The judge in the Karen Read retrial decided against telling jurors that they are allowed to return a split verdict on Tuesday — an issue raised shortly after her mistrial last year.

Karen Read's murder trial now rests with the jury, which appears focused on a drunken driving charge after prosecutors played clips of her discussing spiking her own drinks.

Supporters of Karen Read packed the sidewalk across the street from the courthouse, anxiously awaiting a verdict during a day dramatized by a series of questions from the jury. But by 4 p.m., the judge sent the jury home to come back a resume deliberations in the morning.

The same issue arose at Read’s first trial: multiple jurors, in the wake of Cannone declaring a mistrial, reported to Read’s defense that they agreed to acquit her on two of the three counts, but they didn’t know they could return a partial verdict. That led to a lengthy appeals fight that was appealed to but not taken up by the U.S. Supreme Court.

Those charges never should have been brought forward,” Aidan Kearney said Tuesday outside Norfolk Superior Court, where he was covering jury deliberations in the Karen Read trial.

More than three of four Boston Herald readers who have participated in our poll would vote “Not guilty” if they were on the Karen Read retrial jury.