I am not a lawyer, but I am someone who uses common sense. Jurors aren’t legal experts and often can be swayed by things that have nothing to do with the law, so while it seems Hernandez is dead in the water here are a few reasons he might get off.
1- No one testified he pulled the trigger.
He doesn’t have to pull the trigger to be found guilty, but once again this is common sense we are using. Jurors don’t like to convict people who they may believe wasn’t the one doing the killing. The prosecution didn’t put his accomplices on the stand and no one they brought to the stand can say 100% that Hernandez was the one who shot Odin Lloyd, that might be a problem for some jurors.
2- The defense in one line, circumvented the majority of the prosecution’s case.
When the defense admitted Hernandez was at the crime scene it basically muted a lot of the prosecution’s case. The prosecution went to great lengths to show the jury that Hernandez was there and assumed that his defense would try to pretend he wasn’t. By admitting he was and saying didn’t know what was going happened it could put a small amount of doubt in jurors mind if Hernandez was the mastermind.
3- What is more likely, two career criminals being a cold blooded killer or an NFL player?
You have three people at the crime scene, but two are criminals and one plays for the New England Patriots. Aaron Hernandez could be a psychopath, but if just one juror can’t wrap their mind around why an NFL player would just randomly plot and kill someone right next to their house well….
4- Hernandez’s fiancée didn’t bury him.
The girlfriend, wife, sidechick, fiancée and etc always knows the truth. Shayanna Jenkins could have said Hernandez told her he did it even if he didn’t, that would have been game over for Hernandez. So, while she did give some damaging testimony, she never outright said she thought he did it or he told her he did.
5- No motive.
You don’t need a motive to convict, but as I have said before we are talking about common sense. The prosecution had to convince 12 people than an NFL player with millions of dollars in the bank decided randomly to kill a guy for no real reason besides possibly being annoyed with him, just a mile away from his home. Once again Hernandez could just be crazy, but only takes one juror to believe that no one is that stupid or that crazy.