[Silhouette]

Several on the jury were clearly surprised by this and I think had we known it may have changed our verdict.

Presumably that is why the jury is not told. If the jury's job is to determine, as fairly and impartially as possible, whether someone committed a crime of which they have been accused, then it makes sense to hide other information that does not affect that fact but could cause emotional rather than logical and evidence-based deliberation.

The problem here doesn't seem to be hiding the full situation from you and your colleagues on the jury. The problem seems to be that having fulfilled your purpose in the proceedings by making the determination you were asked to make, and the judge was then denied the ability to fulfill their purpose in the proceedings properly because their hands were tied by the Three Strikes rule and so the punishment arguably did not fit the crime.

Of course, whether the way the jury is kept in the dark in such a case stands up to ethical scrutiny in light of principles like jury nullification is a different question.