Jussie Smollett checked himself into an outpatient rehab treatment program following his release from jail, Page Six can confirm.<br /><br />“It’s something he’s been wanting to do for years,” a source close to the former “Empire” actor confirmed to us Wednesday.<br /><br />They added that he “just wrapped a movie” and felt “it was time.”<br /><br />TMZ was the first to report the news, with his rep revealing that “Jussie has had an extremely difficult past few years.”<br /><br />“He has quietly been working very hard for some time now and we are proud of him for taking these necessary steps,” the rep concluded.<br /><br />The actor’s PR team did not immediately respond to Page Six’s request for comment.<br /><br />Smollett’s rehab stint comes more than one year following his release from Chicago’s Cook County Jail. He had served just six days of the five-month sentence he received for being convicted on five counts of felony disorderly conduct for lying to police about a hate crime.<br /><br />He made headlines in 2019 after he submitted a police report in Chicago alleging that two masked Donald Trump supporters attacked him while calling him “Empire f—-t n—-r” and pouring liquid he believed to be bleach all over him.<br /><br />He also claimed they wrapped a noose around his neck.<br /><br />After the Chicago Police Department labeled him a “victim,” they swiftly changed course and named him a suspect in the case when they could not come up with evidence of any attack.<br /><br />Twelve jurors in a Chicago criminal court ultimately convicted Smollett of staging a hate crime in Dec. 2021 and his sentence came in March 2022.<br /><br />The “Mighty Ducks” actor was released from jail — where he was holed up in the psych ward, according to his brother — early after an Illinois state appellate court ruled he could live freely in society as his lawyers worked to appeal his conviction.<br /><br />Shortly after his release, the “B-Boy Blues” producer was proudly defending his name.<br /><br />“If I had done this, I’d be a piece of s–t. And I don’t think that’s really questionable,” he said on a June 2022 episode of Sway Calloway’s SiriusXM show, “Sway in the Morning.”<br /><br />“If I had done something like this, it would mean that I stuck my fist in the pain of black African Americans in this country for over 400 years.”<br /><br />He added, “It would mean that I stuck my fist in the fears of the LGBTQ community all over the world. I am not that motherf—er. Never have been. Don’t need to be.”<br /><br />He also proclaimed his innocence in an R&B track called “Thank You God…” he released on streaming platforms.<br /><br />“It’s like they’re hell-bent on not solving the crime / Taking out the elements of race and trans and homophobia that’s straight taking lives / But turn around and act like I’m the one that killed the strides,” he rapped.<br /><br />#jussiesmollett <br />#convictions <br />#rehab
