The Jussie Smollett Incident

Summary

Hoax! Podcast — “The Jussie Smollett Incident”

Hosts: Dana Schwartz & Lizzie Logan
Date: June 22, 2026
Episode Theme: A deep-dive into the Jussie Smollett hate crime hoax, examining why people believe hoaxes, the context around the case, and its cultural impact.

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Overview

This episode wraps up Season 1 of "Hoax!" with an in-depth, candid, and nuanced examination of the Jussie Smollett case—the media firestorm, public and personal motivations, the messiness of truth, and the aftershocks for issues of race, homophobia, police trust, and public gullibility. The hosts aim to fact-check, explore controversies fairly, and reflect on the social forces that made this hoax so resonant.

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1. Season Reflection & Introductions

Timestamps: 02:58–07:28

• Season Recap & Approach: Dana and Lizzie share gratitude for their audience’s engagement and suggestions, and note the podcast’s focus: “the lies we wish were true and truths that sound like lies.”
• Intent for Episode: Lizzie calls this their most challenging topic yet, meant to reflect their “hoax groove” and critical approach, with extra care due to the case’s complexity.
• Notable Quote: “If tomorrow it's proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that it happened exactly how he said that it happened, then I'm a jerk. Like, I own that. Then…I—then, you know what, cancel me, Lizzie. Like, that's just on me.”
  — Lizzie Logan (10:41)

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2. Trigger Warnings & Disclaimers

Timestamps: 08:09–13:18

• The hosts emphasize sensitivity: topics include racism, homophobia, hate crimes, and media frenzy, and they promise to balance Smollett’s own claims of innocence.
• They invite listeners to skip the episode if it feels out-of-bounds, noting, “His perspective will be taken into account…We’re going to give him his say.” (10:38)

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3. Who Is Jussie Smollett?

Timestamps: 13:18–20:22

• Personal Background: Son of a Black/Irish mother and white Jewish father; one of six siblings; grew up in the Bay Area and LA; childhood actor (with anecdotes about his early, “truly deranged” made-for-TV movie).
• Career Overview: Came to fame as Jamal on Fox’s “Empire” (2015). Show is a “big deal” as an unapologetically Black drama series at a rare time for Black representation on network TV.
• Identity: Openly gay; embraced by Black and LGBTQ+ communities; seen as a face of modern civil rights in entertainment.
• Memorable Moment: Lizzie tells a tangent about meeting his sister Jurnee: "She's maybe the best looking human I've ever met...she glowed. Like, little piece of heaven." (18:37)

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4. The Context: "Empire", Activism & Cultural Atmosphere

Timestamps: 20:22–33:07

• Cultural Moment: Post-Obama, “peak woke” optimism: “We really thought television was gonna save the world...The future is female. Just so you remember, everyone was a man bun.” (27:40)
• Rising Pressure: Smollett’s massive rise—record deals, activism, performing at the White House—mixes fame with the expectation to be both artistic and a symbol for progress.

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5. Setting: Chicago, Crime, and Police Reputation

Timestamps: 33:07–41:12

• Chicago PD’s Reputation: Noted for both excessive force and inability to control violence; “bad on both sides.”
• 2014–2019 Backdrop: Laquan McDonald shooting and coverup, DOJ investigation, major protests, and police leadership shakeups.
• Insight: “The cops just, like, even more than usual, look so bad during the years leading up to this incident. It’s a real moment, especially for Chicago PD.” (39:08)

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6. The “Attack”: What Smollett Reported

Timestamps: 41:12–52:39, Key Details at 43:35–45:36

• Event: On January 29, 2019, Smollett reported being attacked at 2am in Chicago by two masked men who called him racist and homophobic slurs, poured a chemical (believed bleach) on him, and put a noose around his neck, shouting “This is MAGA country!”
• Host Skepticism: The hosts analyze the improbability of white, MAGA-hat-wearing hate criminals lying in wait in a wealthy, touristy part of Chicago during a polar vortex, recognizing him in the dark.
  • Notable Exchange:
    Dana: “I just don’t think white non-fans of Empire would have recognized Jussie Smollett…”
    Lizzie: “…Seems like quite the coincidence.” (47:21)

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7. Immediate Aftermath & Public Reaction

Timestamps: 58:46–62:45

• Universal Sympathy: Public, media, politicians (even Trump) overwhelmingly support Smollett after his report.
• Jussie’s Public Response: He performs to a sold-out crowd soon after, declaring, “I’m the gay Tupac.” (62:08)
• Quote: Dana: “Sometimes celebrities say dumb things. People who are a lot, a lot. I think…Sometimes celebrities say dumb things.” (63:34)
• Early Doubts: Jokes, e.g., from Dave Chappelle, about how the story was “cartoonish” and doubts were present in some communities all along.

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8. Why People Believed: Cultural Dynamics

Timestamps: 65:31–70:18

• The event was “the Ruth Konda forever of hoaxes”—uncomplicated, providing a clear good-and-evil narrative, and letting liberals “feel really good about how they voted.”
• “If only racism and homophobia were this clear cut and obvious. Like it’s a horrible thing to believe happened, but it’s almost a fantasy that makes rich liberals feel really good about how they voted.” (65:40)

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9. The Investigation Unravels

Timestamps: 71:38–77:08

• First Red Flag: Smollett hesitates, then redacts, then gives selective phone records to police.
• Critical Break: Security and ride-share footage implicates two Nigerian-American brothers, Ola and Bola Osundairo, both Empire extras and Jussie’s acquaintances. After returning from Nigeria, they are detained and confess to police.
• Their Story: Smollett allegedly recruited and paid ($3,500 check) them to stage the attack as a publicity stunt.
• Notable Detail: “Who pays for crimes by check? Rich person 101: get cash.” (91:12)

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10. Legal & Media Fallout

Timestamps: 83:52–98:35

• Massive public, media, and police backlash; Smollett is indicted for filing a false police report.
• Charges suddenly dropped after he forfeits $10,000 and does community service (Kim Foxx, State’s Attorney: “not that strange …to drop a class 4 felony…” 94:48)
• Outcry for real consequences leads to special prosecution, new charges, and a jury trial—Smollett convicted on five of six counts in 2022.
• Sentence: probation, 150 days in jail—mostly overturned later by Illinois Supreme Court on double jeopardy grounds (102:19).
• Ongoing lawsuits wrap up in May 2025 with a $50,000 charity donation.

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11. Competing Narratives & Theories

Timestamps: 104:28–120:20

• Pro-Jussie: Grainy footage with “lighter” skin figures, missing security tapes, alternate witness statements, and the Chicago PD’s poor reputation offer a thin—but not impossible—margin for reasonable doubt.
• Anti-Jussie (Consensus): All credible evidence points to a staged event: confessions, money trail, phone logs, and a story tailored for maximum impact and sympathy.
• Lizzie’s 10 Theories: Creative range spans from total innocence to full cynicism—including, most plausibly, an attempt to dramatize the real pain of micro-aggressions for social good gone awry.
  • Notable Synthesis:
    “After years of…racism and homophobia that is too subtle to fight…Jussie found himself…benefiting from privilege, yet full of rage…Stressed and exhausted…he came up with a plan that…would give him a platform…never meant to get the cops involved…All he could do was stick to his story, even as it made him look, for lack of a better word, bug nuts, bananas.” —Lizzie (119:40)

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12. What Did It All Mean?

Timestamps: 120:36–130:12

• Scale of Harm: Despite the media circus, “no one except him got hurt.” (120:50)
• Public Panic: Fears that real hate crime victims would be doubted have not, apparently, materialized on a broad scale; the case instead became a “bizarre one-off,” “strange celebrity thing.”
• Skepticism: The main legacy—a right-wing talking point on “wokeness,” victimhood, social capital, and “DEI points,” though Dana emphasizes the blame doesn’t lie solely with Smollett but with broader internet and political culture. (124:49)
• Hot Take: “With hindsight, this is not that big of a deal.” (120:40)

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13. End-of-Season Reflections

Timestamps: 130:12–131:30

• Takeaway: The hosts emphasize the importance of sticking to facts, self-awareness about their own biases, and a willingness to be corrected.
• Goodbye: “Please hoax responsibly.”

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14. Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “This is the Ruth Konda forever of hoaxes.” —Lizzie (65:31)
• “Sometimes celebrities say dumb things.” —Dana (63:34)
• “My white guilt should only be used for good.” —Lizzie, quoting 30 Rock (88:10)
• “Who pays for crimes by check? Rich person 101: get cash.” (91:12)
• “After years of…racism and homophobia that is too subtle to fight…he came up with a plan…never meant to get the cops involved…All he could do was stick to his story, even as it made him look, for lack of a better word, bug nuts, bananas.” —Lizzie (119:40)
• “With hindsight, this is not that big of a deal.” —Lizzie (120:40)
• “Please hoax responsibly.” —Both hosts (131:26)

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Key Timestamps

• [09:02] — Comparison to “Balloon Boy” and media hoaxes
• [13:18] — Introduction to Jussie Smollett’s background
• [23:12] — Historical context of Black TV in the 2010s
• [33:07] — Overview of Chicago’s crime and police
• [43:35] — Night of the alleged attack
• [58:46] — Hospital and public/media support
• [63:34] — On celebrity self-image and “the gay Tupac”
• [71:38] — Smollett's reluctance to hand over phone
• [76:24] — Osundario brothers emerge as suspects
• [86:10] — 50 Cent weighs in: "He has spoken."
• [102:19] — Illinois Supreme Court overrules conviction
• [119:40] — The “making visible the invisible wounds” theory
• [120:40] — The “not a big deal” legacy take

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Tone & Style

Throughout, the hosts are frank, self-aware, occasionally irreverent but careful to acknowledge the pain behind fake and real hate crimes. Their rhetorical style mixes research, lived experience, pop culture references, and running asides, creating a thorough but accessible, layered dissection of the Smollett incident’s many meanings and mysteries.

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Summary by section for non-listeners: You’ll leave this episode with a better understanding not just of the Smollett case, but of how hoaxes are believed, why they matter, and why the search for truth is rarely simple—or satisfying.

Transcript

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[Dana Schwartz]

a production of I Heart Podcasts.

[Advertiser/Promoter]

Folks.

[Lizzie Logan]

It's a hoax. I swear I never was to see this, I'm left wondering.

[Dana Schwartz]

Welcome to Hoax, a podcast about the lies we wish were true and truths

[Lizzie Logan]

that sound like lies.

[Dana Schwartz]

I'm the ghost of Dana Schwartz.

[Lizzie Logan]

And I'm the evil twin of Lizzie Logan.

[Dana Schwartz]

Welcome to the show, Dana.

[Lizzie Logan]

It's our last hoax of season one.

[Dana Schwartz]

It's our last hoax. I'm very excited you've been teasing. A very long episode via text.

[Lizzie Logan]

A long episode. A juicy. And that is an Easter egg episode. And I also just wanted to give us time to like, talk about what the season has meant to us. Talk about what we've learned, say thank you to the fans and we're gonna keep in every tangent and every digression in the whole episode.

[Dana Schwartz]

I love it. Yes.

[Lizzie Logan]

Buckle up, buckle up. A long episode. How do you feel about season one of Hoax?

[Dana Schwartz]

I have had a blast researching hoaxes. I think what I've been most dazzled by is the joy of like 19th and 18th century court cases. Because over ridiculous things, I'll tell you, these hoaxes that seem like, so silly. And then I'm like, and it was a court case that lasted months.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yes, yes, yes.

[Dana Schwartz]

So that was very fun for me to dive into these hoaxes. And I also think the main thing I learned is that even at the time, people didn't always believe them. Totally. And I'm like, there are people today who fully believe very dumb things.

[Lizzie Logan]

Oh, yeah. People have not gotten significantly more or less like, trickable.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah, I passed a Scientology poster on the way here.

[Lizzie Logan]

Oh boy.

[Ryan Reynolds]

I'm just.

[Dana Schwartz]

I'm getting political.

[Lizzie Logan]

No, I was about to say just oh boy, Scientology.

[Dana Schwartz]

But I just mean I think that's part of the fun of researching hoaxes is realizing that like the press coverage they got back then was also because it's fun to cover hoaxes the same way today. People love covering scammers.

[Lizzie Logan]

Oh, absolutely.

[Dana Schwartz]

And that doesn't mean just cause we all wrote about Anna Delvey or read about Anna Delvey doesn't mean everyone would have fallen for it.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yes. And I've been impressed by the creativity that goes into some of these hoaxes. Like, people really put a lot of effort into them.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

Um, I've also been really excited by and thankful for the reception that this podcast has gotten. I mean, you obviously, like, had a lot of built in goodwill and fans from nobleblood. I am much newer to the podcast game, so I just want to say thank you, everyone who has sort of stuck by through me. I've had, like, you know, just maybe some growing pains of me learning how to be a podcaster.

[Dana Schwartz]

You are a natural.

[Lizzie Logan]

Thank you. I think. I think I started, like, pretty strong, but just I was not as practiced as you were.

[Dana Schwartz]

That's. This is a totally new animal. And I also want to say for people who listen to Noble Blood, thank you for trying something completely different.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah, absolutely. And people have so kindly written in with so many suggestions for hoaxes. We do, like, have. We have noted them. We haven't really gotten to any. We have a running list, but we have made a list of them, and people have very kindly written in with, like, small corrections and, you know, just suggestions of ways that we can be more accurate with our word choices.

[Dana Schwartz]

I'm really grateful when fans have sent photos, they've, like, visited sites that we can't get to. Someone sent a photo, she visited Anna Anderson's grave. I should have sent you. I should have showed you these photos.

[Lizzie Logan]

No, it's okay.

[Dana Schwartz]

And I will. I just am very, very grateful for the way people are engaging with these stories. So thank you. Thank you. Yes, we will find a future for this podcast. So stick with us, follow on Instagram, and we will tell you exactly where that future is.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yes. And don't unsubscribe from this feed, please.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah, nothing's gonna happen. Don't worry if the next episode that comes up will be a hoax episode. So just. Just chill out.

[Lizzie Logan]

All right, Today's topic is Jussie Smollett.

[Ryan Reynolds]

Woo.

[Lizzie Logan]

Okay.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, I cannot wait. Because this is a story, truly, that I did not really engage with.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

I just kind of was like, I'm out. Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

Similarly, I followed it for a little bit, and then when it was revealed that there were major inconsistencies, I had the reaction that I think a lot of people had, which is like, this is not white people's business.

[Dana Schwartz]

This is not my business. Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

But, you know, I am a pop culture writer and we have a podcast about hoaxes. This is my business.

[Dana Schwartz]

This is a major hoax.

[Lizzie Logan]

This is a major hoax. So trigger warning. Racism, homophobia, police brutality. Descriptions of attacks by strangers.

[Dana Schwartz]

Those are good and important. Trigger warnings also.

[Lizzie Logan]

Disclaimer. There's gonna be more disclaimers.

[Dana Schwartz]

Great.

[Lizzie Logan]

Like, we're gonna be doing a lot of table setting throughout the episode.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

We're gonna go through it pretty slowly. If you're someone who wants us to get to the point. We're not gonna get to the point right away. We're gonna go through it quite slowly.

[Dana Schwartz]

There's a lot of table setting to be done to do this correctly.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. I wanted this to be the. The last episode that I brought to the podcast because I wanted to be the best podcaster I could be by the time we got to it.

[Dana Schwartz]

Wow. Lizzy.

[Lizzie Logan]

Because it's a complicated story.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

And I wanted us to be, like, in our hoax groove.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

And I also thought that it was an interesting sort of bookend to the first topic that I brought to this podcast, which was balloon boy.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yes.

[Lizzie Logan]

So both were modern media hoaxes where all of the participants are still alive. They are both about people who had already been on tv. The balloon boy family, you might remember, was on wife swap reality tv and then were essentially, like, potentially using these hoaxes just to get on TV more. They had a lot of media coverage and then got called liars who did it for publicity. In both cases, the people who are involved still claim innocence.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay.

[Lizzie Logan]

And in both instances, there was, like minimal jail time served and the charges were essentially dropped. And it was basically trial by media.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. It does seem like sometimes for these hoaxes, except when the 17th century, the 18th century, most of the time people are like, well, what are we going to put them on trial for?

[Lizzie Logan]

Right. Obviously this is much more serious.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

But the general shape of it is actually quite similar. So speaking of seriousness, Jesse to this day maintains his innocence.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay.

[Lizzie Logan]

And so if you're listening to this and you believe him, you might be thinking, like, where do these two straight white girls get off going on their mostly sort of light hearted podcast and calling this gay black guy a liar about a hate crime? So, like, you know, fair's fair. Skip this episode.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

His perspective will be taken into account in this episode. We're going to give him his say. I'll also say, listen, a lot of very smart people think he's lying. And we're not saying that we don't believe hate crimes happen. We're saying this story is questionable. But if tomorrow it's proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that it happened exactly how he said that it happened, then I'm a jerk. Like, I Own that. Then I. Then. Then you know what? Cancel me, Lizzie. Like, that's just on me.

[Dana Schwartz]

I will also point out that because hate crimes are real and legitimate, when people don't tell the truth about them, it muddies the water and makes things much harder and messier for people who really do experience that violence. So also just keep that in mind.

[Lizzie Logan]

That's gonna be a big thing.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah, that's something that makes me very frustrated. People who, especially online, now that this is a rel, I actually don't know much or anything about this case, but it does make me very frustrated online when I see people sort of like, spinning a narrative of victimhood that isn't accurate and smells fishy because then it. It just muddies the water and makes it harder for people with legitimate grievances to find voice.

[Lizzie Logan]

But my last two points of, like, why I think this is sort of a legit topic for our podcast are my big ones. Number one, Jussie's okay.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

So he got sober a few years ago. He's engaged, he's making music. He was recently on a reality show. His whole family supports him. Like, we're not kicking a man who is down. Great. We're not, like, making content about an incident that, like, ruined his life.

[Dana Schwartz]

Like, he's good, sober, engaged, surrounded by loving family.

[Lizzie Logan]

He has a life. So this is. This is a man who's like, out there. And I don't know if he's thriving, but he's certainly doing fine. Great. And as part of that, he's talking about this. He participated in a documentary about it. He's given at least two podcast interviews about it. And he knows that if he talks about it, the media is going to talk about it. Like, he brought it up, you know, he's giving the media permission to talk about it. He knows how the game is played. So, like, this is not an incident that he's too traumatized to talk about. And he knows that if he talks about it, he's giving the media permission to talk about it. And he knows that the narrative is that it was a hoax. So we're covering all sides of it.

[Dana Schwartz]

So, like, I'm actually very excited to dive in.

[Lizzie Logan]

All right, so who is Jussie Smollett?

[Dana Schwartz]

An actor?

[Lizzie Logan]

Yes. He is one of six siblings born to a black and Irish mother and a white Jewish father in the Bay Area.

[Dana Schwartz]

White Jewish father, already, Common ground and the Bay Area.

[Lizzie Logan]

So he's technically like a quarter black.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay.

[Lizzie Logan]

So I would say that he is light skinned black, kind of the Way he looks is like if he told you he was something else, you might believe him.

[Dana Schwartz]

Do you have a picture?

[Lizzie Logan]

He looks black.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yes, I know. I know this actor and I know his sister, I think was on Lovecraft Country. Yes. And I did watch that show and love that book. Okay.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah, yeah, he's a good looking guy.

[Dana Schwartz]

I don't know whether I know him from, like the media related to this or to be honest, if I have seen anything he's been in.

[Lizzie Logan]

He was mostly just on Empire.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah, I didn't watch Empire.

[Lizzie Logan]

The reason that I'm describing his skin color so specifically and I'm going to describe other people's skin color throughout the episode is that I believe that it speaks to, like, potential motivations and is relevant and him being perceived as black is very important to him and like, claimed by the black community. The siblings are raised primarily by their mother and they all get into acting as kids. He has a small part in the Mighty Ducks.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, the original.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah, the first one. It's his second role. But here I already want to go on a tangent because that is sort of like touted as his breakout, but it's technically. Yeah, so it's technically his second role. His first role is in one of the most insane made for TV movies I've ever come across. And I just need to tell you about the first thing he ever wrote.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay. His first ever made for TV movie.

[Lizzie Logan]

So it's called A Little Piece of Heaven. It stars Kirk Cameron and Cloris Leachman.

[Dana Schwartz]

Great.

[Lizzie Logan]

Okay. It's directed by Mimi Letter, who directed Deep Impact.

[Dana Schwartz]

Wow.

[Lizzie Logan]

And the, like, Ruth Bader Ginsburg movie on the basis of sex.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

But in 1991, she directed this made for TV movie. And I'm just gonna read you the logline from IMDb.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay.

[Lizzie Logan]

Will Loomis lives with his mentally handicapped sister Violet, who wants a younger child to play with. So Will kidnaps one and then another from the local children's home and tells them they're dead and have gone to heaven. Will and Violet try to make their farm a little piece of heaven for the kids while the authorities wonder what has happened to the kidnapped children. Oh, my God.

[Dana Schwartz]

Is this based on a true story?

[Lizzie Logan]

No, wait, I don't think so.

[Dana Schwartz]

If this was not based on a true story, that is deranged, who are we supposed to be rooting for?

[Lizzie Logan]

I mean, I have no, like, I would hope.

[Dana Schwartz]

What's crazy is it's like these parents have kidnapped children and these children are being violently traumatized.

[Lizzie Logan]

Well, it's the older Brother who kidnaps children.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. That's pretty bad.

[Lizzie Logan]

And then at some point, like, a judge is like, you can't tell these kids that they're dead, but you can. Like, you can open up your farm as, like, an orphanage.

[Dana Schwartz]

They get permission to be around children after they've killed.

[Lizzie Logan]

It's the most insane thing I've ever heard. It's like, but I don't know, Lizzie,

[Dana Schwartz]

we have to do. Okay, let's do a hoaxed movie night. We'll do Anastasia.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

And we'll do A Little Piece of Heaven.

[Lizzie Logan]

But I was like, you know what? What if this is where Jesse learned that, like, reality is just whatever you want it to be?

[Dana Schwartz]

W. That is relevant. Is he one of the kidnapped children?

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay, maybe he did. Maybe he learned that.

[Lizzie Logan]

I think he's the first kidnapped child. And then the little girl is like, I wanted a little girl to play with, not a little boy. It's the most insane thing.

[Dana Schwartz]

I'm like, I really can't even wrap my head around it. We need to watch this movie and report back.

[Lizzie Logan]

It really just blew my mind when I read that. All right, so the family moves out to la, and all six siblings book a show together.

[Advertiser/Promoter]

Wow.

[Dana Schwartz]

Because they're all, like, good looking, cute.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. And it's called On Our Own, and it's basically, like, a very upbeat party of five.

[Dana Schwartz]

Great.

[Lizzie Logan]

But it's like six siblings being raised by their older sibling.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

And the show ends, and he stops acting for a little bit. He went to high school where he felt very out of place. He attended mostly white schools, and he doesn't go to college. I'm not sure, like, what he's up to sort of during the years that he would have been in College. But in 2012, he gets back into acting. At this point, the rest of the siblings have stopped acting, except for, as you pointed out, Journey, who's his sister, who has had a great career.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah, she's great. I've seen her in things.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah, she was on. But she's had, like, a steady career since being a little kid. Oh, yeah. She was on Cosby. She was on Friday Night Lights. You might recognize her from Eve's Bayou, Birds of Prey, Lovecraft country. And I'm gonna go on a little tangent here. I have met Jurnee Smollett. Wow. She was lovely. She's a very nice person. She's maybe the best looking human I've ever met.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah, I can imagine that.

[Lizzie Logan]

Like, I've met movie stars where I'm like, oh, you're Such a good, good looking human. Jurnee Smollett. I was like, oh, you're an angel.

[Dana Schwartz]

Like, little piece of heaven.

[Lizzie Logan]

Little piece of heaven. Like if I had to be with a woman.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

Like she glowed.

[Dana Schwartz]

I do wonder. I mean. Yeah. She's just like a stunningly beautiful woman. When celebrities become famous, I think something they get some skincare regimen that normal people aren't privy to because they get

[Lizzie Logan]

other water, I think.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. Okay, Tangent. That's gonna stay in.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

I was eating lunch and someone walked into the restaurant. And before I even identified it was a person, I was like, oh, their skin is glowing, their clothes look different. Like you just knew it was a movie star before they walked in. And it was Connor's story.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

And he has not been famous that long.

[Lizzie Logan]

No.

[Dana Schwartz]

And it was astonishing. Just like the truly celebrity glow. Even before I recognized who it was. Skin, hair, their clothes fit different. I want to know what they're doing. Different waters are, I think, accurate.

[Lizzie Logan]

Different water. But also, even because I've seen other celebrities, Jurnee was like. She just was.

[Dana Schwartz]

She's getting special water.

[Lizzie Logan]

Journey's getting the most special. She's bathing in the special water. Just good for her. Anyway. But also, I'm just saying, like, man, can you imagine being like the second most famous person in that family?

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

Might be kind of rough, but whatever, they're. They're close or great.

[Dana Schwartz]

I don't know. Sometimes I do think being siblings to a famous person is great because you get a lot of the perks without a lot of the downsides, maybe.

[Lizzie Logan]

I think Jesse wants to be famous.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

In 2015, he books a small but main role on a little show called Empire.

[Dana Schwartz]

Big show.

[Lizzie Logan]

Do you remember Empire?

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. Huge deal.

[Lizzie Logan]

Do you remember what Empire was about?

[Dana Schwartz]

A music dynasty family. It's like Succession, but music.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yes. And it was on before Succession.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. So Succession is Empire for media.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. So it's King Lear with the record company.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

Great pitch. It's Lucius Lyon, played by Terrence Howard, is the head of a record label and he finds out that he's dying, I think of als, and he has to figure out which of his three sons to leave his record label to.

[Dana Schwartz]

Gender swapped. King Lear.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yes. And at the same time, his wife, Cookie, played by Taraji P. Henson, just got out of prison.

[Dana Schwartz]

Fun.

[Lizzie Logan]

And she's coming for her peace. And it is a phenomenon. It is. Gets huge ratings in its first season. It's like doing that thing where it gets bigger ratings every episode. Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

Word of mouth.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yep. I'm a little bit of a. What's up?

[Dana Schwartz]

Is he one of the kids?

[Lizzie Logan]

Yes. So he's the middle son.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay.

[Lizzie Logan]

I'm a bit of a TV history nerd, and I was going to do a whole history lesson about black television in 2015 with, like, Shonda Rhimes and Tyler Perry, but it was not strictly relevant.

[Dana Schwartz]

Interesting, though. We'll talk about that later.

[Lizzie Logan]

But I'll just put this in here as a little. If anyone else is a TV history nerd and is wondering why there were a lot of black sitcoms in the 90s and then they're suddenly stopped being black sitcoms.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

A big part of it is because the WB and UPN merged and became the cw, which wanted a white audience.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.

[Lizzie Logan]

So all of which is to say, in 2015, when Empire premiered, it was not the first show with an all black cast to be like, the show of the moment, but it was still very, very rare.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

And most of these sort of must see network shows of the moment were like all white shows like Desperate Housewives or they were these big ensemble shows like Grey's Anatomy or Lost, which had diverse casts, but the main characters were like white people in a love triangle.

[Dana Schwartz]

And even something like Scandal, which does have a black female lead, is a big ensemble. And it's. She's mostly interacting with white people. Her love interest is a white person. It's a big, you know, diverse ensemble. Like, I don't know if people would consider Scandal a black show.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

No.

[Lizzie Logan]

So again, like, yeah, like, how to Get Away with Murder was sort of also riding that wave. And Empire broke through as unapologetically all black.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

So it was just very exciting. Jesse's dad dies the same day the show premieres.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh.

[Lizzie Logan]

So Jesse's dad had not really been around during his childhood, but I think they had reconnected during his adulthood. So he's dealing with overnight fame. He's dealing with the loss of his dad. Jesse plays Jamal, who is the middle son and who is gay, and he

[Dana Schwartz]

is gay in real life.

[Lizzie Logan]

And the show creator, Lee Daniels, is also gay.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay.

[Lizzie Logan]

So even though Jamal starts as a small part, Lee Daniels keeps putting more and more of his own experiences into Jamal and sort of using him as an avatar to, like, talk about gay rights.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

So, yeah. So Jesse's also gay. When the show premiered, he just doesn't talk about his private life. But three months after the show premieres, he confirms to Ellen that he's gay, which had already been speculated.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, Coming out to Ellen. What a moment.

[Lizzie Logan]

So basically what he says is, I was never in a closet. So he doesn't really come out. He just sort of says, oh, I've never noticed. Like, I. Well, I was never dating a woman. Like, I've never not.

[Dana Schwartz]

I've never not been gay. I just haven't, like, talked about it a bunch.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. Cause he doesn't want to be seen as not embracing who he is or hiding himself, but he just doesn't want it to be a story.

[Dana Schwartz]

I mean, as an actor, I find it very interesting and legitimate the way that once Hollywood perceives someone as gay, they're absolutely put into a box. I mean, that was the whole thing with, like, people have speculated that that's one of the reasons Matt Bomer never got Superman. Even though he was considered a frontrunner and very much looks like Superman. There's just a perception of actors still to this day of like, a listers cannot be gay. Yep. So I understand the sort of tight situation Jesse would have been in, being like, well, I don't want to not embrace who I am and be proud of myself. But also I want to. I want as much potential for my career as possible. Because Hollywood has these insane biases.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. And I mean, there's even like, even, you know, straight white actors who don't do a lot of press will say, the more the audience knows about your real life, the less they see you as a character. And they just don't want you to think of them as whoever they are. They just want you to see them as the characters that they play. But so he says, you know, my family embraces me. They've known who I was since I was a teenager. I just don't want to make it a story.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

At this point, this is what Queen Latifah is also saying. And, you know, we've since known her to walk red carpets with her, like, female life partner. Three months after that, we get the Supreme Court decision that legalizes same sex marriage federally.

[Advertiser/Promoter]

Wow.

[Dana Schwartz]

This is such a throwback. You're like, I cannot believe that this was so recent. Yeah, yeah, Great.

[Lizzie Logan]

So, like, things are rapidly changing. So from the time he booked the part to the time the show premiered, to the time he's giving the interviews, the cultural value of him being an out black gay man, you can see him doing the math of this might be a huge negative all the way to this potentially might be a huge positive. Almost like, could there be a whole community that is begging to embrace me? You know, I don't know.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. It's like, is this. Historically, this has been a negative. Maybe this is the one moment where this might benefit me.

[Ryan Reynolds]

Right.

[Lizzie Logan]

And he's so. He's embracing it. So he becomes friends with, like, the activist DeRay McKesson.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

His Twitter bio.

[Dana Schwartz]

The best guy.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yes. From the Black Lives Matter movement. His Twitter bio at the time is I am here to save the world. Great. Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

I mean, that's also just very actory.

[Lizzie Logan]

It's very actory. And like, you just have to really. You were saying throwback. You just have to really think back to, like, Obama's second term.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

We really thought television was gonna save the world.

[Dana Schwartz]

We really did.

[Lizzie Logan]

Orange is the New Black was gonna fix prison.

[Dana Schwartz]

And I, to the best of my knowledge, it did. Right.

[Lizzie Logan]

Transparent was gonna fix trans rights.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

In the most sincere way.

[Dana Schwartz]

It was a very earnest. It was peak woke.

[Lizzie Logan]

We were so lived out.

[Dana Schwartz]

We were fully lived out. We really thought it was gonna work.

[Lizzie Logan]

And so he goes from being this sort of quietly queer brother of a successful working actress.

[Dana Schwartz]

The future is female, Lizzie.

[Lizzie Logan]

The future was female. Just so you remember, everyone was a man bun.

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a car online on autotrader right now?

[Advertiser/Promoter]

Really?

[Narrator/Advertiser]

At a playground?

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah, really?

[Advertiser/Promoter]

Look at these listings from dealers.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Wow, your search can really get that specific.

[Advertiser/Promoter]

Really?

[Narrator/Advertiser]

And you just put in your info and boom. Cars in your budget.

[Lizzie Logan]

Mom needs a second.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Honey, you can really have it delivered.

[Advertiser/Promoter]

Really? Or I can pick it up at the dealership.

[Lizzie Logan]

One sec, sweetie. Mommy's buying a car.

[Ashley I]

Mommy, look.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

I think your kid is walking up the slide.

[Advertiser/Promoter]

Kyle.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Again?

[Advertiser/Promoter]

Really?

[Lizzie Logan]

Auto trader. Buy your car online?

[Advertiser/Promoter]

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[Narrator/Advertiser]

he

[Lizzie Logan]

goes from being the quietly queer brother of a successful working actress to being potentially like one of the faces of the new civil rights movement. Yeah, he's got a record deal.

[Dana Schwartz]

What sort of musician is he like? I don't know.

[Lizzie Logan]

John Legend 2.0.

[Dana Schwartz]

He's a singer.

[Lizzie Logan]

He's like a singer songwriter. He's performing at the White House for the Obamas.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, so he's sort of Lin Manuel Miranda ing too?

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah, like overnight. I can imagine. He is under so much pressure and he's got again, I would imagine, such a huge ego.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, of course. This is my tangent. When I worked at Entertainment Weekly, it was Sort of anecdotally known and very common. The actors who were the absolute worst to work with were brand new actors on a huge hit show.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

Whereas career actors were, like, humble and lovely and wonderful. Like Bryan Cranston, you interview him about Breaking Bad and he's like, yes, you're a professional. I'm a professional. Here's my time. Let's sit down. Where Imagine the cast of a high school singing club. I was gonna say Glee. Glee kids, it's like they go from zero to 60 so fast that they're just like. The ego was very hard to manifest.

[Lizzie Logan]

Every insecurity is blown. Yeah. All right, we're going to make a hard left turn and talk about police brutality.

[Dana Schwartz]

Great.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

And did Glee address that?

[Lizzie Logan]

Police brutality? No.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay. Well, I guess that's why it's not solved.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. All right. Chicago, a city, you know, a city

[Dana Schwartz]

I'm very familiar with.

[Lizzie Logan]

Did you know that Chicago has more cops than the lapd?

[Dana Schwartz]

No, but that makes sense.

[Lizzie Logan]

I was surprised to find this out. Chicago has the second biggest police force in the country.

[Dana Schwartz]

After New York.

[Lizzie Logan]

After New York. And then LA is the third.

[Dana Schwartz]

Well, we're the second city.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. And I think it's because LA is not as. Like, does this make sense? LA is not as big as la.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

La, yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

LA is not very dense.

[Lizzie Logan]

Well, LA is not very dense. And also, like the LA area.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

Like, not everyone who works in LA lives in technically la. Like, again, this is a tangent, but wherever we're keeping it when we're recording this, it is only five days after the mayoral primary. And just anecdotally, I kept seeing online people talking about, or like, poll workers saying that there were Republicans in Beverly Hills, you know. Yeah. Who were mad that they couldn't vote for. They were like, hey, why isn't Spencer

[Dana Schwartz]

Pratt on the ballot?

[Lizzie Logan]

On my ballot. He, if you didn't know, is a Republican running for mayor of Los Angeles. And they didn't realize that Beverly Hills is not technically in Los Angeles.

[Dana Schwartz]

Beverly Hills, Burbank, West Hollywood's its own city. Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

So, okay. However you, the listener, feel about law enforcement in this country, the fact is that the Chicago PD just does not have a good reputation.

[Dana Schwartz]

Does not have a good reputation.

[Lizzie Logan]

Dana backed me up as a Chicago girl from Chicago.

[Dana Schwartz]

I'm from the suburbs of Chicago, but I can confirm that it does not have a good reputation.

[Lizzie Logan]

Like, just. Even if we're just talking American police, like, Chicago's not the shining star of the law enforcement.

[Dana Schwartz]

Its reputation is bad on both sides. Like it's, it's bad where it's like they're not enforcing crime. It's really dangerous in certain areas. And it's bad where it's like they are, as the, you know, perception goes, very racist, very violent.

[Ryan Reynolds]

Right.

[Lizzie Logan]

Like they're brutal and it doesn't even work. You know what I mean? Like they're, they're brutal and Chicago's dangerous.

[Dana Schwartz]

So Empire, Chicago's a beautiful city. It's my favorite city in the country.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah, Chicago also great. Chicago's really clean. Yeah, I will say that. Really nice. Empire is set in New York, but it was filmed primarily in Chicago. That's why we're talking about this. In the years that we're going to talk about, Chicago is also going through a little crime spike.

[Dana Schwartz]

Republicans love to talk about that little crime spike.

[Lizzie Logan]

So I couldn't find an exact filming schedule for the first season of Empire, but I know that they filmed the pilot in spring 2014, and then the pilot premiered in January 2015. So I'm assuming that they film season one through the rest of 2014.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah, probably the fall.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. So this is happening right when they're filming season one. October 2014. A white Chicago police officer named Jason Van Dyke shot and killed a 17 year old black boy named Laquan McDonald. Dana, do you remember any of this?

[Dana Schwartz]

I remember, like the story, but not the details.

[Lizzie Logan]

Okay, so I'm about to describe the event, so if you don't want to hear about this, just fast forward like 90 seconds. It was nighttime. Laquan had a small knife and had been breaking into cars on the side of the road. So someone had called the cops. And there were other officers already on the scene. And he had slashed one of the police car tires. And the other officers were waiting for someone with a Taser to arrive. They didn't all have tasers, so they were waiting for someone with a taser to arrive so that I assume they could tase him. And Officer Van Dyke and his partner showed up. And Officer Van Dyke gets out of his squad car and immediately just like opened fire on this kid.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, my God.

[Lizzie Logan]

And he shot him 16 times.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

And Laquan was alive when the paramedics arrived, but dead by the time they got to the hospital. End of description of murder. So the police claim that the shooting was in self defense, but the autopsy comes out and says it's not in self defense. And the city agrees to pay the McDonald family $5 million. And then the dashcam footage comes out as the result of a journalist's Freedom of Information act request and shows that it's this, like, sort of brutal and very bizarre incident and the city erupts in protests. And because, you know, it's. It's not just the murder, it's the COVID up.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

Because this has happened. It's taken over a year for the dash cam footage to come out. And the chant is 16 shots in a cover up. And Kim Fox, who is a black woman, uses this moment to get elected the first black state's attorney in Cook county history. So, obviously, like, for this podcast, I'm not going to get into the exact details of, like, police reforms, but this is a very big deal. There's a Department of justice investigation into the Chicago pd and the investigation finds that basically, like, the Chicago police use unreasonable and excessive force. They have a pattern of covering up their mistakes instead of having transparency and accountability. And they're like, violating people's civil rights, and it's unconstitutional. And this whole process is taking a few years. They're ordered to undergo various reforms, including a consent decree, which I won't get into, but I know that I a little bit know what. It's from the. From the TV show Elspeth.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Good show.

[Lizzie Logan]

And the reason that I'm talking about all of this is because the cops just, like, even more than usual, look so bad during the years leading up to this incident.

[Dana Schwartz]

It's a real moment, especially for Chicago pd.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yes. And like, unlike other sort of, oh, there was a shooting and we look. Bad moments that can happen in various major cities. This one has, like, real consequences. Like, the Department of Justice got involved. There were court reforms as a result. Like, this one kind of stuck. You know, like, the cops don't even look like evil geniuses. They sort of look like evil idiots.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. And that is sometimes the scariest thing in these. You know, you get the footage and you're just like, they're not even acting rationally by their own logic.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. The mayor at the time, Rob Emanuel, fires the white superintendent of police and replaces him with Eddie Johnson, who is black. And, you know, he doesn't say, like, this is to stop the protests, but like, there's sort of a feeling that, oh, they just gave the job to a black guy to appease us.

[Dana Schwartz]

Sure.

[Lizzie Logan]

But, you know, I. You can interpret that however you want.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. Though it's like whether the chief of police should be black is something that, like, I, as a white person with, unfamiliar with, like, intimate, like, on a personal level, the history of police violence. I'm like, that's not for me to weigh in on.

[Lizzie Logan]

Right. Like, activists have different reactions to that, but that does happen as a direct consequence of this.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. And whether it was meant cynically or, like, to genuinely try to make things better, that's. Who knows. Or a combination of both.

[Lizzie Logan]

January 2019. Officer Van Dyke, who originally had, like, gotten away with it. It had been a. Declared a justified shooting. He's. He had been indicted. He's convicted of murder.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Good.

[Lizzie Logan]

And sentenced to just under seven years in prison.

[Dana Schwartz]

Great. An actual consequence.

[Lizzie Logan]

Actual consequence. One week later, back to Jussie Smollett. Okay, things are not going so great if you're Jussie Smollett. Really not as good as they were when we last checked in with him in 2015.

[Dana Schwartz]

How long has it been now?

[Lizzie Logan]

It's been four years.

[Dana Schwartz]

Four years. Okay. How old is he?

[Lizzie Logan]

Just for context, 35.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay. So 30s. Four years since Empire premiered.

[Lizzie Logan]

Empire ratings are really far down.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

Nose dive down. He has been getting online threats the way I think, like, any outspoken gay, Black Lives Matter advocate probably does. But he also recently received, like, a letter, Like a sort of classic threat letter with, like, cutout magazine, like, letters.

[Dana Schwartz]

That's so funny that these people writing threats are that lazy.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

With, like, cliche.

[Lizzie Logan]

A marker drawing of a guy with, like, a noose around his neck.

[Advertiser/Promoter]

Ugh.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

I mean, I have absolutely no doubt that his mentions at this time were horrific.

[Lizzie Logan]

Horrific. So, you know, it's probably a rough time.

[Dana Schwartz]

And it's not like, you know, he's on Empire, but it doesn't seem. I don't really have a memory of this, but it doesn't seem like he's getting a ton of other gigs.

[Lizzie Logan]

Nope, he's not. Yeah, he's not, Dana. Yeah, he's not. Yeah. He flies from LA into Chicago and he lands around midnight. And his creative director, Frank Gatson.

[Dana Schwartz]

When you say his creative director, Dana.

[Lizzie Logan]

We're moving past it. Great. His creative director, Frank Gatson, picks him up at the airport and drives him back to his condo in Streeterville, which is a neighborhood in Chicago. Yes. There's no food in the apartment. So around 2am he goes out to the Walgreens thinking that it's open all night, but it's not. So he goes another block to the Subway Sandwich. At this point, it's January 29th. I mean, maybe it's like the early hours of January 30th. Anyway, it's the end of January, It's Chicago, it's cold. This is during a polar vortex. It's like, negative 20 degrees. Yeah, but, you know, there are a couple other people at the Subway Sandwich. So later someone will be like, no one in their right mind would go out for food at this hour. But, like, you know, some people do also.

[Dana Schwartz]

I'm like, I don't know. You're hungry. People would be like, what are you supposed to do for food? Get delivery. That means someone else has to go outside. I actually don't think this is crazy. I mean, I think it's unpleasant, but sometimes you have to go out for food even when it's cold.

[Lizzie Logan]

I don't know what to tell you. He goes out for food, but it is very, very cold out. While he's in the Subway Sandwich, he texts his manager asking just like, hey, like, can we talk? He gets his food. He steps out, his manager calls him. So he's on the phone, he hears

[Dana Schwartz]

that his manager calls him at like 2:00am yeah, well, I think his manager's

[Lizzie Logan]

in LA, where it's probably like midnight. Whatever. He hears some guys yelling at him and he just ignores it and keeps walking. And then they yell a little louder and they say, hey, Empire. Are you that Empire F. Slur n Slur.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

So they've called him a horrible name for gay people and for black people. And he turns around and they say. And he says, what is the race

[Dana Schwartz]

of the people harassing him?

[Lizzie Logan]

We'll get that in a sec. And he says, what did you say to me? And they go, this is maga country.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, okay, I'm gonna guess who they are.

[Lizzie Logan]

He turns around and they start, like, punching him.

[Dana Schwartz]

It's absolutely not maga country.

[Lizzie Logan]

Good point, by the way.

[Dana Schwartz]

I will say Chicago.

[Lizzie Logan]

Put a pin in that.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

They start punching him.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay.

[Lizzie Logan]

He tries to fight back, but they, you know, it's two on one. They beat him up and knock him down. They're wearing ski masks, so, like, balaclavas. And all he can see is the skin around their eyes. So he can tell, like, from their build and their voices that they're men. And he can tell from the skin that they're white.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay.

[Lizzie Logan]

But that's all he knows. And then they just, like, leave. He goes home. He still has his phone and his sandwich. Okay. He realizes that there's a rope around his neck and a chemical on his sweater. Let's pause and talk about this horrifying thing that has happened. And also some of the details that are a little bit strange.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yes, I will say that. To me, what is strange? Not even that he still has his sandwich and Phone. Cause it wasn't a robbery, it was a hate crime. They were beating him up for being the gay guy on Empire. What is slightly strange is. Okay, a few things to me just on the surface. Uh huh. The balaclavas in the middle of a polar vortex actually does not strike me as weird. No. I'm like, actually people would be wearing

[Lizzie Logan]

face coverings also if you're about to commit a hate crime, you might cover your face.

[Dana Schwartz]

But the. They obviously wouldn't have known that he was walking around. It seems like a crime of opportunity seeing as he just arrived back in Chicago and it doesn't seem if it is a crime of opportunity. The fact that they would have a noose and chemicals seems surprising.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. Which will later be like discovered. Like the, the consensus is that it's bleach.

[Dana Schwartz]

But even still, like, why would, why

[Lizzie Logan]

would they be walking around the bleach.

[Dana Schwartz]

Walking around bleach at 2 in the morning.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

If they just came across him. It's not MAGA country. So I'm like, why is, why are MAGA people walking around? But people are everywhere. So this is a more cynical one. Maybe because he's a bigger deal in the. Maybe like the MAGA community had sort of made him a target. But it also strikes me as I did not watch Empire. I don't think I would have recognized him on site where I'm like in the dark. In the dark, just walking around Chicago identified which sibling from Empire he was where I'm like, MAGA people probably weren't watching Empire. It just seems to me it seemed

[Lizzie Logan]

like four years into its run when it was not that big of a deal anymore.

[Dana Schwartz]

That's why I'm like, I just don't think white non fans of Empire would have recognized Jussie Smollett.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. Seems like really quite the coincidence.

[Dana Schwartz]

But the only counterpoint to that I would say is maybe like in the MAGA community, you know how they sometimes have their enemies that. I'm like, maybe he was really famous for being a black Lives Matter, like punching bag in the MAGA community.

[Lizzie Logan]

Right.

[Dana Schwartz]

But I don't know if he was. I don't know. I don't think they would recognize him from watching Empire Season 4.

[Lizzie Logan]

I mean the other thing is like, okay, obviously racists can live anywhere.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yes.

[Lizzie Logan]

And hate crimes can happen in well to do areas. Streeterville in particular. I like looked up where all this happened on a map. My mom for work for a while lived in Chicago. She lived like two blocks from where this happened. And I'VE stayed at her apartment. I've walked by that Subway sandwich shop. There is no, like, no way.

[Dana Schwartz]

Can I look up on a map where this happened? I would like to see. Oh, my grandpa used to live around there. I just. It's like by Michigan Avenue, which is the main, like, shopping thoroughfare where, like, there's the Ralph Lauren store and the

[Lizzie Logan]

Harry Potter Mile, if you know what that is.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

If you're like a skinhead looking for trouble, you don't go to this area.

[Dana Schwartz]

Again, it's the most populous, like, most touristy walk area.

[Lizzie Logan]

And it's like a rich area for like, retirees and yuppies.

[Dana Schwartz]

Again, Chicago River. It's like the Langham Hotel, which is like a fancy hotel and like an Apple Store. Like the fancy Apple Store, the big one.

[Lizzie Logan]

Like, there aren't bars, there aren't sporting places where you could find a lot of rowdy people. It would just be such a bizarre place to, like, hang out.

[Dana Schwartz]

Looking for trouble.

[Lizzie Logan]

Looking for trouble.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

So sort of the only explanation that makes sense is that they were waiting specifically for him. Yeah. And like you said, like, that he was a target.

[Dana Schwartz]

Because again, if you have a noose to which is a, you know, hate indicated indication of a hate crime against a black person and bleach ready to go around where Jussie Smollett lives and they recognize him from Empire, a show that they wouldn't naturally have watched unless they specifically hated this person. It does seem like they would have needed specifically to stalk and wait for him, which is possible.

[Advertiser/Promoter]

Right.

[Lizzie Logan]

But then it's like, okay, so they, they did this thing and they punched him and then they ran away. Like, I don't know. I mean, now I'm trying to parse the logic of, like, white supremacists who, like, don't really operate on, like, logic. They just, like, are fueled by hate. And I guess that'll keep you warm in the negative 20 degree weather. But, like, how would they know he was getting back that night?

[Dana Schwartz]

Like, and they, they decided to do their hate crime during a polar vortex. Which is true commitment.

[Lizzie Logan]

Which is true commitment. And like, a little bit smart because I guess there's not going to be a lot of witnesses. But like, to what end? And it's just, it just seems so unlikely.

[Dana Schwartz]

It's a challenging thing to believe, especially when you know the context of Chicago. Like, I think other people. If you just said a hate crime happened at night in Chicago, you'd be like, yeah, that's plausible.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

And then the location and the details and the specificity of it leaves sort of a sour taste in your mouth for me. You know, I think that the strangeness of it is especially because no one wants to question a hate crime happening.

[Lizzie Logan]

Right.

[Dana Schwartz]

If someone tells you a hate crime happened against them for being gay and black, you want to, of course, always be like, that is horrific. How can I support you?

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. Like, if he had just said, like, the craziest thing happened. These white guys bump my shoulder. And then we got into a fight, and they punched me and they called me the N word, I'd be like, yeah, sounds about right.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah, that sounds really right.

[Lizzie Logan]

They recognized me from my TV show and had props with them. I'd be like, all right. Sounds like they had a plan. Quite the plan.

[Dana Schwartz]

Quite the plan. Also, now, knowing where it is, I'm like, at 2am in this area, it kind of only makes sense that they would have been waiting there. Thank God he needed to get out to get food. Yeah. Because this is also not a neighborhood. Again, this is a very.

[Lizzie Logan]

How did they know his apartment wasn't gonna have food in it?

[Dana Schwartz]

This is a very populous tourist area. So it's like, if they were stalking him, if it was any other time of day, there would have been a million witnesses. So, like, thank God he just happened to. Let's wait all night in case he needs to come out and get food. Because it's not like, you know, at 6:00am Even, you know, people will be out. We can't.

[Lizzie Logan]

And let's hope he doesn't have a friend with him.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

So, okay.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. No, no. There are details about this story that are strange and require more context.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yes. All right, back to the tale.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

He doesn't want to call the cops.

[Dana Schwartz]

Sure.

[Lizzie Logan]

He just doesn't trust the police. Fair. But his creative director calls anyway.

[Dana Schwartz]

I guess we're just breeze. Non past.

[Lizzie Logan]

We're breathing.

[Ashley I]

You know what?

[Lizzie Logan]

I think it's, like, for his album or whatever.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay, okay, okay.

[Lizzie Logan]

You can hear the 911 call. Like, in documentaries. He's like, I work for an artist. There's been an attack, and he doesn't want me to call, but I think we need to file a report. Two detectives show up, and Gatson meets them in the lobby, and he's like, all right, you're going to meet a celebrity. Do you guys watch Empire? And they're like, oh, yeah, I've heard of it. So they walk in, they ask him a few questions. He's wearing the noose.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, okay. I don't like that.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. And they're like, oh, is that. Do you want to take that off?

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

And he goes, well, yeah, I just put it on to show you guys.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay.

[Lizzie Logan]

And he takes it off, and then he goes, oh, are you recording? I don't want this recorded. So they turn their body cams off because he asked them to.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay.

[Lizzie Logan]

I got the sense from the body cam footage that he's, like, a little bit embarrassed.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

You know, he's been victimized and maybe a little emasculated.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. If you're beaten up in any context as a man, you're. That's. You know, I don't think it's embarrassing, but, you know, I can understand why other people are embarrassed.

[Lizzie Logan]

It's like. It's just an awkward situation. Eddie Johnson, the police chief superintendent, will later say that the noose being on was suspicious because who sits around wearing the noose? Yeah, it's traumatic, but Jussie will say he took it off, but then he just put it back on to show the cops.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay.

[Lizzie Logan]

Eddie Johnson loves to say that all these things were suspicious. He just calls everything suspicious. In hindsight.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. Like, it's weird, but I don't find that suspicious.

[Lizzie Logan]

Actually, I am not gonna include all the things that he calls suspicious because there's enough, like, good evidence that I'm just gonna skip all the things that he calls suspicious that are random and circumstantial.

[Dana Schwartz]

Like, hindsight things.

[Lizzie Logan]

Like, he just loves to be like. And I found that suspicious. I was onto him from the beginning because this was suspicious and that was suspicious. And I'm like, no, you didn't. You're just saying that because in hindsight, we know that it was suspicious. But, like, you don't freaking know. Like, whatever. I'm leaving out all of that. And so, you know, whatever.

[Dana Schwartz]

But noted.

[Lizzie Logan]

Just. Just in case you had heard before, like, in case you're coming into this episode being like, but what about this thing that was suspicious? Like, I'm leaving. I'm leaving out the suspicious things because there's good evidence and we have enough to go on with the good evidence. Great.

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[Advertiser/Promoter]

Really?

[Narrator/Advertiser]

At a playground?

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah, really.

[Advertiser/Promoter]

Look at these listings from dealers.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Wow, your search can really get that specific.

[Advertiser/Promoter]

Really?

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[Lizzie Logan]

Mom needs a second.

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[Advertiser/Promoter]

Really? Or I can pick it up at the dealership.

[Lizzie Logan]

One sec sweetie. Mommy's buying a car. Mommy, look.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

I think your kid is walking up the slide.

[Dana Schwartz]

Kyle again?

[Advertiser/Promoter]

Really?

[Lizzie Logan]

Autotrader? Buy your car online?

[Advertiser/Promoter]

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[Lizzie Logan]

So after he talks to the cops, the cops are like, you should probably go to the hospital and get checked out.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

He goes to Northwestern Memor. He gets an X ray and a CT scan. He's fine. It's just cuts and bruises.

[Dana Schwartz]

I think that's where I was born.

[Lizzie Logan]

And they're like, did you know about Dana?

[Dana Schwartz]

They're like, did you Hear about Dana 1993.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. As you said, everyone is. Everyone has the reaction that you sort of predicted of, like, oh, my God, what a horrible thing.

[Dana Schwartz]

That's an abhorrent thing to happen to people. An abhorrent thing to a person.

[Lizzie Logan]

The news gets out pretty much overnight, immediately. If there's any worry that this will kick off like a race war in Chicago. Like, it doesn't. Everyone's just Team Jussie.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. Everyone should be like, that is a horrible thing that happened to this person.

[Lizzie Logan]

Trump is like, that's awful. Yeah, he like, kind of just skims over the maga of it and he's just like, that's the worst. That's horrible. That shouldn't happen.

[Dana Schwartz]

That's nuts. That. Even Trump is like, yeah, bad.

[Lizzie Logan]

No, he's like, that's despicable. You shouldn't do that. That's awful. Reese Witherspoon gives them a shout out. Viola Davis, Zendaya, Kevin Bacon, Jordan Peele, Kamala Harris, Andy Cohen, et cetera, et cetera. Everybody is giving shout outs to Jesse.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay, I have to bring this up just because you said Kamala Harris.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

The day that I saw Connor's story at lunch.

[Lizzie Logan]

Oh, yes.

[Dana Schwartz]

Also saw Kamala Harris at that same restaurant. Just a fun fact about me.

[Lizzie Logan]

I recently saw Jason Siegel at UCB waiting in the lobby for hours because his fiance was in an improv show. And I was like, dude, go to a cafe nearby.

[Dana Schwartz]

You don't have to just sit away in the lobby. Was he working?

[Lizzie Logan]

He was on his phone.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, come on, Jason.

[Lizzie Logan]

And it wasn't even, like, proper ucb. It was the UCB annex.

[Dana Schwartz]

That's. I wouldn't want my fiance waiting for me for that long. That's like, yeah, go to a cafe.

[Lizzie Logan]

All right, anyway, whatever. You know what it is?

[Dana Schwartz]

Suspicious.

[Lizzie Logan]

Suspicious. Listen, we have to lighten up the episode. We're lightening it up, because we're lightening up the episode. We're just talking about facts, and then we're making jokes about other things that are not the facts.

[Dana Schwartz]

Thank you.

[Lizzie Logan]

Four days after the attack, Jesse plays a show at the Troubadour here in la.

[Dana Schwartz]

Great, great theater.

[Lizzie Logan]

It's sold out.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. I imagine a lot of support. He's been in the news.

[Lizzie Logan]

A lot of support. It's very important to him that he shows everyone that he's doing okay. It's also Black History Month at this point.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

He tells the crowd, I'm not fully healed yet, but I'm going to. I'm going to stand strong with you all. He says, be blacker, be gayer. I love you. You know what? There's no right or wrong way to respond to these things. And I'm just gonna put it out there. I am a survivor of, like, a random stranger assault. I'm totally fine. And the guy who did it is in prison. And if anyone came for me about the way I reacted to that, I would, like, tell them to shut the f up. So there's no right or wrong way. Except Erica Kirk is reacting the wrong way. She is reacting the wrong way to what? A horrible, horrible thing happened to her family. Yeah. And she is reacting the wrong way. I will say that Erica Kirk is being weird at this show. He also says I'm the gay Tupac.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay.

[Lizzie Logan]

Which a lot of people are like, now, that's an interesting thing to say.

[Dana Schwartz]

That's a little much.

[Lizzie Logan]

That's just an interest. Like, it's sort of when you try to give yourself a nickname.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah, we're all calling me the gay Tupac.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. It's sort of like he wanted. He wanted bloggers to start calling him the gay Tupac. So he said he was the gay Tupac.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. That's a stretch.

[Lizzie Logan]

And, like, all the coverage is, like, he did not elaborate what he meant by that.

[Dana Schwartz]

I think it's pretty clear what he meant by it.

[Lizzie Logan]

I, a tiny bit get what he meant by that.

[Dana Schwartz]

I. I think I get what he was going for. I don't think I agree.

[Lizzie Logan]

They. Here's what I'll say. They both have ties to the Bay Area.

[Dana Schwartz]

They both are in show business and were victims of violence.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yes. Both of their mothers were involved with the Black Panthers. Oh, cool. So if he grew up being, like, interested in Tupac's music and knew that he died from sort of just like, a sudden act of violence and then this thing happened to him, he might. I understand that he Might be looking for a role model.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

He might be like, God, who, who do I like? I need to contextualize this thing that happened to me. Oh, my God, Tupac. Like, that's how I can make meaning out of this horrible thing that happened to me is Tupac's legacy. Albe, the gay Tupac.

[Dana Schwartz]

I also think I'm gonna go on the record and say this. Sometimes celebrities say dumb things. People who are a lot, a lot. I think, like, happens. I think a lot of celebrities are in weird bubbles. They get very arrogant because people are waiting on them hand and foot on set. Like, literally just being an actor on set, you're just like, can I get you anything? What can I do? And so that for years, I think distorts their brains. And they're surrounded not by normal people, but by other, like, showbiz people and people who make money off them. And I just think sometimes celebrities say dumb things.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. It's a little. As we talked about, this was a little fishy from the start.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

Dave Chappelle has a pretty famous bit about how, like, black people didn't believe this from the start.

[Dana Schwartz]

And I want to go on the record, fully normal and fully non controversial comedian Dave Chappelle.

[Lizzie Logan]

Dave Chappelle, who's right about everything. I'm just quoting him as a source because it is very hard to do, like, forensic evidence of, like, who believes it. You can't, like, yeah, like, I can't. Lexis, Nexus, people's thoughts. So I'm trying, like, this is my source of what people thought.

[Dana Schwartz]

So what did. Yeah, what was this?

[Lizzie Logan]

So Dave Chappelle has a bit about gay people wanting black people to believe this and black people, not black people, being like, oh, it's not that we're against him because he's gay, we're against him because we know he's lying.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

If you go on Reddit, the sort of. The sentiment is like, oh, we all, like Chicagoans, always knew this was fishy. But we didn't want to say that because, you know, we didn't want to. Like, who wants to call a hate victim a hate crime victim a liar? Usually we talk about why people believed it at the end of the episode. I want to right now talk about why people believed it. To me, this. Tell me if this sentence makes sense. This is the Ruth Konda forever of hoaxes.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. White people wanted to live out.

[Lizzie Logan]

To me, this is. This crime is a little cartoonish.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

If only racism and homophobia were this clear cut and obvious. Like it's a horrible thing to believe happened, but it's almost a fantasy that makes rich liberals feel really good about how they voted.

[Dana Schwartz]

I will also say it kind of reminds me actually of something that happens on the other side too. Have you seen like Republicans occasionally or have you know, posted on the Internet like fake graffiti that like liberals supposed that like antifa supposedly did to their house? Like bad graffiti that's like, like Antifa forever with like weird misspellings. So like Republicans could be like, ah, these antifa. And it clearly is like a false flag that like they did to themselves. That's sort of the same thing where you're right, it's like a fantasy of what the other side does.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. And it's like this is such a neatly uncomplicated story. There are no bystanders who didn't help. A noose and a bleach are awful, but they're not guns. So we don't have to have a debate. He didn't get seriously injured. Like obviously I'm against hate crimes. Like obviously Lizzie.

[Dana Schwartz]

On the record.

[Lizzie Logan]

On the record. But you know, real life is messy. Yeah. Usually when you attack someone, they punch back. And then by the end of the fight it's not always super clear who the victim is.

[Dana Schwartz]

And also in terms of making something a hate crime versus just an act of random violence. These perpetrators said the f. Slur. The n. Slur.

[Lizzie Logan]

They explained their motives.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah, they said, we recognize you specifically the guy from Empire. Gay hate crime, black hate crime. Like. Cause sometimes people just attack people and it's horrible and horrific and there is no clear cut motive. So like you said, uncomplicated.

[Lizzie Logan]

Uncomplicated.

[Dana Schwartz]

And the noose, again, very uncomplicated symbol.

[Lizzie Logan]

I mean, well, a complicated but like.

[Dana Schwartz]

No, no. A complicated clear symbol with a complicated horrific legacy.

[Lizzie Logan]

And you know, in a lot of like homophobic attacks, the attacker will use the excuse that their victim was like coming onto them, which is horrible and like almost always not true. But it does speak to like, like a real anxiety about sexual safety. This time they didn't have to deal with that. Yeah. Very few people are 100% evil or 100% good. So when we deal with actual crimes involving actual people, the narrative can get complicated. But this one, it's so clear.

[Dana Schwartz]

If you're interested in a complicated hate crime, they made a movie of this. But the documentary is more interesting. Marwyn Call. The movie is welcome to Marwyn with Steve Carell. But it's based on a real guy.

[Lizzie Logan]

Toys.

[Dana Schwartz]

It's based on A real hate crime.

[Lizzie Logan]

It's about a hate crime.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Well, the.

[Lizzie Logan]

I thought that was about a guy who liked figurines.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. Cause he was an artist and. Okay. I mean, this is a real hate

[Lizzie Logan]

crime that's about a hate. I'm literally learning this in real time.

[Dana Schwartz]

So add. Welcome to Marwyn Call Marwan Call on our hoax documentary, hoax film. Watch. It's about an artist who is attacked and he can no longer do his drawings. So he turns figurines into his art and, like, makes elaborate figurines. But what's kind of interesting and complicated is he is, in my recollection, a man who likes wearing women's shoes, but he's not gay. He's just perceived as gay.

[Lizzie Logan]

Okay.

[Dana Schwartz]

And that's why they think he's gay and do the hate crime. But he's not gay.

[Lizzie Logan]

Okay.

[Dana Schwartz]

It's a horrific attack, and it's a really interesting documentary. And it is a, to the best of my knowledge, an attack that did, in fact, happen.

[Lizzie Logan]

Wow.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. Watch the Marwencall documentary. Very interesting and nuanced.

[Lizzie Logan]

I'm losing my mind over here.

[Dana Schwartz]

You just thought it was toys, and you're finding out there's a whole hate crime subplot.

[Lizzie Logan]

They advertised that movie with no indication that it was about a hate crime.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah, well, because it is kind of a complicated hate crime. Because can you do a gay hate crime against guys not actually gay?

[Lizzie Logan]

Okay. So again, see, I. That's complicated. This isn't.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay, and see, this is why we're leaving the tangents in.

[Lizzie Logan]

This is why we're leaving the tangents in. So I. Okay, to get back to the point. So this is why people were eager to believe that this had happened, is that it cast the world in a very clear good versus evil.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, and they said this is maga country, right?

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

That also is, like, clear villain.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. It's all just very like, hey, here's a really obvious thing I can be against to show everyone that I'm a good person is I can support Jussie Smollett.

[Dana Schwartz]

It's so easy to support Jussie Smollett that even Donald Trump can do it.

[Lizzie Logan]

Even Donald Trump can do it. It's so easy that you almost don't even look and see that it doesn't make a ton of sense.

[Dana Schwartz]

And also, historians sometimes refer to this thing called the criter of embarrassment. It's actually more in ancient religious texts, but it's sometimes used by historians, which basically means, given a historical text, if someone confesses or writes about something embarrassing you verge on the side of it being true because you think, like, why would they write something embarrassing if it's not true? And a man being beat up is usually not something that someone wants to brag about.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yes.

[Dana Schwartz]

But this is kind of the unique brief moment when there would be maybe some social, political capital to be gained by this publicity.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yes. And he also. I mean, like, it being two against one, I think, sort of gets him out of the, like, embarrassment of losing the fight.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

But, yeah, he can be like, I fought back. But, you know, two against one.

[Dana Schwartz]

Two against one. Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

All right. So as I said, there's all these things that people find suspicious, but the first thing that is, like, actually suspicious is that Jussie won't turn over his phone.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay.

[Lizzie Logan]

So they want his phone because he says that he was on the phone with his manager at the time of the attack. And he says that he has, like, private stuff on there.

[Dana Schwartz]

Sure.

[Lizzie Logan]

Like his music and, you know, other stuff that he's working on. He later says that.

[Dana Schwartz]

And, you know, people take photos from private photos from celebrities sometimes. I mean.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah, he later says that, like, he was doing drugs.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, shit.

[Lizzie Logan]

So he just didn't want them to find that out.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

I'm also gonna just maybe this is none of my business. I'm gonna speculate. This is a gay man in Hollywood.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

I would imagine that there's material on there from people who are not out.

[Dana Schwartz]

I was gonna say the same thing. I was like, this is a gay man in Hollywood. I fully understand why he doesn't want his phone going to the police, where all it would take is one person to, like, leak embarrassing, compromising things like you said, on drugs, Engaging with people who aren't out.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah, sure. So about a week later, he gives them a PDF of his phone records.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

But he has redacted some stuff.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. Maybe calls to people who aren't out, whatever. Drug dealers.

[Lizzie Logan]

So, yeah, so he's, like, cooperating in quotes. He's cooperate. He's cooperating, but he's cooperating.

[Dana Schwartz]

You sure? But to this point, I actually am like, I understand that.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. The attack itself took place right by a security camera, but the camera was, like, facing the other way. So they don't have footage of the attack. But Chicago has a ton of security foot cameras all around. So what the police do is they just collect security footage from all around the area.

[Dana Schwartz]

And just looking at the Google map, there's, like, a lot of banks around. It's like a very commercial area. It's like there's a lot of banks, which seem like.

[Lizzie Logan]

And a lot of hotels.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

Which have a lot of cameras in the lobby facing outward, so you can see if people are passing in front of the lobby. So they don't find any footage of the attack, but they do find two figures who leave the scene right after the attack. And again, it's 2am during a polar vortex. There's nothing. Not a lot of people around. They're like, this has to be them.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

By going from camera to camera, including ring cameras. Remember, your ring footage is not private. They watch those figures get into a cab and go up to the north side of Chicago, and that's where they lose track of them.

[Dana Schwartz]

I mean, they're gonna. So they're working to find these guys.

[Lizzie Logan]

Oh, yeah, absolutely. This is a international news story. The cops do not have a good reputation. They want to win.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. They want to find these guys.

[Lizzie Logan]

They want to find these guys. They do not want to drop the ball on a hate crime against a black celebrity in the city of Chicago.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

So they can't find out who these people are, so they decide to go, like, back in time. They retrace the steps. They find what they think are the same two figures arriving in the area, and they basically run it back. They find those guys getting out of a cab. They retrace the cab. They find those guys getting into the cab after getting out of an Uber.

[Advertiser/Promoter]

Hmm.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay, well, this does sound suspicious.

[Lizzie Logan]

And then they retrace the Uber coming from that same area on the north side.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay.

[Lizzie Logan]

So it looks like these two people got into an Uber, took it down to sort of near where the attack happened, got into a cab, took it to the area of the attack, waited around a little bit, did the attack, took a T, took a cab back to the north.

[Dana Schwartz]

It does seem like something someone doing a hate crime would do. Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

Like, why would you go from an Uber to a cab unless you were trying to sort of COVID up your footsteps? Yeah. So they call Uber, and they're like, hey, we need ride shared data. And they say the. And again, 2am in a polar vortex. Uber says there was only one ride called that night in that area, and it was called by this guy, Ola Osundero. Ola Osundero is a Nigerian American. They in a lot of press are called, like, he and his brother are gonna be called, like, the Nigerians. They're Nigerian American. They grew up in America, but their family's from Nigeria. Ola and Bola are the brothers. Those are their nicknames. They are Nigerian. And so they are like dark skinned black. Like Jesse. If you saw him very quickly, you might mistake him for, you know, he could be Mexican. He could be something else.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

Ola and Bola, you would not mistake for any other race. They are black.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yep. I. And fully around the eyes.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yes. Any. Any part of them. Obviously black people can beat up other black people.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

They can be maga and I guess they could shout racial epithets at each other. But it just. It does seem unlikely that Jussie would confuse them for white. Like, it just. It doesn't really line up that this would be them. But this is where the evidence has taken the police, that these are the two guys who.

[Dana Schwartz]

The only two guys who are in this area.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. Going through social media, the detectives see that they have been extras on Empire.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, interesting.

[Lizzie Logan]

They know Jesse.

[Dana Schwartz]

Interesting.

[Lizzie Logan]

But they can't do anything yet because the day after the incident, Ola and Bola flew to Nigeria. They're out of the country.

[Dana Schwartz]

Interesting.

[Lizzie Logan]

So the cops do something I find kind of underhanded, which is that they start leaking to journalists that they have suspicions about Jussie's story.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. That is not great. Too early.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

You haven't figured it out yet. Especially because you're like, maybe these people knew Jesse and wanted to do a hate crime against him specifically because he said something mean on the set of Empire.

[Lizzie Logan]

Who knows? And this allows them to discredit him without risking their own reputation because they're not saying it with their chest. You know, they're letting the media take the fall.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

People are also more likely to believe a leak than an actual source because it feels like a scoop.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

It feels like someone is telling the truth off the record that they're not allowed to say on the record. And people are really suspicious of the police, but they're gonna trust like a dogged reporter that has the real story. Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

Especially if it's like one cop speaking

[Lizzie Logan]

out off the record, when really this is just cops feeding journalists talking points that the journalist will have to answer for, but the cop doesn't have to stand behind it.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, that's so smart. I never even thought of that.

[Lizzie Logan]

You're so right. So, yeah, back in 2019, this is where I personally stopped following the story. I was like, this is not white people's business. But it works. The tide begins turning. People feel more comfortable saying, this doesn't really add up. MAGA people don't watch Empire. People are not carrying a bleach and rope with them at 2am doesn't really seem like skinheads would bother doing a whole thing against this guy.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

So Valentine's Day 2019, two weeks after the incident, Fox tells Jesse, you need to do some damage control.

[Dana Schwartz]

Fox, the network that Empire's on?

[Lizzie Logan]

Yes. Yes. And so he does an interview with Robin Roberts because she is black and gay.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yep.

[Lizzie Logan]

And he sits down with her and says, I want people to know that I fought back and I'm not lying. He also says that he thinks he would be more believed if he had said that the attackers were Mexican or Muslim. I don't know about that, but maybe. Maybe he says, you know, I want the little gay kid at home to know that he matters. He's very. He's, like, crying and.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

Being a little righteous. But again, people can react to things however they want.

[Dana Schwartz]

According to his Twitter, he wants to save the world.

[Lizzie Logan]

He is here to save the world. They show him a. They show a picture from the security footage of the two dark figures.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

And he's like, yeah, see, I'm not making this up. There were two guys in the area that I said, I. Those two guys did it.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay?

[Lizzie Logan]

And the cops are like, I'm so glad he said that on national television, because those two guys are Ola and Bola. And we are right now at the airport picking them up.

[Dana Schwartz]

Great.

[Lizzie Logan]

Because they just flew back to the US they detain them as persons of interest and they don't say anything until their lawyer gets there.

[Dana Schwartz]

Smart.

[Lizzie Logan]

Their lawyer is literally a woman that their mom met when she was driving Uber.

[Dana Schwartz]

I mean, sure, yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

She shows them the Robin Roberts interview, and she is like, look, he's fingering you on national television. You're gonna take the fall for this, so you should probably start talking.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, what do they say?

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[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah, really.

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[Lizzie Logan]

Really?

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[Lizzie Logan]

One sec, sweetie. Mommy's buying a car.

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[Advertiser/Promoter]

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[Lizzie Logan]

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[Lizzie Logan]

okay, so this is where there's, like, speculation. During the raid of their home, the cops found guns and drugs that they weren't supposed to have. So if you are inclined to be anti Chicago pd, you could say that the Chicago PD used this to coerce a false confession out of the brothers.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay.

[Lizzie Logan]

If you are inclined to be anti Jesse, you could say that. No. They just cut a deal for a true confession.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. And especially given the context of his phone records were not given over and were redacted. That's additional context that is just interesting, but also very plausible.

[Lizzie Logan]

Just. Just. I'm just gonna report the facts, okay? The facts. Like, I wasn't. You know, meetings with the lawyer are privileged. I'm just going to report the facts of what they confessed, okay. Not how they got the confession, because I don't know. What they say is they met Jussie on the set of Empire, and they became his friends and his trainers and his weed dealers.

[Dana Schwartz]

Sure.

[Lizzie Logan]

They show the cops a text that one of them got from Jesse saying, hey, I need your help with something on the lower, like, a few days before the attack. And that text referred to a conversation where he asked them to beat him up. He said that his plan was for them to beat him up near a security camera, and then he was going to leak the footage onto the Internet to become a poster boy for, like, Black Lives Matter and gay rights. And the brothers also have a check from Jesse from. For $3,500. So the cops call Jesse down to the station and show him the mug shots of Ola and Bola. And they're like, hey, we found the guys from the security footage. They were the only people in the area on the night of the attack. Would you like to press charges against them for aggravated assault? And Jesse's like, I told you it was two white guys and these are two black guys. You can't tell black people and white people apart, you know? That's very progressive of you. That's a joke. He's just mad and says no.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

The brothers say that Jesse told them what to buy, which the cops then leaked to a reporter. So then the reporter goes to every store that. That sells ski masks, and sure enough, he finds the store which has a security camera, and there's footage of them of them buying the ski masks. You know, it's cold in Chicago. A person could just want to buy a mask for their face. But, like, it's really looking like their story checks out. Yeah. And one of the brothers did call Jesse at 1:00am the morning of the Incident. Yeah. There's, like, a call log of that. And then, I mean, the final nail in the coffin. The king speaks. 50 Cent calls Jesse a liar.

[Dana Schwartz]

50 Cent.

[Lizzie Logan]

50 Cent has weighed in.

[Dana Schwartz]

50 Cent has weighed in.

[Lizzie Logan]

He has spoken.

[Advertiser/Promoter]

Oh.

[Dana Schwartz]

And like. Oh, this all. Yeah. Oh, my gosh. I understand all of, like,

[Lizzie Logan]

what are you groaning about?

[Dana Schwartz]

I just, like, I know that as a white person, it is not my position to weigh in, not on the facts. And I'm very, very grateful that you have restricted yourself to the facts as they are known. I just don't like someone taking advantage of. Of a moment where being a victim of a hate crime would lead to attention and publicity. And it feels so icky.

[Lizzie Logan]

It feels icky. But it's also like, no one.

[Dana Schwartz]

Again, like you said, no one got hurt. Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

Like, if we take away the attention and the, like, social capital and the race of it all, it's like. Like, it's just this weird, like, stunt gone wrong.

[Dana Schwartz]

It's a stunt gone wrong, but it was a stunt also meant to.

[Lizzie Logan]

And you can't tug away those things. But if you could, it was a

[Dana Schwartz]

stunt meant to tug at the heartstrings of liberals. And I'm like, oh, you got me.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. I mean, there's a good 30 rock line where Liz is like, my white guilt should only be used for good. Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

Don't take advantage of my white guilt.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. But also, like, what did he get out of it? No money. Like, nobody actually did anything with their white guilt.

[Dana Schwartz]

Well, he got a true bedorcia and he got more famous.

[Lizzie Logan]

That had already been booked.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, well, good for him.

[Lizzie Logan]

People just bought more tickets.

[Dana Schwartz]

He got more famous, and then he

[Lizzie Logan]

got way more famous, and then he got infamous.

[Dana Schwartz]

Unfortunately, again, the real victims aren't. And this is now me getting on a soapbox. It's not white people who feel silly that they were taken advantage of and tricked. It is victims of actual hate crimes that I think then are taken less seriously and are framed a little bit as more of a joke. Like, I think that genuinely is the consequence of a hoax. Like, this is. It muddies the water for real victims.

[Lizzie Logan]

And we'll get into, like, if that has come to pass. Yeah. So he is charged with disorderly conduct and filing a false police report.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, he's charged, all right.

[Lizzie Logan]

He turns himself in and hands over a bond. Jesse's whole family stands by him, but other than that, pretty much nobody claims him.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah, it's a. It's a tough story, especially once the Olembola confession.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

Because they do. They confess that Jesse asked them to do this.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yes.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

They're.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

And he's getting made fun of on snl. He's written out of Empire.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

He goes to set and, like, apologizes, but he doesn't admit anything. He's just like, I'm sorry this is happening. He hires a lawyer from a law firm that represents, like, Chris Brown and Andrew Tate. But I. Whatever. Lawyers take the cases they take. His lawyer goes on the offensive, asking what I think are some pretty good questions, which is, why would he hire black people to pretend to be white people? Why wouldn't he just hire some white people?

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

You know, to which I would say, like, probably didn't think they'd get caught, but still.

[Dana Schwartz]

He didn't think they would get caught. He was friends with them. You don't want to, like, maybe he didn't have two white people that he was close enough friends with that he would fully trust not to flip if the. When the pressure came in. Because it's like, when the police. If the police figured it out, you know?

[Lizzie Logan]

Right. But still, like, it's just.

[Dana Schwartz]

It's a good question.

[Lizzie Logan]

It's a weird. It's a weird decision. And also, why would he do this? What's the motive? The Chicago PD have a press conference, and they say that he did it to get a raise and that he sent himself the threatening letter. They have no evidence for either of these claims.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

So, like, that. Those are just two things that they state very unequivocally that they will never provide evidence for.

[Dana Schwartz]

I also. I'm like, I have absolutely no doubt that he has been threatened and harassed.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yes. The FBI looks into the letter. They never figure out who sent it. And there's no evidence that he. That, A, this would have somehow led to a raise, or B, that, like, he was hard up for cash. So that's just, like, not a good motive.

[Dana Schwartz]

The only motive you can point to is publicity and attention.

[Lizzie Logan]

I think that's a much better motive.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. He's an actor. They famously love attention. Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

I'll say another thing. Who pays for crimes by check?

[Dana Schwartz]

That I was gonna say. Well, because. I was gonna say they could say, well, he's are weed. You know, we're his weed dealer. He was paying for weed. But you would never pay for weed with a check.

[Lizzie Logan]

Rich person 101.

[Dana Schwartz]

Get cash. Cash.

[Lizzie Logan]

Jesse's explanation for the check is that it's for training in a meal plan for a music video that he's going to.

[Dana Schwartz]

Well, that's Also plausible. I would pay for training in a meal plan via check.

[Lizzie Logan]

And literally in the like, note section on the check is like the name of the music video.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

Like, it absolutely checks out. He says that the need your help on the low text was about he wanted them to pick up an herbal fat loss drug while they were in Nigeria.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

That's like illegal in the States.

[Dana Schwartz]

Like they were going to Nigeria. Also plausible.

[Lizzie Logan]

I would also believe that Jesse was just embarrassed and trying to cover up the fact that he wanted like regular illegal drugs.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

Like, I could even see a world where he says, okay, they. The reason that they came and met up with me at 2am was to like, I bought cocaine from them.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

And then also unrelated to that, I got beat up by some white guys.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. I wasn't out just getting a sandwich. I was also buying cocaine.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. I was also buying cocaine. And then later I ran into one white guy who did this thing. Like it was a coincidence.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

You know what I mean? Like, I'm just making all this up, but I'm like, I would believe that there's some version of it that involves like regular drugs.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah, very plausible.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. But I don't know, he never says any of that. So whatever. The cops, they'll say that they're really mad and that they think that, you know, we wish that the murders got this attention instead of this Hollywood thing. I think they're loving this.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, I bet they're laughing it up.

[Lizzie Logan]

They're thrilled. They, they're like, look at our good police work. We're smarter than this TV star.

[Dana Schwartz]

Well, that's the thing. When I'm saying the muddying the waters, this like, lets the cops have a victory lap.

[Lizzie Logan]

They're like, don't you dare take advantage of our racial tension. And we have less hate crimes than you thought in Chicago.

[Dana Schwartz]

See, one less. Yeah, Specifically, one less.

[Lizzie Logan]

One less is better than one more. In March, he pleads not guilty.

[Ryan Reynolds]

Sure.

[Lizzie Logan]

At this point, Kim Fox has recused herself.

[Dana Schwartz]

The lawyer.

[Lizzie Logan]

The state's attorney.

[Dana Schwartz]

State's attorney.

[Lizzie Logan]

Because back when Jussie was the victim, she talked to him. So she's sort of like. So she just recuses herself.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

So the attorney prosecuting his case is now a white man named Joe Magatz.

[Dana Schwartz]

Maggots.

[Advertiser/Promoter]

I know.

[Ashley I]

All right.

[Lizzie Logan]

And all of a sudden he drops the charges.

[Dana Schwartz]

Sure.

[Lizzie Logan]

And Jussie agrees to pay $10,000 of his bond and complete community service.

[Dana Schwartz]

Honestly, I'm like, yeah, as you should. It's like, it's such a messy, complicated situation. You're like, let's not make a big deal of this. It's embarrassing for everyone.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. Kim is still the one who has to go, like, on news shows and explain the decision. She says this might seem really strange to people who don't work in the legal system, but it's actually not that strange that a. That the state's attorney would choose not to pursue a Class 4 felony, which is the lowest class of felony. Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

It's like what you said it was like filing a false police report.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

Why would they go through this entire rigmarole for filing a false police report? Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

She says Cook county has a really high rate of homicide, domestic violence, gun violence, and it's a better use of her time to go after those crimes. And he's not just getting away with it. He did community service and gave up money, and he can put whatever spin he wants on it, but, you know, lots of people do crimes and don't see the inside of a jail cell. And he has no criminal record, and it's a nonviolent offense.

[Dana Schwartz]

And also, it's, like, got away, quote, unquote, got away with it. It's a crime that doesn't, like, hurt people. Tangibly. Again, we talk about muddying the waters. Yeah. And the real victim then of it coming out was his reputation.

[Lizzie Logan]

Like, mostly people want to make him pay because they tweeted really cringy statements about lynching. Yeah. But making people tweet cringy statements about linging is not against the law.

[Dana Schwartz]

It's not against the law.

[Lizzie Logan]

Mayor Emanuel calls it a whitewash of justice.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, Maybe shouldn't have used that phrase, but. All right. All right, Mayor Emanuel.

[Lizzie Logan]

I think their hope was that Jesse would just, like, shut up.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

But he treats it like he's been vindicated.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. Because they dropped the charges. And he's like, see? I did it.

[Lizzie Logan]

He's like, I've been vindicated. This is proof I didn't do it. Yada, yada, yada. Really rubs everyone the wrong way. He's. He's like, I've been cleared. I've been redeemed.

[Dana Schwartz]

And you know what I also will say for him? Being like, okay, so the cops couldn't catch the white people who did this. You mean the Chicago PD couldn't catch the people who did the crime. Yeah, sounds about right.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. So he's still written out of Empire.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

Trump is really mad because he had blamed maga.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

And so he's like, jesse's racist against white people.

[Dana Schwartz]

See, this is the thing that makes it worse. Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

The FBI has decided to look into this whole charges drop situation.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

His lawyer is like, great. Now it's a federal case. He's being double victimized. And at the end of 2019, Lori Lightfoot takes over for Rahm Emanuel and fires Eddie Johnson for drinking on the job and lying about it. So things are going great in Chicago.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yep. Things are always going great with Chicago pd. Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

A special prosecutor charges him with six counts of disorderly conduct.

[Dana Schwartz]

That again, also seems like they weren't quite sure what crime to charge him with because, like, you're like, is that disorderly conduct?

[Advertiser/Promoter]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

Cause you, like, waste the police's time. I don't like, I guess.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

I'm not a lawyer.

[Dana Schwartz]

I'm not a lawyer.

[Lizzie Logan]

I mean, I am, but I'm not. He goes to trial.

[Dana Schwartz]

He go, okay, now he goes to trial. See, I was so checked out. I didn't know this happened.

[Advertiser/Promoter]

This was.

[Lizzie Logan]

Now we're like in the pandemic.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay. So we were worrying about other things. We all kind of moved on.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yes. In one of the documentaries I watched, they're like, this was Chicago's O.J. trial. And I'm like, I don't think anyone was paying nearly that much attention.

[Dana Schwartz]

No. The thing about the O.J. trial is people cared.

[Advertiser/Promoter]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

The lawyers have a new strategy, his lawyers, which is that they say that the brothers did it because they were homophobic.

[Dana Schwartz]

It is interesting, again, given that there's so much security camera footage that you're like, yeah, if there was another person in this area, we would. Or another two people in this area, we would have seen them. These are the only two people in this area.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

And it's all really dark. You can't see the face of anyone at all.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. So again, it makes sense as a defense where you're like, I guess these were the two people.

[Lizzie Logan]

The jury does not go for this. And he is convicted on five of the six counts.

[Dana Schwartz]

Wow.

[Lizzie Logan]

By now it's 2022. The officer who killed Laquan McDonald has just gotten out of prison early for good behavior. Oh, great. He served less than half of his sentence. So is the Chicago legal system trying to make an example out of Jussie as a distraction? Oh, possible, because it makes law enforcement look competent and reminds people not to believe everything. That sounds really bad. I don't know.

[Dana Schwartz]

It also kind of feels like maybe it's not that mastermindy, but it is convenient.

[Lizzie Logan]

That's where I land. I think that they would manipulate the Courts at this point. Laquan McDonald was murdered eight years ago. So I'm not sure that they're falsifying evidence.

[Dana Schwartz]

And there was a jury trial for Jesse. Right. It was a true jury who.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. I'm not sure that they're making up evidence in the Jesse case to cover up what happened with Laquan, but I'm sure they're, I don't know, throwing extra resources at the. I would believe that they're throwing extra resources at the case.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. They want to at least not humiliate themselves at this point.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. They're in it to win it. One month later is Jesse's sentencing. So his supporters, including the Rev. Jesse Jackson and the actor Samuel L. Jackson, who are not related despite having the same last name. I mean, I knew that, but I thought it was funny. Write letters to the judge asking for leniency and sentencing.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

They point out that people who are convicted of Class 4 felonies often don't serve any jail time. And they find other ways to serve their sentences, like house arrest or community service or, you know, you can check in with a parole officer, do weekend jail. Basically, they say, listen, this kid is famous, black, gay, and had a Jewish dad. He's going to be a target in prison, and he has already suffered a lot. It would be very reasonable for you to find an alternative.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

The white male judge is not having it. He orders Jesse to pay over a hundred thousand dollars in restitution, $25,000 in

[Dana Schwartz]

fines, but he already paid $3,500 for the crime.

[Lizzie Logan]

He's like, jesse, you are a liar and a pretender and a charlatan. You are getting 30 months probation and 150 days in jail starting now.

[Dana Schwartz]

Wow. Did they ever get his phone?

[Lizzie Logan]

Jesse's?

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. I don't know, because I am curious whether they, like, could. I mean, I guess they got the texts from the brothers.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

It's just very interesting.

[Lizzie Logan]

There's no other smoking gun texts.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

Jussie stands up in court and he yells out, your Honor, I respect you, but I did not do this. And as he's being led out of the courtroom, he turns and he yells, I am not suicidal.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, interesting. They think they're going to kill him to quiet him. He thinks they're gonna kill him to quiet him.

[Lizzie Logan]

He thinks that there's a chance that something will happen to him, that, like, he could get into a fight in jail and that the cops will be so embarrassed that they'll say that it was suicide.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

Just like if he Dies for whatever reason in jail, that the cops will be so embarrassed that they let this happen to him that they'll say it was suicide to cover it up. And. Or this guy is so messy and lives for attention and drama. Sure. He gets out on appeal six days later. Oh, great.

[Advertiser/Promoter]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

So he's granted an appeal, and he makes bail. And so, yeah, in October 2023, he goes to an outpatient rehab. In November 2024, the appeal is still happening, and the Illinois State Supreme Court overrules the entire second trial and conviction because the state had originally agreed to drop the charges in exchange for community Service and the $10,000 bond. And since he held up his end of the bargain, they have to hold up theirs.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yes.

[Lizzie Logan]

So it's basically the double jeopardy principle, which is that you can't try a person for the same crime twice. Twice. So expanding on that, if you agree not to try a person, you can't undo that deal. You already made a deal on whatever crime you think they did.

[Dana Schwartz]

Fair.

[Lizzie Logan]

While all of this has been going on, Chicago has been suing Jussie for the cost of the investigation.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay.

[Lizzie Logan]

And Jussie has been countersuing the city of Chicago. This part of the case doesn't wrap up until May 2025.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, so messy.

[Lizzie Logan]

Jesse donates $50,000 to a charity, and that settles it. So great job, everybody. This is an awesome use of the courts.

[Dana Schwartz]

You know what? A charity got $50,000. That's good.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yep.

[Dana Schwartz]

I'm happy about that. I can't believe how many trials this took. Yeah, and I was just talking about how all the trials were for hoaxes were back in the 1700s. I was wrong about that.

[Lizzie Logan]

For the last few years, Jesse has been working a little. He directed a couple movies. He made another album. He was on a reality show. He goes to events sometimes. He talked about the incident on two podcasts. And last year, he participated in a Netflix documentary.

[Dana Schwartz]

See, that's what's interesting to me, because, I mean, I guess he needs to kind of maintain that it actually happened. But if I were Josie or his publicist or his creative manager, I would say, just say that's in the past. I don't want to talk about that anymore. I want to talk about moving forward. This was one night, 10, almost 10 years ago.

[Lizzie Logan]

20, 19.

[Dana Schwartz]

2019. Okay. Almost seven years ago. This was one night seven years ago. I just want to move forward with my life.

[Lizzie Logan]

I think he'll start saying that soon.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

The documentary is interesting. It goes through the whole thing without ever mentioning the Bleach.

[Dana Schwartz]

Like bleach that was found on his sweater.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

Or jacket.

[Lizzie Logan]

That's just like, not part of it. Like they just. That's not part of the evidence anymore.

[Dana Schwartz]

Interesting.

[Lizzie Logan]

The documentary makes a lot out of this one bit of security footage.

[Dana Schwartz]

Is the documentary pro or anti Jesse or pretty middle balanced?

[Lizzie Logan]

It tries to present itself as balanced, but it is kind of pro Jesse.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay.

[Lizzie Logan]

Because it makes a lot out of the like very little pro Jesse evidence that, like, is actually quite weak.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay.

[Lizzie Logan]

It makes a lot out of this one bit of security footage that seems to show one of the two, like, figures stepping into some light and maybe having lighter skin than the Osundero brothers. But, like, it's very grainy and it's not high quality footage. And like, there's just really nothing to suggest that that actually is like correctly colored.

[Dana Schwartz]

And we actually have actual evidence that these brothers took this Uber and cab. We know they did come to this area.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. So, like, until someone explains what else they were doing in that area, it really isn't.

[Dana Schwartz]

And it does not seem from the footage that I'm sure the police combed through that other people, another pair of people were in this area.

[Lizzie Logan]

Well, so they find these two witnesses.

[Dana Schwartz]

Okay.

[Lizzie Logan]

One of them was a doorman at the Sheraton and saw a white guy in a ski mask running at the time of the incident. And there is security footage that would maybe corroborate this. And some of the security footage is missing.

[Dana Schwartz]

Interesting.

[Lizzie Logan]

And we know from the Laquan McDonald case that the cops have the ability to like cover their tracks. Deleting footage. Yeah, but I've also seen people say that, like hotel security cameras, like they have lag. Like they have, like, they don't record, you know, they just sort of take snapshots.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

So, like, this is maybe not quite a smoking gun.

[Dana Schwartz]

And also it would be difficult to identify someone's race in a ski mask running past you at two in the morning when presumably the doorman was inside.

[Lizzie Logan]

I think he says that he, like shone his flashlight in the guy's face.

[Dana Schwartz]

All right.

[Lizzie Logan]

I mean, I don't know why this guy would lie. He's a black guy.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

So maybe he was running. I don't think he was running saying, I just did a hate crime.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah, but okay,

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[Lizzie Logan]

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[Lizzie Logan]

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[Lizzie Logan]

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[Lizzie Logan]

contact store for availability. There's also a woman who lived in Jesse's building who says that she took her dog out to pee at midnight who says that she saw a white man, like, standing on the corner with, like, a bit of rope in his, like, coming out of his pocket.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, suspicious.

[Lizzie Logan]

Very suspicious. But also, like, okay, so he stood there for two hours in negative 20 degrees.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

I mean, but again, if you're, like, fueled by the fire of racism, I guess it keeps you warm.

[Dana Schwartz]

It also is. It's tricky because you're, like, on one hand, the Chicago PD would have, when this crime was told to them, would have wanted to do everything to solve it right away. But if they couldn't and could only link the Nigerian brothers, then they would. Would want to cover their tracks, to not be embarrassed.

[Lizzie Logan]

I mean, I can imagine a situation where they find the Alcindero brothers, get a confession, and then just stop looking. Yeah, like, they're just like, oh, other witnesses came forward, whatever. We don't want to interview them. Yeah. The Austin Darrow brothers have released a book. They've gone on Fox News. They have a podcast about what they did. Like, they're obviously out for money and attention, too. Like, they're not, you know, unbiased in their recollection of things. Yeah, they're not necessarily trustworthy narrators. But let's get into it. Let's get into the theories. The best way that I can describe looking into this in, like, a normal hoax, I feel like one side says, okay, here's my story. My story is red. And then the other side says, well, my story is blue. And then we talk it through, and we find, okay, well, the story is mostly blue, but it's a little purple. And then we do another hoax, and it's like, one side says, okay, well, my story is one. And the other side says, well, my story is five. And then we talk it through, and we find out, okay, well, it's actually four, you know, and we, like, find the middle ground.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

And in this, it's like, well, one side says it's green and the other side says it's seven. And I don't know how to find the middle ground between green and seven.

[Dana Schwartz]

Well, because the most generous to Jussie is even if details are suspicious, there's a version of this where he was attacked and, you know, he was walking home and he was the victim of a hate crime or not, or just a random act of violence. And he maybe, for attention, maybe believed it, fabricated a version that was. With more emphasis on. That it was a hate crime against him, that it was, you know, because he was gay and because he was black and because he was on Empire. And that's a version where you're like. And then he told details to the police that were a little exaggerated. But he was attacked and a victim of random violence. Or.

[Lizzie Logan]

But he somehow would have had to have a noose with him because there's security footage of him getting home with the noose around his neck.

[Dana Schwartz]

He didn't take it off before he got home.

[Lizzie Logan]

He walked into the lobby with the noose around his neck.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, yeah. He didn't notice somehow.

[Lizzie Logan]

Well, he had it. I'm just saying he had it on. I'm like, when he left to go to. To go get some food, he didn't have the noose on, and when he came back, he had the noose on. So his attackers must have had a racial component or he had the rope with him.

[Dana Schwartz]

Well, so that is the. The evidence against this. Like, he was the victim of a random act of violence and then. Which he then exaggerated. Yeah, because it's like, well, you can't.

[Advertiser/Promoter]

There was.

[Dana Schwartz]

There was a prop. There was planning involved. So did he plan this or did someone else plan this?

[Lizzie Logan]

Right, so the. Okay, so neither version makes sense.

[Dana Schwartz]

The problem is he just went too far. If he didn't have a prop, people would have believed him.

[Lizzie Logan]

Like, why would a racist know where he was and wait outside in a polar vortex only to lightly beat him up, but also have props? But also, why would he fake it so poorly?

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah, he thought he would get it. I mean, the answer to why would he fake it so poorly is he's a celebrity who thought he would get away with it.

[Lizzie Logan]

Jussie, in an interview with Variety, said that basically all of the, like, inconsistencies are to further cover up what happened with Laquan McDonald.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, don't.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

That's.

[Dana Schwartz]

That's. This is the part that I, like, don't want to be On Jussie's side. Because I'm like, don't use this horrific tragedy of a boy who was murdered.

[Advertiser/Promoter]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

He sort of just suggests.

[Dana Schwartz]

Tests it. Okay.

[Lizzie Logan]

He's like. And he just sort of ties it together to just sort of cast doubt on the Chicago pd. He's like, well, all this stuff about how corrupt the Chicago PD was was coming out. So that's why they kept doing all this stuff, to keep my trial in the news and keep my trial going. Which, like, yeah, it's icky. He just wants to smear the Chicago pd. But, like, I'm not going to sit here and ride for the Chicago pd. But, like, I don't necessarily disagree that they would use his trial to, like, cover their misdeeds, but I don't think that doesn't mean that they've just followed the evidence.

[Dana Schwartz]

That's the double side of it. The thing that's true, which is that the Chicago PD absolutely would have taken advantage of this trial to make themselves look better. And that doesn't necessarily mean they were fully lying. Maybe they were just taking advantage of this situation where they're like, oh, great, a celebrity that we can make look dumb and look stupid. And we can, like. Because he. If, you know, they just fell in their laps. Just fell in their laps.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

Of course they would take advantage of it.

[Lizzie Logan]

So I came up with, like, 10 theories. 10 theories that I have ordered from Jussie Innocent to Jesse guilty.

[Dana Schwartz]

Great. I am so excited. I can't believe you. I can't even think of 10 theories. I mean, I have two theories, but please, please.

[Lizzie Logan]

Number one, it happened exactly as Jesse said it did.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

Sometimes just. Things are crazy.

[Dana Schwartz]

Things are crazy.

[Lizzie Logan]

And just. We just don't have all the information. Just, like, somehow.

[Dana Schwartz]

Somehow, look, these people were out to try to do a hate crime.

[Lizzie Logan]

Like, I. I don't know how racists think.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

Maybe they thought it was worth it to stand out there in the cold. Yeah, whatever. There's security footage. Can lie. And the brothers had a different reason for being in the area.

[Dana Schwartz]

The brothers were selling him weed. Maybe. Yeah. Who knows? It happened.

[Lizzie Logan]

It happened. Number two, it happened similar to how he said it did, but, like, he exaggerated. Like, they didn't actually yell. What? What he said they yelled.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

And maybe it wasn't two guys. It was just one guy. And that's why they can't find it on the security footage, because he, like, he wanted to seem tougher. So he said it was two guys. Yeah, because he didn't want to admit he lost a fight to one guy. And that's why they couldn't find on security footage, because they were looking for two guys and there's actually one guy.

[Dana Schwartz]

That is a slightly more plausible version. Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

Someone else paid white guys to do this. Or like some, like, white guys did this and then had Ola and Bola take the fall for it.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, okay.

[Lizzie Logan]

Someone else had Ola and Bola do this and that's why Jesse's confused.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah, he wasn't involved at all. Although they. You think they would confess to someone else telling them to do this?

[Lizzie Logan]

They're, like, scared of that person.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, sure.

[Lizzie Logan]

He's paying. He's paying them still.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

To say it was Jesse.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

It was someone else's idea who said it all up. But Jesse was in on it. And that's why it all sounds so screwy.

[Dana Schwartz]

Sure.

[Lizzie Logan]

That's why there's, like, weird missing texts. And, like, the plan is so bad because there were, like, delayed flights and like, it was just like a bad plan because maybe someone who wasn't in Chicago and didn't know about the weather, like, it was just like a bad plan. Bad plan with miscommunications.

[Dana Schwartz]

I mean, that's. He does have a creative director and

[Lizzie Logan]

that's why it was, like, unclear whether or not they were going to call the cops. Yeah, yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

Not fully thought of.

[Lizzie Logan]

Number six, Jussie had a mental health crisis and genuinely doesn't remember telling them to do this.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

Number seven, he got the threatening letter and wanted the studio to pay for him to have security. So he planned the attack out of a legitimate fear of violence.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

And it was just like a last minute thing. And that's why it's like, such a bad plan.

[Dana Schwartz]

At any point did he ask for security or did this. Cause I wonder. Or either way, I mean, if he felt like he was threatened, he wanted to be like, see, it's serious.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

He had a legitimate fear, and so he sent himself the letter.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

And so he wanted the studio to pay for security, and so he sent himself the letter. And then when that didn't work, then he did this plan and it was all very last minute. And that's why it's such a bad plan. Yeah. Number nine, after years of experiencing the kind of racism and homophobia that is too subtle to fight aggressively but still wears away at the soul, Jussie found himself famously black and famously gay and benefiting from privilege, yet full of rage at a time when it seemed that victims were their own breed of Celebrity. He wanted to make his inner wounds visible to the outside world. He wanted to engage meaningfully in civil rights work the way his mother had. But growing up on set had given him a distorted view of the line between reality and fiction. Stressed and exhausted by his job, he came up with a plan that in his mind, would give him a platform from which to speak about things that mattered. Staging a quote, unquote real incident that wouldn't actually hurt anyone. He just wanted attention and never meant to get the cops involved. But by that time, it was too late. And as the case spun out of control, all he could do was stick to his story, even as it made him look, for lack of a better word, bug nuts, Bananas Lizzie.

[Dana Schwartz]

That is incredibly well said. And you know what? I can also see in someone's misguided head, as you said, making internal, very legitimate wounds external. Him being like, this will be a platform for good.

[Lizzie Logan]

Right. Like, maybe people have shouted that at him in the past.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

And he just never complained about it because he didn't want to be a rich celebrity complaining. But he's like, no, I'm gonna be. I'm going to talk about how I've. People have shouted this at me.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

Number 10. While the country faced a racial reckoning, Smollett callously and maliciously sought to capture the zeitgeist for his own selfish aims, banking on the public's sympathy to prop up a stalled career instead of doing what every other hack in Hollywood knows you have to do. Skip the shortcuts and put in the work.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. I think it's probably. I'm going to say, I'm going to Hope 9. Yeah. That's where I land. Dana Schwartz.

[Lizzie Logan]

All right, this is our last section. Are you ready for my hot take?

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

I don't even know if I believe in this hot take, but this is my hot hot.

[Dana Schwartz]

This is the best kind of hot take. One that you can't fully defend in

[Lizzie Logan]

the fullness of time. With hindsight. This is not that big of a deal.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. I mean, the thing is, no one. No one except him got hurt.

[Lizzie Logan]

I think the response at the time was correct.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

Because the response to the incident was a huge what the fuck? Because that is the correct response.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

And then the response to the revelation that it was a hoax was a huge what the fuck? Also correct.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

But as you said, I think there was a very big. I think people were nervous that future hate crimes would be not believed.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

I am not an expert. I don't know that that has come to pass.

[Dana Schwartz]

I actually agree with you. I think because he is a celebrity that maybe actually makes it more ridiculous as like a, as a circus exit.

[Lizzie Logan]

It's just a bizarre one off happened.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

Like people. I mean, granted there were video, but like people believe and understand even if they have different reactions to it. People don't think that George Floyd's death was faked.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

People don't believe that Breonna Taylor's death was faked. Like it's so bizarre that it goes outside the realm of hate crime stories and into the realm of strange celebrity things.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yes.

[Lizzie Logan]

I don't know that people are being accused of Jussie smolletting.

[Dana Schwartz]

The only thing that I would say is a consequence, but I would argue is not his fault, is just the rapaciousness of like the maga far right movement is it makes like wokeness look silly.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

But they would take advantage of anything to try to make wokeness look silly.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. And, and correct me if I'm wrong, if other people aren't being believed as a result, then that's horrible. And I take this back.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

But I just, I haven't, I haven't noticed that happening. Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

It doesn't seem like the narrative, for at least the ones we hear about in the news, is people questioning whether or not they've actually happened. But I will say it shone a light to me. This is my read of the situation that I have not done the research in. To me, it's shown a light on the fact that people get social capital and benefit from playing the. I mean literally, in this case, playing the victim. And I think that narrative is one that the right really latched onto for the purposes of ridiculing and minimizing the suffering of legitimately vulnerable populations.

[Lizzie Logan]

I mean, sort of the classic like victim who lied story is like that Rolling Stone article about sexual assault. Like the women whose stories of sexual assault are later shown to have like inconsistencies. Every time that happens it's like, like, oh God, here's another setback or something. But usually it's like someone who is not famous, who then gains some sort of fame as a result of being a victim and then is shown to have, for lack of a better word, just like, made it up.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

That tends to set back victims in general. Jesse was already famous, but. And so it, it has this weird effect of it being like, I guess maybe now people won't be believe celebrities. It does. I don't know that they're less like, less inclined to believe victims.

[Dana Schwartz]

I fully agree with you on that point. I will be more critical in general, I think, than you, because I do think. And again, I don't blame Jesse for this. I think this is a problem of like, Internet culture and the way the far right operates, that it made wokeness look silly and it reinforced an idea that they had in their heads that people play the victim for social gain.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yes.

[Dana Schwartz]

And I think that that is a narrative that a lot of people on the right have, that people cry victim for their own benefit for. What is it?

[Lizzie Logan]

Points.

[Dana Schwartz]

Points. But I was saying for like the diversity.

[Lizzie Logan]

Dei.

[Dana Schwartz]

Dei. Thank you. Whatever. Like, oh, DEI points is what they're trying to get. And I think that this moment, because it was so publicized and because it was so like, once you have the narrative in your head of this guy faking this elaborate thing, it's so silly. It reinforces this cultural movement away from wokeness because it's like, see, people are only playing into this for their own social benefit. And I think measuring that and ascribing that to Jussie isn't fair because you just, you can't do that. But I do see this as like a bullet point in a. I mean, a genuine post woke an anti woke backlash that we have seen in our culture, which is reinforced by a belief that people complain about genuine social injustices for attention.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. And I mean, and that speaks to a lot of like, larger cultural trends that this podcast is on about.

[Dana Schwartz]

No, like, and it's also impossible to measure.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

I'm just like anecdotally trying to like, pull from the sky of these random data points.

[Lizzie Logan]

No, totally. Like, I 100 agree with you and I. And I do wish that, like, we relied less on like, stories and more on like, hard facts because then it would matter less if, if stories got debunked because hard, like, you know what I mean, like, if we didn't need examples. So. But you know what I mean, it's

[Dana Schwartz]

that thing of one person is a tragedy. A million people is a statistic.

[Lizzie Logan]

Exactly. I also think, like, just to my, to my point of this being like, whatever, like, so Jesse's trying to have a comeback.

[Dana Schwartz]

Sure.

[Lizzie Logan]

I wouldn't hire him if he was

[Dana Schwartz]

trying to have a comeback. He really should be quiet about this.

[Lizzie Logan]

He should. There are other men in Hollywood trying to have a comeback right now and succeeding who their careers were destroyed for crimes that. I'm not going to compare apples and oranges.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

In terms of impact, right or wrong. But what they did tangibly hurt other people. Whereas Jesse's main victim is himself.

[Dana Schwartz]

And also if you're, if you Google Mark Wahlberg hate crime. It's not a hoax. So just. That's just a fun fact for you.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yes. And there are men who, for instance, recently showed up at snl, recently showed up at the Netflix's Laugh Festival, recently showed up at the Cannes Film Festival, who I would argue did things that damaged their careers but are now having comebacks, who tangibly hurt other people. Where I'm like, obviously the bar in Hollywood is pretty low. Maybe none of these men should get to have careers. But I'm like, whatever, Jesse. Like, I don't care. Like, whatever.

[Dana Schwartz]

You know, the difference is the quote unquote gatekeepers, like the powerful people don't like feeling tricked and they don't like feeling like Jesse was trying to trick them.

[Lizzie Logan]

I'm just like, whatever, he's just mentally

[Dana Schwartz]

ill. Like, yeah, he just did, like you said, a bananas thing.

[Lizzie Logan]

He's just like. And I don't even mean to disparage mentally ill people because most of us would not ever do this. Like, it's horrible, but like,

[Dana Schwartz]

famous a form of mental illness.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. Like, I don't know. I think he was just having a minty beef. I.

[Dana Schwartz]

It's like such a. I understand why it got so much attention. Because it took, for lack of a better word, like, fun thing to parse out.

[Ashley I]

Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

Because it's kind of like you said, like an actual victimless crime by the end. Like, he's the only victim, but that, like, so people can get this schadenfreude, like, like going through the true crime details of it without actually feeling bad because, like, a person isn't dead. Thank God.

[Advertiser/Promoter]

Yeah.

[Dana Schwartz]

Oh, so much. But again, yeah, people, men are coming back in Hollywood for doing way worse.

[Lizzie Logan]

Yeah. So that's what happened. Or it didn't happen.

[Dana Schwartz]

I think I would love, you know, people more qualified than us to weigh in on what Jesse Smollett's future should be in Hollywood. I'm not the arbiter of that, but I also am like, look, we all make mistakes. We all do insane sometimes. We all do insane things. Not this insane. No, I think I'm a little. Not angrier. Annoyed, like, I don't know the right word for like, annoyed. Just because I'm so scared and troubled by this, like, anti woke backlash that people who did take advantage of the moment I am inclined to view more harshly. But I also fully agree with you that men come back in Hollywood for doing far worse to actual victims.

[Lizzie Logan]

I Mean, yeah, again, like I'm not like we should welcome him back but it's hard for me to stir up real vitriol against this guy. I just think of it, he's. He's just a clown to me. Like he's just a fool to me.

[Dana Schwartz]

I think actual gay black people could

[Lizzie Logan]

better inform he is an actual gay black people. But that was, that part was not a hoax. He really is gay and black.

[Dana Schwartz]

I think gay people of color might have different opinions on what his.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Oh, probably.

[Dana Schwartz]

Yeah. Yeah. But Lizzie, I am very grateful for like the clarity and restraint and fact based reporting that you shared in this hoax. Because again, like you said, this was one where I was like, nope, not for me. But it is very interesting.

[Lizzie Logan]

You know, we tried to keep it to the things that we knew to be true and we probably got some stuff wrong.

[Dana Schwartz]

But you have 10 possible theories and

[Lizzie Logan]

I think 10 possible theories. What if gotta be right.

[Dana Schwartz]

One of em's gotta. It has to land somewhere on that spectrum.

[Narrator/Advertiser]

Somewhere.

[Advertiser/Promoter]

That's it.

[Lizzie Logan]

That's all I have.

[Dana Schwartz]

Lizzy Logan, it's the end of the season. Thank you so much for listening.

[Lizzie Logan]

Thank you guys.

[Dana Schwartz]

This has just been a joy and a delight and we are going to continue to hoax, but we're not sure exactly where or when, but probably still on this exact feed and definitely on the same Instagram will be communicated. So thank you for your listening and your support. Yeah.

[Lizzie Logan]

And please hoax responsibly.

[Dana Schwartz]

Please hoax responsibly.

[Lizzie Logan]

Bye. Hoax is a production of Iheart Podcasts. Our hosts are Danish Schwartz and Lizzie Logan. Our executive producers are Matt Frederick and Trevor Young with supervising producer Rima El Kayali and producers Nomes Griffin and Jesse Bunk. Our theme music was composed by Lane Montgomery. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Thanks for listening.

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I mean, you could just keep buying new underwear.

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[Lizzie Logan]

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