And you are simply, uncomprehendingly wrong. The jury could not convict someone that they know is innocent because the defendant standing in front of them has been arrested, charged, arraigned, indicted, and prosecuted under the law, and a judge has allowed the prosecution to go forward despite what would no doubt be multiple defense requests to dismiss the case. Numerous levels of the judicial system have determined that there is sufficient evidence to prosecute and ultimately to convict. What do you think the jury could know that no one else knows? Jury nullification means that the jury has decided that someone doesn't deserve to be convicted of a crime despite the persuasive evidence against him. A case where there is no evidence against someone would not go to a jury in the first place.
This doesn't make sense to me.
The fact is that trials go to a jury, and sometimes the jury rejects the prosecution's case. If the prosecution's case is always rejectable or not on its face, we wouldn't need juries at all. We'd just point out that the Grand Jury thought there was a case, and the judge thought there was a case, and the judge didn't think the defense's motion to dismiss were compelling... So why even bother with a trial? Why even seek the opinion of a jury?
But we do seek the opinion of a jury. Even after the judge has determined that the case is legitimate, we still ask a jury to hear the prosecution's arguments and make the actual binding decision about those arguments.
Because sometimes the prosecution gets past the Grand Jury, and gets past the judge, and gets past the defense's motions to dismiss, and
still fails to establish guilt under the law beyond reasonable doubt, and so the jury returns a verdict of "not guilty" anyway. And I'm saying that
in that commonplace scenario, there might be some cases where the jury is convinced of the accused's guilt, even though the prosecution failed to carry their argument, and find the defendant guilty in spite of that.
Forget about whether or not it counts as "nullification". Do you at least acknowledge that a jury can believe someone is guilty, and return a guilty verdict even though they think the prosecution dropped the ball (perhaps even as a corrective measure to make sure justice is done in spite of an incompetent prosecutor)?
