[Sundae]

See, as a Brit it weirds me out that it horrifies you to make people answer questions, but it's okay to kill them.

Don't get me wrong, defendents can refuse to take the stand here, it's just that once they do they cannot refuse to answer without being in contempt of court.
Those who have strong cases against them or are unhinged in some way are strongly suggested not to do so by their solicitors.

Oh and I'm NOT being superior - we had a trial just last week where an already convicted murderer's defence (about another case with the same hallmarks) was allowed to bring up truly horrible suggestions about the dead girl's parents, despite there never being a suggestion from the Police that they were suspected.

ETA - looks like one of our gutter press employed a private detective who hacked the same teen's mobile phone for messages, and even DELETED them so more could fit in the voicemail. While she was still missing. It's headline news here, even if not relevant to this case. So no moral highground from me I promise.