The Jussie Smollett case had fallen off the front pages over the past few months and it appeared that Kim Foxx was going to get away with her clearly corrupt handling of the situation.

For background on the whole saga, see here and here.

Things changed today though as Judge Michael Tommin approved an order to appoint a special prosecutor to look into not just Smollett, but also Foxx’s handling of the case.

BREAKING: Special prosecutor approved in Jussie Smollett case. @cbschicago pic.twitter.com/pD7oPMo1sN

— Charlie De Mar (@CharlieDeMar) June 21, 2019

If you click on the above images and read the critique by the judge, it’s not pretty. He’s clearly perturbed by what he sees as an unprecedented move by Foxx to drop all charges in the manner she did.

What this all means is two-fold.

First, Jussie Smollett could be recharged now. In fact, I’d expect that to happen as there was never any justification to let him off the hook. The claims of off the book “community service” were also nonsensical. In reality, he spent a day or two at Kim Foxx associate Jesse Jackson’s outfit “consulting” on their radio program. It was a joke.

Secondly, Kim Foxx is in hot water now. In the above approval letter, the judge specifically notes that Foxx likely broke the law by recusing herself and then not appointing a special prosecutor. Furthermore, he notes that the way she did hand off the case, i.e. to her in-office colleague she still had control over, was not supposed to even be possible under current law. She did it anyway.

I actually speculated months ago that this could be an issue for Foxx. A lot of Twitter lawyers were saying she was in the clear but I never thought it made sense. If the law mandates a special counsel after recusal, then how could she come back and say “well, I wasn’t really recused” to avoid responsibility under the law? That would make the entire statue ineffectual in all situations and pointless.

We’ll see where this goes but I’m assuming there are a lot of happy people within the Chicago PD today.

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