That does not make it less illegal.
It just makes it a perfect candidate for jury nullification!
It just makes it a perfect candidate for jury nullification!
Jury nullification gets its teeth from the principle of (no) double jeopardy: once a defendant in a criminal case is found not guilty of a charge, they cannot be re-tried on those same charges.
(There are an increasing number of loopholes, including of charges in another, or higher, jurisdictions, and/or on different charges.)
The prosecution has no right of appeal. The defence does.
This is not the case in a civil suit. Either party (plaintif, here, the US government, or defence, here, Snowden) may appeal an unfavourable decision, through courts of appeal or ultimately the Supreme Court.
Jury nullification specifically does not apply to this case.
A prosecutor, given the option and knowledge of the situation, would never willingly have a person on the jury that knows they could totally disregard the criminality of the charges at hand.
Knowing that I could nullify does not in any way prevent me from properly concluding a verdict based on the laws that are in place.
It's only if I choose to actually nullify that I'm not doing jury duty properly, but the knowledge of nullification as far as I can understand in no way prevents me from doing jury duty properly.