Civil rights attorney and Fox News contributor Leo Terrell went off on Jussie Smollett’s prison release during a Thursday segment of “Outnumbered.”
Smollett was sentenced to 150 days in jail and 30 months probation Thursday after being convicted of filing a false police report that he had been the victim of a hate crime. An appeals court voted 2-1 to release the former “Empire” actor from prison for a personal recognizance of $150,000 on the grounds that he show up to future court appearances.
“I tell you, I’m so upset by this. I’ve been a civil rights attorney for 30 years, and I’m proud of being a civil rights attorney for people who have been victims of discrimination,” Terrell said. “I want every Fox viewer to know right now, Jussie Smollett is a liar and he’s a convicted felon. He is not a civil rights victim, he is playing the race card which is not appropriate for the following reason: this guy tried to bamboozle the entire country on the fact that he was a victim of a vicious hate crime by Trump supporters.”
“How embarrassing, how insulting — for people who gave their lives to the civil rights movement,” he continued. “For Jussie Smollett to make $2 million a year and then fall on the race card? I mean, this is embarrassing!”
Terrell blasted Smollett’s Empire co-star Taraji P. Henson, who compared his punishment to Emmitt Till in a Sunday Instagram post. (RELATED: Jussie Smollett Believes He Got Jail Time For Conviction Because He’s Black)
“Emmett Till was brutally beat and ultimately murdered because of a lie and none of the people involved with his demise spent one day in jail, even after Carolyn Bryant admitted that her claims were false,” Henson wrote. “No one was hurt or killed during Jussie’s ordeal. He has already lost everything, EVERYTHING!”
Smollett’s attorneys requested an emergency suspension to his sentence Tuesday due to alleged “vicious threats” that called his safety into question. The lawyers also argued that his placement in protective custody was equivalent to “solitary confinement,” which could lead to “extraordinary damage on his mental health.”
After his sentence, Smollett repeatedly told the judge he was “not suicidal” and warned that if “anything happens” to him, he did not do it to himself.
“And if anything happens to me when I go in there, I did not do it to myself and you must all know that,” he said Monday. “I respect you, your Honor, I respect your decision, jail time… I am not suicidal.”