According to a spokesman for the city’s police, the actor faces criminal charges.
"Jussi Smollett is now officially held as a suspect in the Chicago police investigation for filing a false statement," - wrote a representative of the department on Twitter.
Earlier, the media reported that the police suspected actor Jussi Smollett in the dramatization of the attack.
According to Smollett, in late January, two men attacked him, shouting "racist and homophobic" threats. The actor said that the attackers threw a rope around his neck, and doused them with some unknown substance.
As some media outlets wrote, the actor himself could have tweaked the attack, fearing that his role would be cut out from the series.