The jury in the Peter Colwell shooting trial have been discharged after failing to reach verdicts on the manslaughter charges against two gamekeepers.
On day 18 of the trial at Caernarfon crown court on Thursday December 13 Mr Justice Picken stopped their deliberations.
The jury had been considering their verdicts for more than 23 hours, having retired nearly a week ago.
Ben Fitzsimons, aged 23, of Nanhoron, Pwllheli, and Ben Wilson, 29, of Ely, Cambridge, denied the manslaughter through gross negligence of Peter Colwell, 18, a gamekeeper on the Boduan estate near Pwllheli.
He’d died when a shotgun went off in a 4x4 vehicle in a pub car park at the village of Llanbedrog.
When he opened the prosecution case, QC Patrick Harrington said: "The killing was neither deliberate nor malicious.
"But a young man died as the result of the cavalier disregard of the fundamental rules of gun safety by Ben Wilson and Ben Fitzsimons.”
It was the fourth week of the trial.
The prosecution said a re-trial would be sought.
It was fixed to start on June 3 and bail granted to the two defendants.
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