How have the courts dealt with the issue of jury deadlock?

Green contends the trial court erred by not declaring a mistrial. We accord great deference to a trial judge's decision whether to declare a mistrial because of jury deadlock. United States v. Cawley, 630 F.2d 1345, 1348-49 (9th Cir.1980). Although the jury disclosed it was divided, it did not indicate that further deliberations would be fruitless, but rather asked for clarification of the judge's prior instructions. Under these circumstances, a mistrial would have been premature. See United States v. Sommerstedt, 752 F.2d 1494, 1498 (9th Cir.) (jury's statement that it is deadlocked is not sufficient by itself to warrant a mistrial), amended, 760 F.2d 999 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, 474 U.S. 851, 106 S.Ct. 149, 88 L.Ed.2d 123 (1985).

Green nevertheless argues that the supplemental instruction was improper because it had an undue coercive effect on the minority jurors. We have noted that when a jury has revealed its numerical division and the court elects to give a supplemental instruction, there is a "danger that the minority jurors would believe that the judge was directing his remarks to them rather than to the jury as a whole." United States v. Sae-Chua, 725 F.2d 530, 532 (9th Cir.1984). For that reason, such a supplemental instruction is not favored when there is a "potentially coercive effect upon those members of a jury holding to a minority position at the time of the instruction." United States v. Beattie, 613 F.2d 762, 764 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, 446 U.S. 982, 100 S.Ct. 2962, 64 L.Ed.2d 838 (1980).