One stinking juror could muck the whole guilty verdict.......i know that, and it just makes

[dickthegrouch]

21. There is a much wider questions here

Other countries have different systems, the UK only requires 9 out of 12 jurors to convict.

But the wider issue is: why do so many seemingly broken legal constructs remain broken for so long?

Even when majorities make wholesale changes possible, they do not occur.

Three examples:
The ability of people with nefarious intent to sue over the injuries they caused themselves that prevented them from completing the crime,
The travesty of ADA suits against any business regardless of whether it is possible to modify the structure to accommodate a disabled person, or whether a disabled person was actually unable to be accommodated,
The use of public money to right wrongs perpetrated by individuals outside of department policy.

All those things could (have) been fixed decades ago if the lawmakers had any will to do so.


(Full disclosure: not one but two of my favorite restaurants were bankrupted by corrupt ADA litigators, who caused them to spend far in excess of any actual damages, trying to remedy the problems of accessibility in very old buildings, multiple times. In each case the City inspector approved the modifications but the ADA litigator managed to hold the business owner to a different standard.
For the record: I don't disagree with the principle of enabling disabled access, I disagree vehemently with it being required regardless of the remediation cost being physically feasible or a substantial proportion of revenue.)