Latest / Crime Stories with Nancy Grace / SHOCK SPECIAL TREATMENT FOR WHINEY EMPIRE 'STAR': HATE-CRIME FAKER JUSSIE SMOLLETT RELEASED AFTER 6 DAYS IN LOCAL JAIL

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SHOCK SPECIAL TREATMENT FOR WHINEY EMPIRE 'STAR': HATE-CRIME FAKER JUSSIE SMOLLETT RELEASED AFTER 6 DAYS IN LOCAL JAIL · Crime Stories with Nancy Grace

0:05
Speaker 1: Crime stories with Nancy Grace. Hate crimes are a very
0:16
Speaker 1: very serious thing. One of the first crimes I ever
0:22
Speaker 1: worked on a case I argued all the way to
0:25
Speaker 1: the Georgia Supreme Court, were hate crimes on black gay
0:32
Speaker 1: males across the city of Atlanta. I'm not talking about
0:37
Speaker 1: Wayne Williams. This is a whole another set of crimes
0:41
Speaker 1: where young black males that were gay were sex assaulted, raped,
0:48
Speaker 1: and then shot in the back of the head. That
0:53
Speaker 1: was a very very difficult case to prove, no witnesses,
1:00
Speaker 1: the caliber of the weapon did not have any DNA.
1:06
Speaker 1: Long story short, it was hard, hard fought, and hard
1:09
Speaker 1: fought on appeal, and the conviction held. So when I
1:15
Speaker 1: hear about someone faking a hate crime and I think
1:21
Speaker 1: about all those young men dead out in fields, behind
1:27
Speaker 1: buildings and alleys with a bullet in their head, I
1:32
Speaker 1: don't like it. I want you to listen to this
1:37
Speaker 1: our cut a from the Today's show, not suicidal And
1:42
Speaker 1: if I could have said that, I was guilty a
1:45
Speaker 1: long time ago. Even after a Cook County judge sentenced
1:48
Speaker 1: Jesse Smilette to one hundred and fifty days in jail,
1:51
Speaker 1: the disgraced actor turned convicted felon Sticky to his story.
1:55
Speaker 1: If I did this, and it means that I stuck
1:57
Speaker 1: my fist in the fears of black and bears in
2:00
Speaker 1: this country for over four hundred years, the former empire
2:02
Speaker 1: stars unwavering claim of innocence, ultimately his undoing. You committed
2:07
Speaker 1: hour upon hour upon hour of pure perjury. Judge James
2:12
Speaker 1: Lynn sentencing Smolett to thirty months felony probation, including that
2:16
Speaker 1: jail time, ordering he paid more than one hundred twenty
2:19
Speaker 1: thousand dollars in restitution to the City of Chicago and
2:22
Speaker 1: pay the maximum fine twenty five thousand dollars. You've turned
2:26
Speaker 1: your life upside down by your misconduct and shenanigans. You've
2:31
Speaker 1: destroyed your life as you knew it as a defiant
2:34
Speaker 1: Smilette was taken into custody last night, his family blasting
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Speaker 1: the judge's decision. He's the reason why folks aren't going
2:40
Speaker 1: to report hate crimes. They're the reason why folks aren't
2:42
Speaker 1: going to report hate crimes. Okay, you heard Jesse Smilett
2:47
Speaker 1: going down, swinging, lying through his teeth till the end,
2:51
Speaker 1: and in the last hours a stunning twist. Jesse Smilett,
2:56
Speaker 1: the former star of the hit series Empire, has been
3:02
Speaker 1: released from jail. Yeah, and when you hear that reporter
3:09
Speaker 1: going on and on about thirty months felony probation, probation,
3:15
Speaker 1: that means you're not in jail. This guy, after all
3:18
Speaker 1: he put everyone through, after the disservice he did to
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Speaker 1: real crime victims, He's gonna do about five days behind bars.
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Speaker 1: He got since to one hundred and fifty days and
3:33
Speaker 1: now he's done about five days. Why because he refused
3:39
Speaker 1: to eat and drink ice water behind bars, so he
3:42
Speaker 1: walks free. Everybody in the Fulton County jail is going
3:45
Speaker 1: to go on an ice water diet and walk free.
3:47
Speaker 1: I guess. I mean it's he Grace. This is Crime Stories.
3:50
Speaker 1: Thank you for being with us here at Fox Nation.
3:52
Speaker 1: In Serious XM one eleven, yet another travesty in the
3:57
Speaker 1: Jesse Smollett case with me an all star panel. Human
4:00
Speaker 1: Geno former District Attorney Lawrence County, former Parole Board member,
4:05
Speaker 1: author Executioner's Toll Dotor. Sherry Schwartz, forensic psychologists specializing in
4:10
Speaker 1: capital crimes. Author of Criminal Behavior and Where Law and
4:15
Speaker 1: Psychology intersect. Paul Zite, former police commander who I can't
4:19
Speaker 1: wait to hear what he's gonna say. Author of Stop
4:22
Speaker 1: Him From Killing Them on Amazon Kendall, but first to
4:26
Speaker 1: Alexis Restaurant Crime Online dot Com investigative reporter Alexis. You know,
4:31
Speaker 1: the whole thing goes all the way back to his
4:35
Speaker 1: ridiculous claims of a hate crime perpetrated upon him because
4:40
Speaker 1: he I guess his main thing was that he was
4:43
Speaker 1: gay or because he was black. It was a mixture.
4:47
Speaker 1: When he went out for a three am subway run.
4:54
Speaker 1: How in the hay has Smlette gotten out after just
4:57
Speaker 1: a few days. So the judge spent almost an hour
5:01
Speaker 1: telling him all of the reasons why he was putting
5:04
Speaker 1: him behind bars. The reasons was he was found guilty
5:07
Speaker 1: of five falony accounts of disorderly conduct for lying to
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Speaker 1: police about to take crime. He says that he was
5:13
Speaker 1: attacked at two o'clock in the morning in Chicago, in
5:16
Speaker 1: the dead of winter, absolutely sub freezing weather. Two men,
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Speaker 1: he claimed, wearing red hats that said make America great Again,
5:24
Speaker 1: MAGA hats. He blamed this on Trump, said they attacked
5:27
Speaker 1: him and said this is Trump country and beat him
5:29
Speaker 1: up and tried to hang him by putting a new
5:31
Speaker 1: sober ahead. The jury said this was a big fat
5:35
Speaker 1: lie and found him guilty of lying. So the judge
5:39
Speaker 1: sentences him to jail. He appeals, well, he first asked
5:43
Speaker 1: the judge cannot have an appeal. The judge says, no,
5:44
Speaker 1: you're going right to jail. Goes to jail. His lawyers
5:48
Speaker 1: file a claim with the appellate court and say he
5:51
Speaker 1: has been sentenced to only five months in jail, only
5:55
Speaker 1: five months. We want to appeal this. We're going to
5:59
Speaker 1: drag this appeal a lot longer than five months. So
6:02
Speaker 1: if you keep our client in for the whole five
6:05
Speaker 1: months and then when it's done the appeal court overturned
6:08
Speaker 1: the conviction, he will have unnecessarily served this time. I
6:11
Speaker 1: don't care. Bobas jail Jesse Smollett hate crime faker walks
6:18
Speaker 1: out of jail after a release serving less than a
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Speaker 1: week of just one hundred and fifty days. Hey, does
6:26
Speaker 1: everybody remember when Paris Hilton went to jail and she
6:32
Speaker 1: was gonna do what she got, like a six month
6:34
Speaker 1: sentence something like that. She did three weeks, maybe because
6:39
Speaker 1: the jail was over crowded. Was that Nicole Ritchie one
6:43
Speaker 1: of them, and it was high drama. And the bottom
6:47
Speaker 1: line is when you have a sentence like one hundred
6:49
Speaker 1: and fifty days, you're gonna get out really quickly anyway.
6:54
Speaker 1: But to petition the court to get out early after
6:58
Speaker 1: what has gone down take a list of our cut
7:01
Speaker 1: twenty nine. Our friend Patrick Eldwood wign Almost three years
7:07
Speaker 1: after he reported being attacked amid homophobic and racial slurs,
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Speaker 1: Actor Jesse Smolett took the stand in his own defense today.
7:16
Speaker 1: While being questioned by his attorney, Smolett described the early
7:20
Speaker 1: morning incident, saying he had gone out to Walgreen's to
7:23
Speaker 1: buy eggs, but it was closed, so he opted for
7:26
Speaker 1: a subway sandwich store instead. On his way home, Smolette
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Speaker 1: says he crossed paths with two men wearing ski masks,
7:32
Speaker 1: with one of them yelling racial and homophobic slurs and
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Speaker 1: saying he was in Maga country while recognizing him as
7:39
Speaker 1: an actor on the TV show Empire. Smolett says he
7:43
Speaker 1: threw a punch in his defense but doesn't know if
7:47
Speaker 1: it landed. He fell to the ground and was kicked.
7:50
Speaker 1: He testified that after the attack, he didn't even know
7:53
Speaker 1: there was a noose around his neck because quote, I
7:56
Speaker 1: was getting my ass whooped unquote, but yet there were
8:01
Speaker 1: no injuries. He had a tiny little cut right there,
8:05
Speaker 1: and I don't know how many patriots he took of it.
8:07
Speaker 1: Now take a listen to our cut thirty three our
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Speaker 1: friend Charlie DeMar CBS and Chicago. The actor also told
8:14
Speaker 1: the jury that he would do drugs with Abel Osendaro
8:17
Speaker 1: and the two had a physical relationship. He said during
8:20
Speaker 1: a bathhouse encounter, there was some touching. Abel denies those claims.
8:24
Speaker 1: I'm ready to do what I gotta do. It's likely
8:27
Speaker 1: that the case will hinge on whether the jury believes
8:29
Speaker 1: Smolette or brothers Abel and Ola Osandaro, who testified Smilette
8:34
Speaker 1: paid them to fake the attack. Right, let me understand something,
8:37
Speaker 1: Alexa's terres shut The payment was tracked down. Wasn't it
8:43
Speaker 1: a check? The payment was tracked down. And he tried
8:47
Speaker 1: to tell the jury that these two guys that he
8:49
Speaker 1: did drugs with, that he went to a bathhouse with,
8:52
Speaker 1: that he allegedly had romantic attachment with sex with, they're
8:57
Speaker 1: the ones that attacked him, and they're attacked him, and
9:00
Speaker 1: they're the ones he couldn't identify. No, wonder the jury
9:02
Speaker 1: didn't believe him exactly. These are guys that he's been
9:05
Speaker 1: friends with for years, and in fact they were known
9:08
Speaker 1: to people on the set of Empire. They are personal trainers.
9:12
Speaker 1: But he wrote them a check, an absolute paper trill,
9:16
Speaker 1: undeniable paper trill, even though he says it was for
9:19
Speaker 1: something else made, maybe drugs or maybe anything else he
9:22
Speaker 1: can't really remember. Awesome, he doesn't care because these two
9:26
Speaker 1: he doesn't even know if they were the ones that
9:27
Speaker 1: attacked him, even though they were caught on video. I
9:31
Speaker 1: think we need a shrink, and we need one pretty
9:33
Speaker 1: quickly for those of you just joining us. And a
9:36
Speaker 1: bombshell turn of events, hate crime faker Empire star Jesse
9:42
Speaker 1: Smilette has walked out of jail after about five days
9:48
Speaker 1: on one hundred and fifty day conviction, straight out to
9:52
Speaker 1: doctor Sherry Schwartz. Forensic psychologists joining us, this guy needs
9:56
Speaker 1: a shrink. Well, that does seem to be the consensus,
10:01
Speaker 1: at least in the psychological community. Nancy. Anybody who fakes
10:06
Speaker 1: something like this an illness a crime, or they fake's injury.
10:11
Speaker 1: Um Typically what we start to look at is something
10:13
Speaker 1: called factitious disorder. If you think about Munchhausen's by proxy
10:19
Speaker 1: when it's when that's done to other people to get
10:21
Speaker 1: sympathy for yourself. This is kind of where you do
10:24
Speaker 1: it to yourself to get sympathy for yourself. But in
10:27
Speaker 1: this case he might also have um, you know, not
10:32
Speaker 1: so much a mental health disorder like that where he's
10:35
Speaker 1: almost sympathetic. But this might have been for personal gain
10:39
Speaker 1: in terms of promoting some movie projects that he was
10:42
Speaker 1: working on to get publicity. Oh he got publicity dot
10:46
Speaker 1: to Sherry Swartz. Didn't he like this to Reschuck? But
10:48
Speaker 1: who's ever going to hire him ever? That's the thing.
10:51
Speaker 1: This is his career is absolutely over. Empire was a
10:55
Speaker 1: huge che in his career. What about a lady justice
10:59
Speaker 1: and peel Bond my rear end, Why do you need
11:03
Speaker 1: a jury if you're gonna then give the defendant an
11:06
Speaker 1: appeal on what the jury just did? Why did you
11:11
Speaker 1: strike a jury? Okay, back back to you, Alexus terrest check.
11:15
Speaker 1: I know you're in Hollywood and that's your mindset, and
11:19
Speaker 1: my mindset is about how hard I thought to prove convictions,
11:25
Speaker 1: to prove cases put a jury through eighteen double l
11:30
Speaker 1: missing work, away from your children, away from your home.
11:33
Speaker 1: You know, nothing drives me crazier than have to be
11:36
Speaker 1: away from the twins and they're in court all day long.
11:40
Speaker 1: Listen to this guy, find about how bad he's got.
11:42
Speaker 1: How much was he getting paid an episode alexus two
11:45
Speaker 1: hundred thousand dollars an episode? An episode? As you hear that?
11:50
Speaker 1: Did you hear that? Finding harrying on and he's been
11:54
Speaker 1: behind bars? What's five times twenty four? Is that one
11:57
Speaker 1: hundred and twenty something? He hasn't even been behind bars
12:02
Speaker 1: two hundred hours and he's out. He has walked three
12:08
Speaker 1: the if Pellet court has three judges. It was not
12:11
Speaker 1: unanimous decision. It was two to one majority rules. And
12:14
Speaker 1: he walked out of court at eight pm Chicago time,
12:19
Speaker 1: in a whole Hollywood production. Again. You know, Jesse has
12:23
Speaker 1: five bodyguards, he has family members, he has defense attorneys,
12:26
Speaker 1: the biggest entourage you've ever seen outside of the TV
12:30
Speaker 1: show Entourage. It's like everything is a Hollywood production for him. Guys,
12:34
Speaker 1: thank us to our cut thirty two. Our friends from
12:36
Speaker 1: WT and Smaller testified he resisted calling Chicago police because quote,
12:42
Speaker 1: I am a black man in America. I do not
12:45
Speaker 1: trust the police unquote. But later he said responding officers
12:50
Speaker 1: treated him very well. He testified as a gay black man,
12:54
Speaker 1: he felt the incident would emasculate him and heard his
12:57
Speaker 1: chances for certain types of future acting roles. Earlier in
13:02
Speaker 1: the day, small Att testified he met the Ocean day
13:04
Speaker 1: Old Brothers through his job on Empire, and that he
13:07
Speaker 1: went to a Chicago bathhouse with one of them where
13:10
Speaker 1: they did drugs and made out. Prosecutors say he recruited
13:13
Speaker 1: the brothers to stage the attack as a way to
13:16
Speaker 1: pump up his career. Smalltt has admitted to paying the
13:20
Speaker 1: brothers thirty five hundred dollars, but says that was for
13:23
Speaker 1: weight training and diet consultation. Okay, time stories with Nancy Grace. Okay,
13:44
Speaker 1: Matthew Nancina attorney, former prosecutor or author, Go ahead, hit me. Well,
13:52
Speaker 1: there's no question that you're angry at Jesse small End.
13:57
Speaker 1: But I think we have to separate the judges that
14:01
Speaker 1: let him go. Yeah, and I understand that as well,
14:04
Speaker 1: But but you know you're mad at him, But we
14:06
Speaker 1: need to separate the people were mad at from the
14:09
Speaker 1: people that were afraid of And uh, why is a four?
14:14
Speaker 1: This is a class four felony? Uh? In most cases
14:18
Speaker 1: in Illinois this this would be flat probation, no jail time. Um,
14:23
Speaker 1: you know, because he's a Hollywood name, Uh, you know,
14:27
Speaker 1: should we treat him more harshly than we would typically
14:31
Speaker 1: other people who file false reports with the police. Okay, wait,
14:34
Speaker 1: who can you name me one person to file the
14:37
Speaker 1: false report with police in your jurisdiction that took it
14:42
Speaker 1: to a jury trial and claimed he was the victim
14:46
Speaker 1: of a racial and homophobic hate crime. Name one, I'm
14:51
Speaker 1: sure don't tell me. Yeah, there haven't who did something
14:57
Speaker 1: like this. Well, I don't know really of anybody who
15:00
Speaker 1: faked their own assault, their own hate crime. Wouldn't do
15:04
Speaker 1: that their own hate crime because they don't have anything
15:07
Speaker 1: to gain from it. The worst conjuring Matthew Mangino is
15:13
Speaker 1: the noose. The noose for a black male to have
15:19
Speaker 1: a news put around on his neck and then we
15:21
Speaker 1: find out, isn't this right? Alexis RuSHA And feel free
15:24
Speaker 1: to correct me if I'm wrong. I'd rather know the
15:26
Speaker 1: truth didn't come out that he took the noose off
15:30
Speaker 1: and then put it back on so the cops could
15:33
Speaker 1: get it and their body cam footage when they came back.
15:36
Speaker 1: He is screwing around with one of the violest and
15:39
Speaker 1: most hated symbols in our country. What happened to so
15:44
Speaker 1: many black males? Awful awful history? And he conjures that
15:51
Speaker 1: up like an evil magician and puts it on and
15:55
Speaker 1: takes it off for effect. Yes, hell, yes, he ought
16:00
Speaker 1: to be in jail. Didn't that what happened? Isn't that
16:03
Speaker 1: what happened, Alexa Strescha. It is. And in fact, he
16:08
Speaker 1: said that these random attackers put this news on him.
16:11
Speaker 1: The brothers were on video at a store buying the rope.
16:15
Speaker 1: They didn't do this of their own, This wasn't their ideas.
16:20
Speaker 1: They did this because he told them what to buy,
16:22
Speaker 1: because this would have made the crime more selection. And
16:25
Speaker 1: Matthew Mangino, I mean a renowned lawyer and author, former
16:30
Speaker 1: district attorney, now a private lawyer. Matthew Mangino, you're telling
16:35
Speaker 1: me that, hey, this happens all the time. They don't
16:37
Speaker 1: go to jail, bs, This does not happen all the time.
16:40
Speaker 1: To pray on the fears of people all across the country,
16:45
Speaker 1: to pray on hatred and injustice, and use it for
16:50
Speaker 1: a pr boost to get a raise in your salary.
16:54
Speaker 1: Oh no, no, he needs to be in jail. Mangino. Well, again,
16:59
Speaker 1: you know we're mad at him, we're angry at him.
17:01
Speaker 1: But again, is he is he? Is he a threat
17:04
Speaker 1: to the society? Is he? Is he a person who
17:08
Speaker 1: we should be afraid of, who's going to be turned
17:10
Speaker 1: loose on the streets? I mean, you know, if he
17:13
Speaker 1: wasn't a celebrity, we would have heard nothing about this case. Uh,
17:18
Speaker 1: you know, the fact that he's a celebrity, the fact
17:20
Speaker 1: that he doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. That's the whole
17:23
Speaker 1: If between he falls in the forest, does anybody hear it? Yeah,
17:27
Speaker 1: it can be heard, even if you're not there. It
17:30
Speaker 1: still makes a sound. Whether he's a celebrity or not.
17:34
Speaker 1: He did this thing right, And people in similar situations
17:38
Speaker 1: who are convicted of class four felonies in Illinois don't
17:43
Speaker 1: go to jail. But you haven't been able to name
17:46
Speaker 1: another similar situation. Have you another actor who's done something
17:51
Speaker 1: like this? No? I don't know if any more than
17:53
Speaker 1: anyone anyone that's done something like this prayed on prejudices
17:58
Speaker 1: and hate and a whole hateful history of targeting people
18:05
Speaker 1: and the worst conjuring of all the news. I mean
18:10
Speaker 1: it goes on and on and on. I want to
18:13
Speaker 1: go to Paul Zyke, former police commander, author of Stop
18:18
Speaker 1: Him From Killing Them on Amazon. Kendall Paul Zyke, what
18:23
Speaker 1: do you think? Well, I think you had two dozen
18:26
Speaker 1: detectives that engage in three thousand hours plus of investigation
18:34
Speaker 1: to bring an offender to justice that did not exist.
18:39
Speaker 1: And the fact that the officers were chasing essentially a
18:45
Speaker 1: ghost is something they're not equipped really, And you could
18:50
Speaker 1: go two careers without finding this exact situation where a
18:55
Speaker 1: top flight actor or any sort of high profile individual
18:59
Speaker 1: or victims so to speak, would make up an entire
19:03
Speaker 1: story and have props and have all these other things
19:06
Speaker 1: to make you believe that the that these terrible things
19:10
Speaker 1: had happened. Furthermore, it also opens the door for an
19:14
Speaker 1: arrest to be made of the wrong people or people
19:17
Speaker 1: that never were involved. You know, we're so worried about
19:20
Speaker 1: people being in prison. Who have you know, twenty thirty
19:23
Speaker 1: years ago didn't do what they were accused of doing.
19:28
Speaker 1: This exact setup, this exact paradigm, could have created a
19:33
Speaker 1: situation where if they believed him and not these other individuals,
19:38
Speaker 1: the people that he hired to commit these crimes. They
19:41
Speaker 1: could be in prison for the next twenty years. And
19:44
Speaker 1: who's who's looking at that, and not to mention the
19:48
Speaker 1: you know, the political motivation behind it all. That's just sickening.
19:52
Speaker 1: And it really for me and law enforcement as in
19:56
Speaker 1: me as a human being, it is the worst within
20:01
Speaker 1: mankind for something like this to happen to be completely false,
20:06
Speaker 1: and nobody's really prepared for that. But guess what it happens,
20:10
Speaker 1: and it just did you know Paul side as go ahead,
20:15
Speaker 1: I'll circle back to side. Go ahead, Yeah, okay, real quick,
20:18
Speaker 1: this is this is Matt Means, you know, and again
20:21
Speaker 1: you know, I understand that the time that was put
20:23
Speaker 1: into his case, but you had twenty five police officers
20:27
Speaker 1: investigating a false report to the police there were eight
20:31
Speaker 1: hundred homicides. Whoa wait a minute, wait a minute. You
20:34
Speaker 1: had all these cops investigating what they believed to be
20:39
Speaker 1: a hate crime, an attempt possible attempt to murder, even
20:44
Speaker 1: by putting a mist around his neck on a celebrity
20:48
Speaker 1: because he's black, because he's gay. That's what they were investigating.
20:53
Speaker 1: And then all roads led back to Jesse Smolette, right.
20:57
Speaker 1: They found the purple. All right, it was smlette. Let's
21:00
Speaker 1: put it in perspective homicides in Chicago, and you've got
21:04
Speaker 1: twenty five police officers investigating this. No, you are not
21:08
Speaker 1: turning this back around on the cops. They think that
21:12
Speaker 1: marveling out there. Wait wait, alexis Tersha. At some point
21:17
Speaker 1: did he say that the purps threw bleach on him? Oh,
21:20
Speaker 1: dear Lord in heaven. I mean, come on, psych help
21:24
Speaker 1: me out here. You hear me and Gino. If you
21:27
Speaker 1: believe that there are perps out there that are throwing
21:31
Speaker 1: bleach on a victim, on beating them, wrapping a noose
21:36
Speaker 1: around their net, taunting them, yeah, you're gonna look for
21:41
Speaker 1: the perps. And then the fact that the victims of
21:44
Speaker 1: celebrity making this crime high profile, giving your city a
21:48
Speaker 1: black eye. Yes, the cops are all over a potential
21:52
Speaker 1: hate crime. Because hate doesn't die. That perp will do
21:56
Speaker 1: it again and again and release his hate in another way.
22:01
Speaker 1: The purp had to be stopped. And you've got me
22:03
Speaker 1: in Gino trying to turn this around on a cop.
22:05
Speaker 1: So there's that question. But this is what I was
22:07
Speaker 1: going to ask you earlier. It makes me think, what's
22:12
Speaker 1: it all for why did I beat my brains out
22:18
Speaker 1: trying to put bad guys behind bars every day, working
22:23
Speaker 1: till three and four in the morning sometimes for this
22:29
Speaker 1: for the perp to be let out. How do you
22:32
Speaker 1: think those and Dari brothers feel. How do you think
22:35
Speaker 1: that gurars feel the cops who stand by and see
22:40
Speaker 1: all that work, all that effort for what? What about
22:46
Speaker 1: is Zake? Well, here's the thing we talked about those
22:49
Speaker 1: twenty four officers, and you can imagine the emotions they're
22:52
Speaker 1: going through it. They're pod. I bet they feel defeated.
22:55
Speaker 1: Defeated absolutely, they put all that in for nothing. Any
22:59
Speaker 1: good cop that's worth their weight, and there's a lot
23:02
Speaker 1: of them in this country, by the way, take that
23:04
Speaker 1: as a personal insult that somebody in their city could
23:09
Speaker 1: possibly be the victim of a hate crime and have
23:12
Speaker 1: all these heinous things done to them. Their position is
23:16
Speaker 1: going to be, I'm not going home, I'm not going
23:19
Speaker 1: to bed until I find the people that did this
23:22
Speaker 1: and bring them to justice, not on my watch. And
23:25
Speaker 1: to have all that be turned around and be an
23:27
Speaker 1: absolute farce and just sham of the criminal justice system,
23:33
Speaker 1: those officers, I guarantee you are defeated till they may
23:36
Speaker 1: even need counseling at the end of that. I mean,
23:39
Speaker 1: when you work that hard. I mean, Alexis terrest Chuck,
23:42
Speaker 1: you have been around me when I've been working on
23:44
Speaker 1: a case. I live it, I breathed it, I ate it,
23:47
Speaker 1: I drink it. That's what I think about until it's solved,
23:51
Speaker 1: and that can take days, weeks, months, sometimes longer. And
23:56
Speaker 1: when you finally crack a case, it finally as to
24:00
Speaker 1: trial and then this, I mean, I agree with zych
24:05
Speaker 1: It's just such a defeat for everyone that worked the case.
24:09
Speaker 1: And you know, the police officers, they in the very
24:12
Speaker 1: beginning believed him. They believe Smollett. They actually were stopping
24:19
Speaker 1: so many people because he had given a description as attackers,
24:22
Speaker 1: so they were questioning everybody in town. They were going
24:26
Speaker 1: to find the perpetrators. Little did they know they were
24:29
Speaker 1: his two friends that he was hanging out with all
24:31
Speaker 1: the time, that he paid to do this. But they
24:33
Speaker 1: were very serious about trying to find the suspect. Don't
24:37
Speaker 1: you know that prosecutor is beside himself. Take a listen
24:41
Speaker 1: to our cut V four. This jury worked so hard
24:46
Speaker 1: and for mister Smollett to get up in front of
24:48
Speaker 1: them and lie for hours and hours and hours. That
24:54
Speaker 1: really compounded his misconduct. And quite frankly, when I all
25:00
Speaker 1: that happened in the courtroom, at least for me as
25:03
Speaker 1: a trial lawyer that spent my life in the courtroom,
25:07
Speaker 1: we don't expect defendants to do that. Defendants have a
25:09
Speaker 1: right to go to trial. Defendants have a right to
25:12
Speaker 1: argue that their case has not been proven beyond a
25:14
Speaker 1: reasonable doubt. But defendants do not have the right to
25:17
Speaker 1: go in front of a jury and lie under oath.
25:20
Speaker 1: Mister Smallett would not have lost this case as he
25:23
Speaker 1: did today unless the jury found that he lied to them,
25:26
Speaker 1: And so that was something that I was very proud
25:30
Speaker 1: that this jury came to the conclusion that he's guilty,
25:33
Speaker 1: and the fact that he came up with a completely
25:37
Speaker 1: ridiculous story to explain his misconduct did not apparently have
25:40
Speaker 1: an impact on the jury's verdict. Boy, I'd love to
25:43
Speaker 1: hear what the jurards had to say today. Take a
25:45
Speaker 1: listen now to our ken me for a alpha. There's
25:49
Speaker 1: two things that I think stuck with the jury. Number one,
25:54
Speaker 1: I think my basic argument that it is ridiculous to
25:57
Speaker 1: think that Smalllett left his apartment on the night of
26:00
Speaker 1: January twenty ninth, at two o'clock in the morning to
26:03
Speaker 1: go buy eggs, and that that's his explanation for why
26:06
Speaker 1: he ended up right at that intersection, right at two
26:09
Speaker 1: o'clock in the morning that the brother said is where
26:12
Speaker 1: he told them the attack should take place. So the
26:14
Speaker 1: fact that it actually happened that way, I think was
26:17
Speaker 1: pretty profound. I also think that sometimes it's simple things.
26:22
Speaker 1: He actually rigged that rope after that rope got put
26:26
Speaker 1: on him. I showed the picture to the jury. Pictures
26:29
Speaker 1: don't lie. Those pictures showed that he actually, after he
26:34
Speaker 1: went through this fake attack, wanted to make it look better,
26:37
Speaker 1: and he jimmied with the rope to make the noose
26:39
Speaker 1: look closer to his throat and rustled around him because
26:42
Speaker 1: the rope you saw it in the courtroom was nice
26:44
Speaker 1: and kneat around his neck because old laws and Daryl
26:47
Speaker 1: didn't have time to do much with it, because a
26:49
Speaker 1: car came and so he ran away. He left the
26:53
Speaker 1: rope next to his face, small lead got up, put
26:55
Speaker 1: it around his neck, and then when it didn't look
26:58
Speaker 1: bad enough, he changed it, and I think that impacted
27:01
Speaker 1: the jury. Alex this terres check. Is it true that
27:04
Speaker 1: Smilette refused to eat? It sounds like a child refusing
27:09
Speaker 1: to eat, having a little tantrum. He wouldn't eat behind bars,
27:13
Speaker 1: and for Pete, say, it's the local jail. Anybody ever
27:16
Speaker 1: seen India Mayberry? For Pete's sake, when Otis would let
27:19
Speaker 1: himself in and out, it's not like he's in the pen.
27:23
Speaker 1: He's not an alcatraz, He's not a max security in
27:26
Speaker 1: the hole. For Pete's sake, he wouldn't eat. So he
27:29
Speaker 1: claimed that he had given up food for length, So
27:34
Speaker 1: he was fasting for the entire duration of length, the
27:37
Speaker 1: forty days of length. So he says that he gave
27:41
Speaker 1: up food six days before he actually was sent him
27:45
Speaker 1: to jail. So he I guess at this point is
27:47
Speaker 1: now not eaten for eleven days, that it was a
27:50
Speaker 1: religious thing, So he was gonna starve for forty days.
27:54
Speaker 1: He was not gonna eat for forty days, the forty
27:57
Speaker 1: days preceding Easter. Do I understand you? Yes, Okay, that's
28:01
Speaker 1: a lie. There's no way Jesse Smilett was not gonna
28:04
Speaker 1: eat for forty days. That's just that's just not true.
28:08
Speaker 1: But fine, another light by Jesse Smilett. And now he's
28:11
Speaker 1: dragging Easter into it. Did you hear that, man, Gino,
28:16
Speaker 1: he's dragging Eastern Well, the only person I know that
28:18
Speaker 1: fast is for forty days was Jesus. And just do
28:22
Speaker 1: not do not start on him. Don't do not. I
28:25
Speaker 1: don't even want to hear him dragged into this conversation
28:28
Speaker 1: for Pete's sake. But I do agree that you're right.
28:32
Speaker 1: That's the only person I've ever known to starve themselves
28:36
Speaker 1: for forty days and forty nights. And although he was
28:41
Speaker 1: greatly tempted, he didn't give in. Smolett, however, is still
28:45
Speaker 1: lying through his teeth. So alexis rustchuk he had nothing
28:51
Speaker 1: but water behind bars, correct the mean streets of the
28:55
Speaker 1: Cook County Local Jail, Right, it is, But the Cook
28:58
Speaker 1: County Jail is not a cush jail. He doesn't need
29:01
Speaker 1: notoriously bad jail. You know what do you think jail is?
29:05
Speaker 1: Alexis ter restaurant? Where are you joining me from Rodeo
29:08
Speaker 1: Drive this morning? No, I'm not on Rodeo Drive, but
29:11
Speaker 1: I am in Los Angeles. But jail and jail. But
29:16
Speaker 1: the Cook County jail is bad as well. It's not
29:18
Speaker 1: a nice one. Well, it's jail. What do you want
29:21
Speaker 1: it to be a spa? Well, I also think that
29:23
Speaker 1: he was getting fairly special treatment, but they said that
29:27
Speaker 1: they well, you're right about that. Didn't he get moved
29:31
Speaker 1: from one place to the next so he could be
29:34
Speaker 1: what did he go to the medical ward so he
29:36
Speaker 1: could have a different surrounding he was in? You know what?
29:40
Speaker 1: Take a less in our cuts. See this is Leah
29:42
Speaker 1: Hope ABC seven. Four days into the one hundred and
29:46
Speaker 1: fifty days sentence, Jesse Smollett remains in protective custody at
29:49
Speaker 1: the Cook County Jail, and his family remained steadfast in
29:53
Speaker 1: their support of the former TV star, who was convicted
29:56
Speaker 1: for lyne to police about a hate crime hoax. He's
30:00
Speaker 1: very strong. Um, it's it's a very angry situation. It's
30:03
Speaker 1: been a complete mental marathon for him and my family.
30:07
Speaker 1: But he's very strong, he's very focused. He Smalllett's youngest
30:09
Speaker 1: brother visited him yesterday at the jail, where Smollett is
30:13
Speaker 1: in a cell by himself and being monitored in the
30:16
Speaker 1: medical wing. Crime stories with Nancy Grace, let me go
30:36
Speaker 1: straight out to Matthew Mangino, a high profile lawyer joining me, Matthew,
30:42
Speaker 1: the medical wing is a cushy area. You're not in
30:47
Speaker 1: general population. There are very few inmates in there. Their
30:51
Speaker 1: nurses walking around, they're they're measuring your hydration and your
30:55
Speaker 1: pulse and all that. Why was he in the medical wing, Well,
31:00
Speaker 1: you're right, that's the medical wing is is like a
31:03
Speaker 1: hospital within a correctional facility. Uh, you know, maybe it's
31:08
Speaker 1: because he was starving himself. I don't know. You know
31:11
Speaker 1: that that's curious that he would be in the medical
31:14
Speaker 1: wing other than his absurd fasting. But again, should he
31:19
Speaker 1: even be in jail is the question. I believe that
31:23
Speaker 1: the jury decided that, and you're still talking about it.
31:26
Speaker 1: The jury decided he was guilty, the judge decided that
31:29
Speaker 1: he had to go to jail. And again, if you're
31:33
Speaker 1: going to look at similar Class four felonies in Illinois,
31:38
Speaker 1: they don't they don't involve jail. Again, again, Matthew Mangino,
31:43
Speaker 1: you keep talking about similar crimes, but yet you have
31:47
Speaker 1: been unable to name one crime that you can specify
31:53
Speaker 1: that is similar to this crime. The breath of his
32:00
Speaker 1: hoax on Lady Justice is beyond compare and still lying
32:08
Speaker 1: through his tea as he SIPs ice water. Take a
32:11
Speaker 1: listen to our cut e from Fox Jesse's Millette going free,
32:16
Speaker 1: at least for now while he tries to get his
32:18
Speaker 1: sentence overturned. The appeals court ordered Jesse's release during the
32:22
Speaker 1: appeals process. He will first have to post a bond
32:25
Speaker 1: of one hundred and fifty thousand dollars before he's led
32:28
Speaker 1: out of Coke County Jail, although it's unclear when exactly
32:31
Speaker 1: he'll be able to walk free. Jesse started serving his
32:34
Speaker 1: five months last Thursday, and immediately after the judge sentence him,
32:39
Speaker 1: he started shouting that he was innocent and raising his
32:42
Speaker 1: fists in the air as he was taken out of
32:44
Speaker 1: the court in handcuffs. You can see those tense moments
32:48
Speaker 1: inside of the courtroom in this video. His defense team
32:52
Speaker 1: and his family members never stopped asking for his release,
32:55
Speaker 1: claiming that Jesse was in physical harm while behind bars.
32:59
Speaker 1: They cited racist and homophobic threats that they had received,
33:03
Speaker 1: and also said Jesse was highly susceptible to contracting COVID
33:07
Speaker 1: nineteen while in jail. So that's the latest when it
33:11
Speaker 1: comes to the Jesse Smolett saga. Here, really racist and
33:16
Speaker 1: homophobic threats again that second verse, same as the first,
33:23
Speaker 1: alexis to Rustchuck. That's what he claimed the first time.
33:26
Speaker 1: For all I know, it's Smolette from the Cook County
33:29
Speaker 1: payphone calling his family. I mean, they're they're they're tuning
33:33
Speaker 1: up with that again. I mean, if these threats were real,
33:38
Speaker 1: it would be different. But they've already been proved to
33:40
Speaker 1: be a line, which doesn't injustice to every hate crime
33:43
Speaker 1: victim out there that has been targeted because they're black,
33:47
Speaker 1: because they're gay, because they're Asian, because they're a woman,
33:50
Speaker 1: because they're Bill on the blink, Hey hey, because of
33:53
Speaker 1: who you are, and they're they're praying on that again.
34:00
Speaker 1: Printers that are that are incarcerated complain all the time
34:04
Speaker 1: about how they have so little access to the outside world.
34:07
Speaker 1: It's very extensive to make a phone call. The calls
34:09
Speaker 1: are collect number one, but go ahead. And so the
34:15
Speaker 1: fact that they're they're saying after five days that social
34:18
Speaker 1: media Twitter, Instagram is affecting how Jesse is, mister Smalllett
34:23
Speaker 1: is being treated behind bars doesn't compute. It just doesn't
34:27
Speaker 1: make sense at Tating people who are saying things about
34:29
Speaker 1: him on social media would then somehow affect people behind bars,
34:33
Speaker 1: as if that information has infiltrated you know, some sort
34:37
Speaker 1: of Gary group behind bars. It's gonna then targett. It
34:42
Speaker 1: defies logic, you know. Matthew me Gino, high profile lawyers
34:46
Speaker 1: joining us, A former district attorney and Lawrence County now author. Matthew,
34:51
Speaker 1: how many times as one of your clients gotten an
34:56
Speaker 1: appeal bond, which means after can acted at trial, typically
35:01
Speaker 1: by a jury, the judges, Oh, you know what, Never
35:04
Speaker 1: mind about that conviction thing. You're going to walk free
35:07
Speaker 1: to tell an appeals court, for instance, the Illinois Supreme
35:12
Speaker 1: Court rules on your case, and then after they rule,
35:16
Speaker 1: maybe you can appeal it on up to the Circuit
35:19
Speaker 1: Court of Appeals. And after that, hey, maybe you can
35:22
Speaker 1: take it all the way to the US Supreme Court.
35:24
Speaker 1: You just don't know how far this appeal is going
35:26
Speaker 1: to go. But the whole time you can stay out
35:28
Speaker 1: behind bars. I mean, why even have a jury trial? Well,
35:32
Speaker 1: to answer your question, you know, it's not entirely unusual
35:37
Speaker 1: to get an appeal bond, I any of you had, Well,
35:40
Speaker 1: I'm just just let me finish. It's not entirely unusual
35:45
Speaker 1: to get one from a trial judge who is the case,
35:48
Speaker 1: who thinks that maybe you have an appeal that has
35:51
Speaker 1: some merit to it based on him having observed the trial,
35:56
Speaker 1: so you know he made granted. It is unusual to
35:59
Speaker 1: within five days, at least in my experience, to have
36:02
Speaker 1: an appellate court intervene and say this person should have
36:07
Speaker 1: an appeal bond over the denial of the trial judge.
36:11
Speaker 1: That's unusual. I can't say that I've ever seen that.
36:15
Speaker 1: Can I ask you a question? Yea, how many times
36:18
Speaker 1: as a prosecutor did you get a conviction on a
36:22
Speaker 1: case and then that person get out on an appeal bond? Us?
36:27
Speaker 1: It's rare because I never had a happen to me
36:30
Speaker 1: as the prosecutor. Not once. Then one person that I
36:34
Speaker 1: took a trial and there was a conviction get out
36:36
Speaker 1: while they appealed the conviction. That never happened, and that
36:40
Speaker 1: was ten solid years of intercity Atlanta high crime. I mean,
36:44
Speaker 1: I don't disagree with you so never, I think never,
36:47
Speaker 1: and you're here, But if you have, if you have
36:49
Speaker 1: a you're not answering. I'm sorry, Matthew Menie know you're
36:52
Speaker 1: not answering. How often did that ever happen to you?
36:55
Speaker 1: Did it ever happen? I would say times, maybe in
36:58
Speaker 1: eight years or a judge, A judge granted and a
37:03
Speaker 1: tilbond when in fact that one of yours. I didn't
37:06
Speaker 1: hear the number. I say a couple. As a district attorney,
37:10
Speaker 1: every case was mine, So I say a couple of
37:13
Speaker 1: times would happen? All right, I've never had it happened.
37:17
Speaker 1: Who's jumping in? Is that Paul's eye? Yeah? The ant
37:20
Speaker 1: I just like to make a quick comment, and that is,
37:22
Speaker 1: you know, when you look at this from the flip side,
37:23
Speaker 1: let's just say he would have been successful. Let's say
37:26
Speaker 1: that that the his plot would not have been discovered.
37:31
Speaker 1: He essentially would be setting up one or two or
37:35
Speaker 1: more people to spend you know, a decade or two
37:38
Speaker 1: behind bars just to promote his career. And and that
37:44
Speaker 1: angle is not really being thought of in this Yeah,
37:47
Speaker 1: he lied, Yes he wasted a lot of time, Yes
37:50
Speaker 1: he had a lot of resources diverted diverted to him.
37:53
Speaker 1: But if his end game would have happened, the perversion
37:57
Speaker 1: of justice would have been un imaginable. You know, you're right,
38:02
Speaker 1: those Cindario brothers could have gone down for years on
38:05
Speaker 1: end for a hate crime for threatening bleach on some
38:09
Speaker 1: a lot for a beating him up, for attacking him
38:13
Speaker 1: and then not putting a noose around his neck. Doctor
38:15
Speaker 1: Sherry Schwartz, what exactly is a pathological liar? Well, this
38:21
Speaker 1: is somebody who, if I mean to put it, really simply,
38:25
Speaker 1: if their lips are moving there they're lying. That's how
38:29
Speaker 1: you can think about them, because the lies literally just
38:33
Speaker 1: come out of their mouths with great deal of ease.
38:36
Speaker 1: Research on pathological liars shows that, you know, if they're
38:39
Speaker 1: hooked up to an EKG right to check their pulse
38:44
Speaker 1: and things like that, that they lie and they really
38:48
Speaker 1: don't experience that same kind of physical reaction that somebody
38:52
Speaker 1: who's telling a lie that doesn't normally lie would like,
38:54
Speaker 1: anxiety and things like that, heightened arousal. They just lie
39:00
Speaker 1: for the sake of lying. Lie for the sake of
39:04
Speaker 1: lying too. Alexis terresta Crime Online dot Com investigative reporter,
39:11
Speaker 1: Smallest Lawyers, filed what we call an emergency motion, claiming
39:17
Speaker 1: that if he stayed in jail, he would have a
39:21
Speaker 1: physical threat even though he was being held in protective custody.
39:28
Speaker 1: What are the grounds on which his defense lawyers argued
39:33
Speaker 1: he should be out on appeal bond. Well, that is
39:36
Speaker 1: what they say. They say that he is in danger
39:39
Speaker 1: of being threatened by people. But they also said, this
39:43
Speaker 1: appeal could take months and months and much much longer
39:47
Speaker 1: than one hundred and fifty days that our client has
39:49
Speaker 1: been sentenced to jail. So if in the very end,
39:52
Speaker 1: you know, one year from now, his appeal is granted
39:56
Speaker 1: and his conviction is a returned, he will have already
39:59
Speaker 1: served that time and you can't take that back. You can't.
40:03
Speaker 1: There's no way to fix that. You serve time that
40:07
Speaker 1: you weren't supposed to ultimately serve. So that is what
40:10
Speaker 1: they argued. That the appeal would take longer than the
40:13
Speaker 1: sentence would, so he should be out on bond during
40:18
Speaker 1: that time. And in fact they imposed one on him
40:20
Speaker 1: one hundred and fifty thousand dollars, and they said, but
40:24
Speaker 1: he didn't have to pay that up front, but if
40:26
Speaker 1: he misses any more court cases, he's have to pay that.
40:30
Speaker 1: So many allowances made for them. Jesse Smolette somehow has
40:37
Speaker 1: pulled yet another hoax on an appeals court. Jesse Smolette,
40:43
Speaker 1: Empire Star hate crime faker has walked free. He has
40:52
Speaker 1: been released from jail while his lawyers appeal his conviction.
40:59
Speaker 1: Big Black for Lady Justice and crime victims all across
41:04
Speaker 1: our country. Nancy Grace proms story, signing off Goodbye