# Hung Jury is No Answer?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hung-jury-is-no-answer/821927>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [September 26, 2018, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hung-jury-is-no-answer/821927 "2018-09-26T03:17:33Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 2

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**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\
**Post date:** [September 26, 2018, 10:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hung-jury-is-no-answer/821927/21 "2018-09-26T22:56:03Z")

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> [@kenobi\_65](#):
>
> A hung jury is a trial that does not return a verdict, one way or the other. It may feel, to you, like “not guilty,” but from a legal standpoint, it’s not.

I agree.

In essence, a trial that ends with a guilty verdict is one where the jury says that the prosecution proved its case. And a trial that ends with a not guilty verdict is one where the jury says that the prosecution is not able to prove its case. In both cases, the outcome is supposed to be obvious.

If there’s a hung jury then the outcome wasn’t obvious. So neither the prosecution or the defense did a complete job. The other possibility is that the outcome was obvious but one or more jury members refused to admit it. In either case, the trial needs to be redone until the correct outcome is obvious and accepted.

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