18 year old men are more passionate than wise. If the Prosecutor trips him up, it may very well cost him dearly. Doubt thise jury will find him guilty but some left wing ideologue on that jury may hang it and force a retrial. Either way not testifying is a bit of a gamble.
A couple points there.
This hypothetical idealogue is going to do this no matter what the testimony is.
The judge has ultimate control of the verdict. He can take the jury's decision away. That happened in one of the tangential russian collusion cases, jury said guilty, judge said "nope." Not saying that will happen here, just that the ultimate power here is not with the jury.
After watching this I agree.
Poor kid
So earnest.
The Prosecutor is vile