I did jury service in a case a few years ago. The accused was clearly (by his own admission) a nasty, criminal piece of work.
At the end of the case, there was a huge gaping hole in the prosecution evidence and we asked for clarification from our room, to the judge, as to whether it had been overlooked or didn’t exist. When he called us back into court to tell us, it was very clear from his words and his tone that he was as baffled as we were that this vital piece of evidence didn’t exist.
It was as close as he could get to saying sorry for wasting everybody’s time, we had to return a not guilty verdict, but it made us all wonder why the CPS agreed to prosecute.