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When I first heard the news about Jesse Smollett back in late January, my first reaction was... who?

But maybe that was the point. Jesse plays a musician named Jamal Lyon on Empire. The show was about to kick off its fifth season on Fox.

On January 22nd, Jesse received a threatening racist homophobic letter in the mail. It had white powder that turned out to be ibuprofen in it.

The return address was just maga. A week later, things escalated.

Zach Stafford has been covering the story for the advocate.

January 29th, a bunch of us were pinged away early in the morning. That Jesse Smollett had just filed a police report stating that he was the victim of a hate crime.

What was really interesting at the moment and what made this story really explosive at job beyond his celebrity was that the Chicago police announced it in a tweet that they were looking into this hate crime.

They called it a racist and homophobic bias incident. That's where we all took off. As a reporter, he used to live in Chicago working on the crime beat.

The Chicago police never say things like that. I think that was the stage of what's played out to be a mellow drama for many people.

What was the story we initially heard from Jesse and from Chicago police?

The story that we were originally given by Jesse and the police was that Jesse Smollett flew into Chicago to finish some recordings or production around his show Empire that does come out later this year.

When he got to his home in downtown Chicago, which is really close to Chicago River of Walk, people have been in Chicago, so it's a central part of the city. He did not have food in his house.

So he says that he went to a subway restaurant that was open late. I went to the subway and got the order during that time. I texted my manager thinking that he was still in Australia because he was on an Australian tour with one of his other clients.

I say, you'll call me when you can. He called me immediately. And while he was on the phone, I heard as I was crossing the intersection I heard Empire.

I was referring to his account of the story. Two men began yelling, racist, and homophobic epithets at him.

I kept walking and then I heard Empire, so I turned around and I said, the did you just say to me? And I see the attacker masked.

And he said, this manga country punches me right in the face.

And as they punched him, he made sure to tell people that he fought back and they kind of tussled in the Chicago streets.

And a big note here is that this was occurring at 2 in the morning in Chicago in what was one of the coldest days the city has seen in decades.

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