Despite the hate crime hoax charges against him being stunningly dropped on Tuesday, “Empire” star Jussie Smollett may not be out of the woods just yet.
An investigation into a death threat letter the actor supposedly received prior to the alleged Jan. 29 attack has been handed over to the FBI, Chicago Police spokesperson Anthony Guglielmi told Fox News.
Smollett initially had been suspected as the source of the letter.
“The U.S. Postal Inspection Service is working closely with our law enforcement partners on this investigation,” the U.S. Postal Service said in a statement to Fox News. “We are unable to provide any additional comment at this time.”
Chicago cops previously said Smollett allegedly resorted to staging the "bogus" attack after the threatening letter he sent himself at his Chicago Fox studio two weeks earlier didn't garner enough attention.
"If he mailed that threatening letter to himself by using the post office, he engaged in postal fraud. That's five to 10 years in jail — that's three times what he's facing for filing a false report if the feds want to go there," Fox News legal analyst Judge Andrew Napolitano said.
Smollett told police he was attacked by two masked men as he was walking home from a Chicago Subway sandwich shop at around 2 a.m on Jan. 29.
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The actor, who is black and openly gay, said the masked men beat him, made derogatory comments and yelled "This is MAGA country" — an apparent reference to President Donald Trump's campaign slogan, "Make America Great Again."
Smollett initially was charged last months with one count of lying to the authorities. A grand jury later indicted him on 16 felony counts of lying to authorities: eight counts for what he told the officer who responded to the report of the Jan. 29 attack in downtown Chicago, and eight counts for what he later told a detective about being the victim of a brutal racist and homophobic beating by two masked men.
Fox News’ Madelin Fuerste, Matt Finn, Jessica Sager, Elizabeth Zwirz, Barnini Chakraborty and Tyler McCarthy contributed to this report.
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