FRIDAY NIGHT SPECIAL: Jussie Smollet Hate Crime Hoax - True Story Instead?
Crime Stories with Nancy Grace
iHeartPodcasts and CrimeOnline
4.2 • 8.1K Ratings
🗓️ 2 August 2025
⏱️ 44 minutes
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Summary
Former "Empire" actor Jussie Smollett convicted of staging a hate crime attack against himself on a cold Chicago night. Then the Illinois Supreme Court overturned Smollett's conviction. The court did not consider where the actor committed the crime, only that his constitutional rights were violated when he was prosecuted again after the original charges were dropped. Smollett then settled with the city. Now a new Netflix documentary suggest Smollett was telling the truth.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is an IHeart podcast. |
| 0:04.8 | Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. |
| 0:11.3 | I cannot believe it. |
| 0:14.6 | Netflix, add it again. |
| 0:17.6 | In the last days, we learned about a so-called Netflix special documentary. |
| 0:24.0 | Okay, that tasted bad going down. |
| 0:27.5 | Documentary with, quote, new evidence that Jesse Smollett's hate crime hoax, quote, might just be a true story. Okay, somebody come scrape me off the floor. |
| 0:46.5 | What? Okay. We've heard about this. We've investigated this. We have the two guys that pulled the hoax with checks written to them. |
| 0:57.6 | We've got all the lies. We've got all the circumstantial evidence. And now Netflix announces a |
| 1:04.6 | quote, documentary. You know, I think it should be called a mockumentary about Jesse Smollett and his hate crime hoax. |
| 1:15.6 | Okay, wait for it. |
| 1:17.1 | What's the title? |
| 1:18.0 | Quote, the truth about Jesse Smollett, question mark, end quote. |
| 1:24.5 | I'm going to vomit. |
| 1:25.9 | No, I've got to keep reporting. |
| 1:28.5 | According to Netflix, they have, quote, new evidence about the case. |
| 1:35.5 | And we'll tell the, quote, shocking true story of an allegedly fake story that some now say might just be a true story. Okay, that's a loaded ad. I'm Nancy Grace. |
| 1:52.2 | This is crime stories. Thank you for being with us. Let's just off the top say, technical legal term. |
| 1:59.7 | That's BS. |
| 2:02.1 | Jussie Smollett pulled off a hoax, a hoax that engendered so much hatred, so many bad feelings, |
| 2:15.1 | wrongdoing from within the prosecutor's office and more. |
| 2:20.5 | If you will recall, Smollett, famous for the storing role of Jamal Lyon on Fox's drama |
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