A Miami federal judge on Monday said the 20-year-old defendant in the Joe Cool case will be retried in January on murder, kidnapping and robbery charges.

But whether Guillermo Zarabozo will be retried on the four firearm charges a jury convicted him of last week remains to be decided.

The 12-member jury convicted him of the four counts but deadlocked on the remaining 12 counts, forcing the judge to declare a mistrial after five days of deliberations.

At a hearing Monday, U.S. District Judge Paul Huck said he would ignore statements made by some jurors to the media. Some said they felt pressured by a fellow juror to find Zarabozo guilty of all charges.

''This court can't legally consider any of those statements,'' Huck said of the post-trial comments by jurors.

But the judge said he is weighing what he called the ''inconsistent'' guilty verdict.

Zarabozo, a former Hialeah security guard, was convicted of four counts of using a firearm during a violent crime that led to four deaths. But jurors could not agree on whether he was guilty of the crimes related to the actual murders of captain Jake Branam, 27; his wife Kelley, 30; and crew members Scott Gamble, 35, and Samuel Kairy, 27, all of Miami Beach.

''How can you reconcile these firearm convictions when he was not found guilty of the murders?'' Huck asked assistant U.S. Attorney Karen Gilbert, the lead prosecutor. Gilbert said convoluted jury verdicts are not uncommon. ''When they happen, we live with it,'' she said.

But Zarabozo's attorneys said they wanted a retrial on all 16 counts -- not just the 12 on which jurors deadlocked.

''We know why we're all here today. It's because the jury reached a verdict they did not understand,'' said defense attorney Brian Stekloff.

During deliberations, jurors asked whether Zarabozo was ''automatically'' guilty of a crime because he had brought the 9mm Glock he used for work aboard the 47-foot Joe Cool during a phony fishing charter to Bimini.

''They asked a question and no answer was given,'' Stekloff said.

Huck proposed a scenario to throw out the jury's four convictions and ``start the next trial with a clean slate.''

Gilbert objected, saying that gave the defense ``a second bite at the apple.''

Huck will continue to hear arguments on Friday.

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