Jussie Smollett’s last-ditch attempt to have his criminal case dismissed was unsuccessful. He was accused of lying to police about being the victim of a racist and homophobic hate crime.

Smollett’s rights were being violated, according to his attorney, because he had already completed community service and given up a $10,000 bail as part of an earlier bargain with Cook County prosecutors to dismiss charges.

“A deal is a deal. That’s ancient principle,” attorney Nenye Uche said.

Judge James Linn disagreed, noting that the case of Jussie Smollett is now being handled by a special prosecutor appointed by another judge.

Smollett, a homosexual Black male, informed police in 2019 that he was assaulted by two masked men while working on “Empire” in Chicago. But after detectives determined that he planned the incident and hired two brothers to carry it out because he was unhappy with his income and wanted to further his career, he was charged with filing a false police complaint a few weeks later. However, the case was dismissed.

A special prosecutor charged Smollett with disorderly behavior in connection with the police reports, which resurrected the case. The actor has entered a not-guilty plea.

Smollett was charged with 16 felony charges of lying to authorities by a grand jury, which his lawyer described as “prosecutorial overkill.” The Cook County State Attorney’s Office dropped all charges against him when State Attorney Kim Foxx recused herself from the case, forcing a court to allow a special prosecutor to probe the decision-making process in June 2019. That special prosecutor determined in August 2020 that Foxx had misused her authority in dismissing Smollett’s case, letting the reopened case to proceed.

Despite Uche’s efforts to get the case dropped, he insists that Smollett wants “nothing more than to go to a jury and clear his name.”

The jury selection process will begin on November 29.