Netflix announces documentary about Jussie Smollett, his 2019 hate crime hoax

LOS ANGELES: Streaming giant Netflix is coming up with a documentary about Jussie Smollett and his 2019 hate crime hoax.

‘The Truth About Jussie Smollett?’ will premiere on August 22, and it features interviews with police, lawyers, journalists and investigators who claim to have “new evidence about the case,” Variety reported.

According to Netflix’s logline, the 90-minute documentary tells the “shocking true story of an allegedly fake story that some now say might just be a true story.”

Smollett was known for playing the starring role of Jamal Lyon on Fox’s music drama “Empire.” In 2019, he reported himself as the victim of a violent hate crime in Chicago, alleging that two men hurled racial slurs at him, poured an unknown chemical substance on him and wrapped a rope around his neck.

The incident was first met with an outpouring of public support for Smollett, with celebrities like Viola Davis and Shonda Rhimes expressing outrage about the alleged attack on social media, and political figures like Kamala Harris and Cory Booker describing it as an attempted modern-day lynching, as per Variety.

Soon, however, Chicago police released surveillance images of the supposed perpetrators, identifying the men as Nigerian American brothers who worked as extras on Smollett’s show “Empire.” Evidence that Smollett had orchestrated the attack and paid the brothers $3,500 later surfaced.

Smollett was initially indicted on 16 counts of felony disorderly conduct, but the charges were dropped. A year later, Smollett was re-indicted, and after a high-profile trial in 2021, the actor was convicted on five felony counts of disorderly conduct. He was sentenced to 30 months probation, including 150 days in jail, plus fines totaling more than USD 120,000, Variety mentioned.

In 2024, the conviction was reversed on procedural grounds, as the Illinois Supreme Court found that the re-prosecution violated due process. In 2025, Smollett settled with the city of Chicago, and he continues to deny that he staged the attack.

The project comes from All3Media-owned production company Raw, which is behind two of Netflix’s weirder true-crime tales in The Tinder Swindler and Don’t F**k with Cats. (ANI)