North Carolina was a ‘bright spot’ for Democrats, governor-elect says
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(WASHINGTON) — After prevailing in a state that went for Republican Donald Trump, Democratic Gov.-elect Josh Stein said that his service as attorney general gave North Carolina voters confidence and called the Tar Heel state a “bright spot” for Democrats on election night.
Stein told ABC “This Week” co-anchor Jonathan Karl that Kamala Harris ran a “strong campaign,” but was hindered by a condensed timeline and “tough national mood.”
“It was a unfortunate night for Democrats across this country, but North Carolina was a bright spot,” Stein said. “ And we’re proud of what we accomplished here.”
This is a developing news story. Please check back for updates.
(NEW YORK) — Jussie Smollett’s attorney said the actor was “harmed substantially” after he was found guilty of lying about a 2019 hate crime in an interview with “GMA3” following the overturning of his conviction.
The Illinois Supreme Court threw out the former “Empire” actor’s conviction in a decision on Thursday after concluding that the state’s prosecution was unfair due to an agreement that initially dropped the charges.
Smollett was first indicted on 16 felony counts of disorderly conduct for filing a false police report, though Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx agreed to drop the charges if he paid $10,000 and did community service. A special prosecutor later charged him again, leading to his trial and conviction.
In its decision on Thursday, the court found that the state could not bring a second prosecution against Smollett after the initial charges were dismissed, and that reneging on the agreement “would be arbitrary, unreasonable, fundamentally unfair, and a violation of the defendant’s due process rights.”
Tina Glandian, Smollett’s attorney, told “GMA3” on Friday that they have been fighting the second prosecution from the start as “completely illegal.”
“It violates numerous constitutional provisions,” she said. “We’ve raised this numerous, numerous times before, various courts. And finally yesterday, the Supreme Court of Illinois agreed with us and said the second prosecution was barred because there was an agreement in place and the state is bound to honor its word.”
The case began after the openly gay actor told police he was attacked by two men while walking on a street near his Chicago apartment early on Jan. 29, 2019. The attackers allegedly shouted racist and homophobic slurs before hitting him, pouring “an unknown chemical substance” on him and wrapping a rope around his neck.
Chicago police said Smollett’s story of being the victim of an attack began to unravel when investigators tracked down two men, brothers Abimbola and Olabinjo Osundairo, who they said were seen in a security video near where Smollett claimed he was assaulted and around the same time it supposedly occurred. The Osundairo brothers told police the actor paid them $3,500 to help him orchestrate and stage the crime.
A jury convicted Smollett in December 2021 on five of six felony counts of disorderly conduct stemming from filing a false police report and lying to police, who spent more than $130,000 investigating his allegations.
Dan Webb, who was appointed by a Cook County judge to continue looking into the case after the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office initially dropped all charges against the actor, said he was “disappointed” in the court’s decision and noted that the ruling “has nothing to do with Mr. Smollett’s innocence.”
“The Illinois Supreme Court did not find any error with the overwhelming evidence presented at trial that Mr. Smollett orchestrated a fake hate crime and reported it to the Chicago Police Department as a real hate crime, or the jury’s unanimous verdict that Mr. Smollett was guilty of five counts of felony disorderly conduct,” he said in a statement.
Glandian said Smollett continues to maintain his innocence and has “vehemently denied” any participation in a hoax.
“We do believe he didn’t get a fair trial, that the jury didn’t hear all the evidence that should have [been] heard, that things were improperly excluded, that the jury panel was not properly put together,” she said. “The Supreme Court yesterday didn’t get to that issue. They said legally this was invalid. It violated his due process and they, based on that, threw out the conviction. But we still maintain that he didn’t receive a fair trial.”
In the wake of the case, she said Smollett has been releasing music and “continued to do what he does best.”
“I think hopefully, obviously this can only help matters because he was harmed substantially after everything that happened, and of course, the convictions and the sentence that was imposed,” she said.
Webb said that despite the Illinois Supreme Court’s decision, the city of Chicago is still able to pursue its pending civil lawsuit against Smollett in order to recoup the investigation costs.
Glandian said she hopes the city “does the right thing” and dismisses that case.
“He’s incurred substantial legal fees. He spent six days in jail, all of which now has been said by the highest court in Illinois was completely unconstitutional,” Glandian said. “So for the city now to further proceed, we’ll see what they do. But hopefully they dismiss that case immediately.”
(MINNEAPOLIS) — The Minneapolis City Council has approved a consent decree with the U.S. Department of Justice to implement major reforms within the Minneapolis Police Department under the watch of an appointed, independent court monitor.
The decree still needs to go through other levels of approval, including the mayor’s office, before it is filed in federal court, according to Council President Elliott Payne.
“On behalf of the council and the entire city, I’d like to thank our community for standing together united in this and for having patience with us as we have traveled a very, very long and challenging journey,” said Payne. “We are just beginning and we know we have a long way to go.”
The police reform negotiations follow a two-year investigation from the Department of Justice into the Minneapolis Police Department’s patterns and practices.
In 2023, the U.S. Department of Justice released a report following a two-year investigation that found MPD was engaged in a pattern of discriminatory law enforcement practices, used unjustified deadly force in encounters with suspects, engaged in unreasonable use of force in encounters with young suspects and at times failed to give proper medical aid to people they had taken into custody.
The investigation was prompted in part by the 2020 police killing of George Floyd, which sparked racial justice and anti-police brutality protests nationwide. The report found that “the systemic problems in MPD made what happened to [Floyd] possible,” and such problems had continued despite reform efforts.
“We also found that MPD officers routinely disregard the safety of people in their custody. Our review found numerous incidents in which MPD officers responded to a person saying that they could not breathe with a version of, ‘You can breathe, you’re talking right now,'” said Attorney General Merrick Garland.
In one 2017 case, Garland said an MPD officer shot and killed an unarmed woman who he said had “spooked him” when she approached his squad car.
“The woman had called 911 to report a possible sexual assault in a nearby alley,” he said.
MPD officers were also found to stop, search and use force against people who are Black and Native American at disproportionate rates, according to the report.
MPD is already under a consent decree from the state to “make transformational changes to address race-based policing,” following a 2023 agreement between the Minnesota Department of Human Rights and the City of Minneapolis.
The human rights agency described the consent decree as “a court-enforceable agreement that identifies specific changes to be made and timelines for those changes to occur.”
In 2022, the Minnesota Department of Human Rights similarly found that the Minneapolis Police Department engaged in a pattern or practice of race discrimination in violation of the Minnesota Human Rights Act. This led to a state consent decree agreement that is ongoing.
ABC News’ Alexander Mallin contributed to this report.
(YEMASSEE, S.C.) — The ongoing operation to capture 43 monkeys that escaped from a South Carolina lab nabbed at least one of the furry runaways on Saturday, according to officials.
Officials in the town of Yemassee said they recovered overnight one of the rhesus macaque monkeys that had escaped from Alpha Genesis Primate Research Center on Wednesday.
“She is well and having a peanut butter and jelly sandwich,” Alpha Genesis CEO Greg Westergaard said in a statement.
Yemasee officials said that “a significant number” of the escaped primates were located in a facility near where the rescued animal was found and were “jumping back and forth over the facility’s fence.”
“Alpha Genesis management and staff are on-site, actively feeding and monitoring the animals, and they will continue these efforts throughout the weekend,” the town’s officials said in a statement.
“The primates continue to interact with their companions inside the facility, which is a positive sign,” they added.
Westergaard said the monkeys were having a nap Saturday afternoon.
“They are coming down to the ground a bit more now. It is a slow process,” he said.
The creatures escaped when a new employee at the Alpha Genesis center left the door to their enclosure open, Yemassee Town Administrator Matthew Garnes said during a briefing Thursday with town officials.
The primates are all very young females weighing 6 to 7 pounds each who have never been tested, according to police. There is no public health threat, police said.
ABC News’ Bill Hutchinson contributed to this report.
