If I had been on that jury I would have voted not guilty and hung the jury at worse, but the real problem is the prosecutors & the judge. The jury was trying to weigh the law along with instructions they were given. They can be excused because many of them do not know better. At least that is my opinion. The prosecutors & judge knew they were trampling justice for the sake of agenda, and justice be damned. They should now be faced with justice of their own in the very system they used unjustly.
BTW, you are not suggesting that all laws be done away with are you? If you are saying that laws need to be examined to see if they aid in the execution of an orderly society, and those that are not are tossed while keeping those we all agree are needed. Then I am with you on that front. A society without laws would soon fall apart.
Agreed. It sounds like they were putting an awful lot of stock in what the judge told them, but, if I understand it correctly, the jury can render their verdict independent of any judicial instruction. I am not a lawyer, though, nor have I served on a jury, so I really don’t know.