And they’re not taking too kindly to the effort of Smollett’s lawyer to try to blame them, even suggesting they were wearing whiteface.
Via Page Six:
The attorney who represented the two brothers who attacked Jussie Smollett said she was “shocked” when she heard that all the charges he had faced in his alleged hate crime in Chicago had been dropped.
“I was shocked. I couldn’t believe it,” Gloria Schmidt told WGN-TV. “For the State’s Attorney’s Office to drop it completely, and not consult with the victim, and with the complaining witnesses, and the key witnesses in this case, I think is baffling.”
The key witnesses are her clients — Ola and Abel Osundairo — who told police the “Empire” actor paid them $3,500 to fake a racist and homophobic attack on him.
“I never doubted for a second what my clients had told me,” Schmidt said. “I think that people need a reason to heal and while it might be easier to blame the Osundairo brothers, it might be easier to do that to conclude that matter, but it’s just not the case.”
Smollett has told investigators that the check for $3,500 was for fitness training.
“There was payment, it was for training. It was for asking them to do a favor also,” she said. “So you really need to look at the intentions. It was always to help a friend.”
The lawyer told the Chicago Sun-Times that her clients had been assigned a victim’s advocate from the prosecutor’s office and were still willing to testify against Smollett.
She said she had never seen a case dismissed completely without some admission of guilt.
“The part that is missing in this transaction is the part where he pleads guilty,” Schmidt said. “From traffic tickets all the way up to felonies, in my eight years of practicing, I have never once had the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office just completely dismiss all charges. Never.”