Who had believed Stacey Glenn was innocent? How many of them had voted to acquit – and why?

The foreperson, Linda Chen, was Chinese-American, forty years old, with an Ivy League education and a successful real estate business. She had a no-nonsense manner countered by a wide and easy smile, and both Yuki and Hoffman had felt comfortable with Chen when they’d cast the jury. Even more so when she’d been voted foreperson.

Now Yuki wondered how Chen had let the jury quit so soon.

Duffy smiled at the jury, said, “I’ve given your note serious thought. I understand that six weeks of trial is an ordeal and many of you are quite ready to go home.

“That said, this trial has been expensive – not just in terms of money, although it’s cost the State of California plenty, but for the better part of a year, both sides have labored to put together this case for you to judge.

“Where things stand now,” said Duffy, “you are the experts on the People versus Stacey Glenn. If you can’t arrive at a unanimous decision, this case will have to be tried again, and there’s no reason to believe that any other group of people would be more qualified or impartial, or have more wisdom to decide this verdict, than you.”

Duffy explained to the jury that he was going to ask them to continue their deliberations, not to give up deeply held ideas based on the evidence but to reexamine their views with an open mind in order to try to reach consensus.

The judge was giving the jury the “Allen charge,” the so-called dynamite charge designed to bust up logjams in deadlocked juries. It was considered coercive by legal purists.

Yuki knew that this was the best option available, but the Allen charge could backfire. A resentful jury could push back and deliver whatever verdict would end its service the fastest.

It was obvious to Yuki that the easiest, least-nightmare-provoking decision would be a unanimous vote to acquit.