Jussie Smollett Asks Chicago Court To Dismiss Charges Against Him Once Again

 Written By @cabbagepatchgrl

According to a motion released on Tuesday, Jussie Smollett has yet again asked for the Chicago court to dismiss all charges against him.

Smollett’s Legal team filed a motion on September 9, in which they argue that his indictment was based on “illegal and incompetent evidence” that was taken from Abimbola and Olabinigo Osundairo during the beginning of the investigation, which was later ruled invalid.

The Osundairo Brothers claimed that they received money from Smollett to stage a hate crime against him because he was not happy about the salary that he was receiving from Fox’s TV show, “Empire.”

In March of last year, felony charges against Smollett were dropped. Judge Michael Toomin ruled the case as invalid from February 13, 2019, to the day that the Cook County State’s Attorney, Kim Foxx, removed herself from the case.

Judge Toomin ruled that everything from the case, including the decision to drop charges, were null and void. As a result, he demanded the case be investigated by a special prosecutor so that they could restore the public’s faith in the criminal justice system.

In February of this year, Special prosecutor Dan Webb brought new charges against Smollett for allegedly staging the hate-crime against himself in January 2019, following the second round of the grand jury’s testimony.

The grand jury depended on the testimony taken from the Osundairo Brothers on February 20, 2019. But Smollett’s lawyers argued that their testimony was invalid because of Judge Toomin’s order.

The motion states that “The OSP cannot have it both ways. It cannot convene a special grand jury based on Judge Toomin’s Order but then rely on the transcripts from those ‘void’ proceedings to secure a new indictment.” It then states that “Furthermore, there is no legitimate reason why the Osundairo brothers were not called to provide live testimony to the special grand jury, particularly when they live locally in Chicago, were available and cooperating with the OSP, and reportedly met with the OSP for hours only one month earlier.”

According to Smollett’s attorneys, the only reason for not producing them is because the “OSP did not want to suborn further perjury by the Osundairo brothers, it did not want to risk having the brothers make additional contradictory statements prior to trial, and it did not want to allow the jurors their statutory right to question the Osundairo brothers about the incident.”

Smollett’s attorneys say that the omissions are “substantial and prejudicial,” and they are asking the court to drop charges against Smollett since he was not granted his due process rights as required by the Fifth Amendment.

‘His Attorneys then argue that Webb’s team ignored a statutory requirement to inform the grand jurors that they had the right to demand live testimony if they desired.

”Thus, based on the record available to the defense, the grand jurors were not aware that they could subpoena and question the Osundairo brothers instead of relying on their one-sided testimony presented by the OSP from proceedings which have been invalidated by the court. The grand jurors were also not advised that they had the power to make their own investigation unaided by the special prosecutor or the court,” the motion read. “The OSP’s failure to inform the special grand jury at the commencement of the proceedings, before each witness testified, and before a true bill was requested, misled the grand jury and deprived Mr. Smollett of his right to the due process of law.”

On October 14, a hearing for the matter is scheduled. Webb did not return a request for comment.