[md_]

Well, I think the clarification is important. It's not like you just go for a vote, and if there's no consensus outcome, boom, mistrial.

Judges aim for consensus, and juries are intended to debate/discuss until they can reach it. So the complaint about "well, prosecutors can just keep trying" rings a little more hollow in that case.

(Again, there are a ton of other reasonable complaints--bullshit forensic "science", the fact that expert witnesses cost money that defendants don't have, mandatory minimum sentences, federal prosecutors' aversion to risking losses at trial, the awful penal system, etc. But this is a weird one to be hung up on, I think.)