Smollett, who is predicted to proceed to disclaim his position within the staged assault in January 2019, faces as much as three years in jail for every of the 5 felony counts of disorderly conduct – the cost filed for mendacity to police – of which he was convicted. He was acquitted on a sixth rely.
RELATED: Jussie Smollett verdict: ‘Empire’ actor responsible of disorderly conduct; protection vows attraction
However as a result of Smollett doesn’t have an in depth felony historical past and the conviction is for a low-level nonviolent crime, specialists don’t anticipate that he might be despatched to jail. The actor could possibly be ordered to serve as much as a yr in county jail or, if Cook dinner County Choose James Linn chooses, be positioned on probation and ordered to carry out some form of neighborhood service.
The sheer measurement and scope of the police investigation was a significant a part of the trial and is vital in a $130,000 pending lawsuit that town filed in opposition to Smollett to recuperate the price of police time beyond regulation, so the choose additionally may order the actor to pay a hefty positive and restitution.
Smollett’s lead lawyer has stated that he’ll ask the choose to dismiss the costs earlier than sentencing. However judges not often grant such motions. Which means this could possibly be the ultimate chapter in a felony case, topic to attraction, that made worldwide headlines when Smollett, who’s Black and homosexual, reported to police that two males sporting ski masks beat him, and hurled racial and homophobic slurs at him on a darkish Chicago avenue and ran off.
WATCH: Authorized skilled weighs in on Smollett sentencing
In December, Smollett was convicted in a trial that included the testimony of two brothers who advised jurors Smollett paid them to hold out the assault, gave them cash for the ski masks and twine, instructed them to vogue the rope right into a noose. Prosecutors stated he advised them what racist and homophobic slurs to shout, and to yell that Smollett was in “MAGA Nation,” a reference to the marketing campaign slogan of Donald Trump’s presidential marketing campaign.
Smollett, who knew the lads from his work on the tv present “Empire” that filmed in Chicago, testified that he didn’t acknowledge them and didn’t know they had been the lads attacking him.
Throughout the listening to, prosecutors and Smollett’s attorneys will get an opportunity to current witnesses and permit Smollett to make an announcement. He may repeat among the issues he advised jurors in the course of the trial about how he was merely a sufferer of a violent crime.
RELATED: Jussie Smollett trial’s solely Black juror discovered case ‘unhappy,’ nonetheless wonders about motive
Smollett may additionally inform the choose as he advised jurors about his intensive historical past of volunteering and donating to charitable causes. And he may say that the truth that the case left his profession in shambles is punishment sufficient for him keep away from custody.
In contrast to the trial, Linn has agreed to let photographers and a tv digicam inside courtroom for the listening to – that means the general public will for the primary time get to see and listen to Smollett communicate in courtroom.
Copyright © 2022 by The Related Press. All Rights Reserved.
