A judge has called for law reforms so jurors can go home to their families overnight in the middle of deliberating on lengthy cases.

Justice Carlisle Greaves made the comments after a marathon session at Supreme Court last Wednesday failed to yield verdicts against all six men accused of a mob attack.

As previously reported, the jury found three of the accused guilty, cleared one, but failed to reach a verdict in the case of the two remaining after nine hours discussing the case.

Eventually, at 8.04 p.m, they told the judge they wanted to be sent to a hotel overnight so they could continue to consider the case on Thursday. Court usually finishes at 4.30 p.m.

The judge granted their request — and the jury was sent to a hotel at a secret location. He made it clear, however, that he would have liked to let them spend the night with their families instead, if Bermuda's law had allowed it.

The UK's Juries Act 1974 does allow a jury to be sent home after they've started considering their verdict "if the court sees fit". But Bermuda's Jurors Act 1971 makes no provision for that. Mr. Justice Greaves said Bermuda's act needs updating in line with the UK legislation.

"This is a case that demonstrates clearly why that is necessary," he said, explaining that he did not understand why juries can't go home in these "modern times".

"In other places you can go home at 4.30 p.m and come back in the morning. This is more defendants than we have ever seen in our lives in the Supreme Court dock. People need time to think, it's a system that requires that every defendant is treated separately," he said.

He also commented: "I think in today's society we can anticipate we might have a lot of multi-hander trials, although we might have escaped with it for 400 years. It looks like this is something that's fairly urgent."

The judge made his comments on Wednesday evening, prior to news that hospital worker George Lynch had been shot dead at the residence where the mob attack victim lived.

The jury was already sequestered at the hotel, and was not informed of the murder until after they came back on Thursday afternoon and delivered not guilty verdicts in respect of the two final men accused of the mob attack.

Mr. Justice Greaves noted after the verdicts that the trial produced a series of rare occurrences and "firsts" in Bermuda's legal history. The jury, which was selected by random ballot, consisted entirely of women.

"This has a pretty long and historical case," the judge told them. "No one in living memory has been able to witness an all-female jury…it is also not very often that a jury has had to be sequestered and to have 12 women sequestered at this time is some historical event."

The only previous reported case of a jury being sent to a hotel overnight was in November 1996 when the jury in a nine-week-long fraud trial was unable to reach a verdict. In both cases, the jury was kept in strict seclusion and not allowed contact with the outside world.

The mob attack trial originally began with seven defendants — although one was cleared at the end of the prosecution case. The judge commented: "I'm also told it might be a historical trial because no-one can remember ever seeing so many defendants in a Supreme Court trial."

And noting the news of the shooting of Mr. Lynch — who is said by Police to have been an innocent victim, unconnected with the case he added: "I don't think anyone has ever heard of anyone dying so close to a case that was actually happening, especially during your deliberations."

Mr. Justice Greaves told the women of the jury that while they are not considered to be targets for further violence: "Arrangements are going to be made to seek to enhance your security and so on for some period of time."

The Police have refused to detail what those arrangements entail.

Attorney General Kim Wilson, reacting to Mr. Justice Greaves comments on jurors being allowed home overnight while in the middle of deliberations, said: "I appreciate that our Act was enacted in 1971, which clearly is old and in need of reform. When I progressed the amendments to the Jurors Act several months ago to enlarge the jury pool, I mentioned at that time there were other areas being considered for reform in the JA.

"Justice Greaves raises a valid point in that our act is silent on the point and it is certainly something I, in my capacity as Minister Of Justice, will consider further along with other reforms and updating of the JA 1971 I feel are necessary."