The Chicago Police Department announced they’ve identified two persons of interest in the alleged attack on Empire star Jussie Smollett. (WGN)
“These individuals are not yet suspects but were in area of concern and are being questioned,” Chicago police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi tweeted.
Chicago police said the two men were picked upon their arrival at O’Hare International Airport Thursday. Both of them are African American, and at least one of them has a connection to the “Empire” actor.
The individual with a proven connection to Smollett is an extra on his television show, Empire.
There goes the narrative. I’m sure Empire is chock full of actors who are MAGA hat wearing, racist, homophobes. ????
— NeoUnrealist (@NeoUnrealist) February 14, 2019
Guglielmi told The Associated Press that the two men are the same people shown in surveillance photos released last month by police. Guglielmi said the men were identified through advanced technology, interviews with Smollett and witnesses, and transportation records.
Around 2 a.m. on Jan. 29, the 36-year-old actor said he was talking to his manager on the phone while walking in Chicago’s Streeterville neighborhood, when two masked men beat him, subjected him to racist and homophobic insults, threw an “unknown chemical substance” on him and put a thin rope around his neck before fleeing.
No arrests have been made and police haven’t found surveillance video to corroborate Smollett’s claims.
Update:
CWB Chicago reports Smollett’s friends brought the rope police found wrapped around his neck at an Ace Hardware store and took a Lyft to the crime scene.
AAN Staff
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