I'm concerned about the implications of Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx’s words as reported on the Fox News website:
Foxx didn’t directly answer the question when CBS 2 TV in Chicago asked if she believed Smollett was innocent, as Smollett has continued to contend, saying only that the matter was handled properly. She pointed to Smollett forfeiting his $10,000 bond and doing community service in return for dropping the charges. “I believe that the outcome — him having to forfeit the $10,000, having to do community service, based on the allegations, and again the (low level) felony and no (criminal) background, are an outcome that we could expect with this type of case,” she said.
OK, what do we have here? A man is charged with a crime, he maintains his innocent, and he has not yet been convicted of anything in a court of law. Yet Ms. Foxx asserts that the “outcome” (as she calls it) is what we “could expect in this type of case.” In other words, we could expect that by paying a $10,000.00 fee and doing community service (whatever that was), this man (and I use the term loosely) is able to make the “allegation” of a felony go away. This sounds like a payoff to me. I mean, if there is no longer even an allegation of criminal conduct, much less a conviction, why should he have to pay one thin dime? And how did he happen to be doing community service before he was convicted of anything? That seems highly unusual and inappropriate to me. What kind of a judicial system is this? Where is due process? Where is the presentation of evidence and a commensurate defense? Ms. Foxx seems to have appointed herself judge and jury. Seems to me she's acting like a tin pot dictator with extra-judicial powers. This whole slimy episode needs to be investigated by the DoJ.
I wonder if Jussie should sue Cook County to get his money back on the basis that he was never convicted of committing a crime.
