On a frigid Chicago night in January 2019, actor Jussie Smollett, a star on the TV drama Empire, reported that he was the victim of a hate-motivated street attack, but police later accused him of staging the whole affair as a publicity stunt.
The case went to trial on Monday in Cook County Circuit Court, with a jury selected by late afternoon to hear evidence for six felony counts of disorderly conduct against Smollett who stands accused of making false reports to the police.
Smollett, 39, has denied that he faked the attack, pleading not guilty in February 2020.
The openly gay black actor told police he had been accosted on a darkened street by two masked strangers.
Assailants threw a noose around his neck, Smollett said, and poured chemicals on him while yelling racist and homophobic slurs and expressions of support for former president Donald Trump.
A month later, police arrested him, accusing him of paying two brothers $3,500 to stage the attack in a hoax aimed at gaining public sympathy and raising his show business profile.
Smollett's acting career has faded since the incident. He lost his role as a singer-songwriter in the final season of Empire, a Fox television hip-hop drama that ended a five-year run in 2020.
His case took an unexpected turn in the spring of 2019 when the Cook County state attorney's office dropped a 16-count indictment against him in exchange for Smollett forfeiting his $10,000 bond without admitting wrongdoing.
The dismissal drew criticism from the mayor of Chicago at the time Rahm Emanuel and the city's police superintendent, who called the reversal a miscarriage of justice, leading a Cook County judge to appoint Dan Webb, a former US attorney, to review the case.
After a five-month investigation, Mr Webb overruled the state attorney's office and concluded that prosecution of Smollett was warranted, questioning the judgment of prosecutors in dropping the original case.
“When he reported the fake hate crime, that was a real crime,” Mr Webb said.
The current case against Smollett has been slowed by legal challenges and the Covid-19 pandemic.
Key trial evidence is expected from the brothers, Abimbola and Olabinjo Osundairo, who prosecutors have said were paid by Smollett to participate in the phoney attack. Smollett is not required to speak in his own defence.
The class-four felony for disorderly conduct and lying to police carries a prison sentence of up to three years, but experts have said it is likely that if Smollett is convicted, he would be placed on probation and perhaps ordered to perform community service.
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Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
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Rating: 4/5
