
I was pretty shocked when I found out that it is produced by Dick Wolfe of Law & Order fame, because the show comes off as pro torture.
Major Major Major Major
@sukabi: any millennial who wants to send more than the Venmo limit?
Roger Moore
@lamh36:
That’s not a difficult decision; it’s dumping on people who can’t defend themselves. A really difficult decision would be for DeVos to say no to her boss and refuse to gut programs to pay for his idiotic wall.
It’s the same way I always hear politicians talk about the need to “make tough decisions” when they cut programs for poor people during economic downturns. That’s not a tough decision; it’s putting the pain on people who can’t fight back. The really tough decision is building up a rainy day fund when times are good and everyone is demanding tax cuts and funding for their pet projects.
Steve in the ATL
@lamh36:
On this specifically, but also generally
raven
@eemom: Throw him in the moat!
Theodoric of York
https://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/video/theodoric-of-york/n8661
Kay
I went to the county meeting tonight and guess who has a Democratic Socialist running for the US House in Ohio’s 5th district?
We do. He introduced himself to the group as “DSA” and they all said “WHO?” They thought it was a union, I think. I am apparently the only member who knows what “DSA” means. Hysterical.
He’s very young and very nice. An IT person for the local public schools. The more the merrier, right?
sukabi
@Major Major Major Major: I’m way beyond millenial age and I haven’t used a checkbook in years and have never used venmo.
Major Major Major Major
@sukabi: more importantly I don’t think he’s denied writing the check, saying it was for a workout class.
ETA How do you prefer to give casual acquaintances thousands of dollars?
Jay
@lamh36:
He’s thinking, outloud, right up until the Cities lawyers mention this thing called “discovery”,
He’s deliberately stoking the rage, trying to incite a lynching.
@SenyorDave:
CPD had black site torture, false confessions, executions and drug squads that protected some od the dealers, robbed others, and ran the drug trade in some of the projects.
Almost all Cop shows/Spy shows in the US are torture apologists and big on the cops/spies committing crime and vigilante “justice”.
sukabi
@Major Major Major Major: haven’t been following that closely, but the over charging and the complete exoneration is hinky as hell.
Duane
@lamh36: The right-wing media was driving this story. Emanuel should know better.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Kay: It will be sternly worded though!
Eric S.
@Steve in the ATL:
Right. They are always over zealous, to out it charitably.
eemom
I’m so old I remember what Rahm’s job was before he became mayor of Chicago.
Jay
@Major Major Major Major:
Brown paper bags and randomly sequenced $20’s.
Barbara
@eemom: I would say there is no need to expend the energy. The demon curse of what goes around comes around seems to have reared its head. I am not fighting over Franken, not for as long as the pu**sy grabber in chief has an ounce of power over me.
Mary G
Rahm is a wolf in sheep’s clothing the same as Tulsi Gabbard. Conservatives who belong in the Republican Party, but claim to be Democrats because that is the only way they get elected.
WaterGirl
@Mary G: I imagine that Barack Obama’s list of regrets while president is not overly long, but I do wonder if him bringing us Rahm might be one of Barack’s regrets.
Ladyraxterinok
@lamh36: He actually said this?
I remember the hearing . Couldn’t watch very much–too upsetting.
Remember the expressions on the men’s faces–there were NO women on the committee. I felt like they were all thinking about the things they’d said and done in their work lives that the women maybe had’t thought was so funny/harmless.
The women rage at the whole hearing led to the election of the first female senator. There was no women’s restroom. IIRC Sen Jesse Helms, GOP from NC, had some nasty comments during move to accommodate her.
eemom
@Barbara:
Agreed. I actually thought it was strange timing for that article to be published. But it did perfectly express what I consider to be the truths of that entire issue, so I thought it was worth sharing.
Barbara
@Mary G: Actually, I chalk this particular display of stupidity up to Emanuel feeling like he has been personally punked by a celebrity. I would also say that politically he has a lot in common with Andrew Cuomo and Cory Booker.
WaterGirl
@eemom: I was happy to read the article. Just like it’s good to have a plan ahead of time for where your family will meet if there is a fire or a tornado or whatever, I think the best timing for an article like that is while there is not a current crisis going on. So the timing kind of makes sense to me.
sukabi
@Major Major Major Major: I don’t.
Ladyraxterinok
@Amir Khalid: Thousands of whites showed up to watch lynchings of blacks. Postcards were sold, collected. I believe the last was in the 1920s
WaterGirl
@Ladyraxterinok: I’m not sure I have ever gotten over — spoiler alert — watching Damien Lewis being hanged until dead at the end of Homeland season 2 or 3. And that was TV.
Eric S.
@Major Major Major Major:
Small, unmarked, non sequential bills.
David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch
@WaterGirl: Barack actually spared us.
At the time of his appointment, Rahm was head of the DCCC and Chairman of the Democratic caucus (Hakeem Jeffries’s current position) — he was slated to replace Nancy Smash on her retirement.
Chyron HR
@Major Major Major Major:
Aww, izzums the evil old man who couldn’t handle losing to a woman starting to realize that he’s not going to win next year, either? Time to burn the country down out of spite again!
WaterGirl
@David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch: Oh my God. I did not know that.
cwmoss
@B.B.A.: I must say, I do like the cut of your jib.
Suzanne
@HypersphericalCow: That was my theory, too: the CPD must have fucked something up BAAAAAAD (Mr. Suzanne wondered if they have a cop on tape using a racial slur or something) and the prosecutor knows that, if they went to a trial, it would all come out.
Pogonip
I wonder what the two brothers involved thought of all this.?
rikyrah
@lamh36:
He won’t be Mayor in 7 days.
And neither one of the women who would be Mayor would pursue this .
Mnemosyne
I’m afraid Cole is either misremembering the whole Paris Hilton imbroglio or the full story didn’t make it cross country.
Hilton landed herself in jail by treating the entire thing as a joke, not bothering to show up to court dates, and being rude to the judge’s face when she finally did bother to show up under threat of being arrested.
She got to cool her heels in jail for a few days just like any other defendant who decides to treat the process with contempt does. That’s why it’s called “contempt of court.”
Mnemosyne
Regarding Smollett, I still feel like something weird happened here, but I have no idea what. Extortion? A faked incident to frighten and then embarrass him? He initiated a plan to get sympathy but his accomplices had a plan of their own? And then CPD managed to fuck the whole thing up even worse.
karen marie
Thank you, John Cole. Yours is the most sensible take I’ve read on this yet. And you (no offense to your delightful, talented and insightful frontpagers and commenters) are why I am a solid fan of Balloon Juice.
janesays
@encephalopath: I think it’s possible these two things are true:
A) Smollett did stage a fake attack for publicity;
B) The racist CPD completely fucked up the investigation is some manner that made it impossible for the case to be prosecuted without a lot of their own bad conduct coming to light in the process.
janesays
@rikyrah: He’s still going to be the mayor for the next 8 weeks – Lightfoot or Preckwinkle won’t actually take office until May 20th. He will be a lame duck mayor this time next week, though.
jonas
Between the unauthorized leaks and press conferences where they stood around in their ridiculous bemedaled uniforms and basically declared Smollett guilty, the CPD stepped all over their own dicks on this. They forgot the Law and Order opening sequence rule: police investigate; district attorneys prosecute.
jonas
@janesays: I think this is pretty much exactly what happened.