Accused of lying to police, US actor Jussie Smollett takes the stand

Actor Jussie Smollett at the Leighton Criminal Courthouse (Charles Rex Arbogast/AP)

Jussie Smollett has taken the witness stand at his trial where he is facing charges accusing him of staging a racist, anti-gay attack on himself and lying to Chicago police about it.

The actor who starred on the TV show Empire will share his account of what happened in January 2019 in an attempt to refute damaging testimony from two brothers who testified last week.