It seems to me that what happened is that the argument (which is one of law, not of fact) has already been made in court prior to the trial. The judge has rejected it, and prohibited it from being raised in the trial (and thus, to the jury) as it is immaterial to the questions of fact the jury is to decide.

Of course, if there is a conviction, the judge's rejection of the argument can be challenged as legal error on appeal.

Juries are exposed to carefully controlled subsets of all possible facts. What does this guy's mom do? What kind of cars do the people working at the bank drive? The answers to those questions are true facts but not relevant to the court.

Jury decides facts, jury findings are (generally) not subject to appeal.