Jussie Smollett Lawyers Say Even If Jussie Staged The Attack, It’s The Cops’ Fault For Investigating!

Donald Trump Jr. made an excellent point in response to Smollett's lawyers blaming police for investigating the alleged attack on Jussie:

Chicago Sun Times has more on how lawyers are trying to shew blame off of Jussie and onto the city's police:

The actor, once a star of the hit-TV series “Empire,” is making one last attempt to get a city lawsuit against him tossed out of federal court before it proceeds to trial.

Sneed learned exclusively that late Tuesday night, his attorneys filed a motion responding to the city’s claim that he should pay the city more than $130,000 to cover police overtime and other costs. The city says the costs were incurred in connection with an investigation into a report he filed claiming he was the victim of a racist and homophobic attack in River North. Police later charged Smollett with staging the attack.

Attorneys for Smollett deny the actor made up the attack, and note charges were ultimately dropped by Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx.

“My client from the beginning has maintained his innocence and disputed the city’s allegations,” said William J. Quinlan, of The Quinlan Law Firm, who filed the motion. He noted that “it’s going to be very difficult for the city to prevail in making a case my client should pay for overtime for a case ultimately dismissed by the state’s attorney.

“It’s ridiculous and a stretch to require him to do so.”

But the latest court filing contends even if Smollett did make a false report, there is no way the city can assert he would have known the city would investigate — and investigate it to the extent cops did. 

“We contend the city is wrong,” Quinlan said of the city’s assertion that Smollett should have known the police would log nearly 2,000 hours in overtime trying to resolve the case. “ ... The mere fact somebody filed a police report doesn’t presume the investigation will be done and certainly not to the extent of what the city is claiming.” 

He added: “Smollett has no control over that.”

In the legal brief, obtained by Sneed, Smollett makes clear that he “disputes any and all assertions that he made a false statement and was not a victim of a crime.”

But even if he did, “The filing of a police report, in and of itself, does not necessitate a sprawling investigation nor does it, as a practical matter, usually result in an investigation as extensive as the one the CPD chose to undertake in this case,” the motion says.

It goes on to say the city “has failed to allege that Mr. Smollett was similarly ‘well aware’ that his statements to police would result in 1,836 hours of police overtime, or any other reasons why he should have known this would have been the case.”

The Washington Times also detailed:

 Jussie Smollett’s attorneys have filed a motion arguing that the actor should not have to pay Chicago $130,000 for a police investigation into what he claimed was a racist and homophobic attack, because he couldn’t have known how much time and money the department would spend looking into his allegations.

                                                                                                                                                        

The motion, filed this week by the former actor in the television series “Empire,” maintains that Smollett did not stage the attack as the Chicago Police Department alleges. But the motion also suggests that it wasn’t necessary to spend 1,836 hours of police overtime and “untold hours of non-overtime police work” on the investigation after Smollett reported that he was a victim of an attack in downtown Chicago in January.

                                                                                                                                                        

According to the motion, the “filing of a police report, in and of itself, does not necessitate a sprawling investigation nor does it, as a practical matter, usually result in an investigation as extensive as the one the CPD chose to undertake in this case.” The attorneys also argue that all a police report does is enable “the police and prosecutors to decide whether and how to investigate.”

                                                                                                                                                                                                      

The police department has said it only did what was necessary and that it conducted a potential hate crime investigation because Smollett alleged that two masked men hurled racist and homophobic insults at him, beat him and looped a noose around his neck.

                                                                                                                                                        

“Whether it’s Chicago or any other U.S. city, when he reported a vicious hate crime it was going to be investigated at the highest level of vigor and detail,” said police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi. The investigation included canvassing the area for witnesses, dozens of interviews, scientific analysis of the rope as well as the liquid that Smollett said the men threw at him, and the collection of hours of surveillance video from cameras mounted on buildings, inside taxi cabs and from cameras along miles of city streets.