More On: Jussie Smollett
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On Tuesday, a Black Lives Matter leader reaffirmed the movement's support for Jussie Smollett, the actor accused of falsely claiming he was the victim of a racist and homophobic hate crime, claiming that activists 'can never believe police' when it comes to a black guy.
Smollett was represented by Melina Abdullah, a former California State University professor and co-founder of Black Lives Matter Los Angeles, who called the trial a "white supremacist sham."
“So let’s be clear: we love everybody in our community,” Abdullah wrote in a statement on the website for the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation. “It’s not about a trial or a verdict decided in a white supremacist charade, it’s about how we treat our community when corrupt systems are working to devalue their lives.”
“In an abolitionist society, this trial would not be taking place, and our communities would not have to fight and suffer to prove our worth,” added Abdullah, who is director of a Defund the Police group. “Instead, we find ourselves once again being forced to put our lives and our value in the hands of judges and juries operating in a system that is designed to oppress us, while continuing to face a corrupt and violent police department who has proven time and again to have no respect for our lives.”
Smollett is accused of filing a false police report in January 2019 alleging that he was assaulted by two individuals who yelled racist and homophobic slurs at him and tied a rope around his neck. He informed police that the attack happened on a cold Chicago night when he was out getting a Subway sandwich.
After initially investigating the brothers as people of interest, police changed their emphasis to determining if Smollett hired siblings Ola and Abel Osundairo to arrange an assault, which Smollett said happened in the posh suburb of Streeterville. The 39-year-old actor allegedly orchestrated the fake hate crime to “promote his career” and paid the two men $3,500 to help him, former Chicago police Superintendent Eddie T. Johnson said.
For allegedly filing four different false allegations to Chicago police officers, Smollett faces six charges of felony disorderly conduct. The actor has insisted on his innocence on several occasions.
"Cops lie, and Chicago police lie especially," Abdullah asserted.
“While policing at-large is an irredeemable institution, CPD is notorious for its long and deep history of corruption, racism, and brutality,” she wrote.
“Black Lives Matter will continue to work towards the abolition of police and every unjust system,” she added. “We will continue to love and protect one another, and wrap our arms around those who do the work to usher in Black freedom and, by extension, freedom for everyone else.”
