*The jury in Bill Cosby’s sexual assault trial said Thursday it’s deadlocked, but the judge ordered them to go back into the jury room and keep trying to reach a verdict.
“We can not come to a unanimous consensus on any of these counts,” the panel said in a note to the judge sent out at 11:06 a.m. after more than 30 hours of deliberations.
Cosby’s lawyers made a motion for a mistrial, which Montgomery County Judge Steven O’Neill denied. The judge instead gave the jury new instructions – known as an Allen charge or a Spencer charge – reminding them of their duty to try to reach a decision, reports NBC News.
But, the judge added, “do not feel compelled to surrender your honest belief” of what the evidence showed simply to come to a verdict.
“I think it’s a good thing they’re asking for read back of testimony,” Gloria Allred told NBC, adding that it was obvious the jurors were working hard to reach a verdict on all three counts,
“I don’t know whether that’s going to be possible,” she added.
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