To make the indictment, therefore, more extensive, the intention of murdering the king was comprehended in it; and for proof of this intention the conspiracy for raising a rebellion was assigned; and, what seemed to bring the matter still nearer, the design of attacking the king's guards.
Russel perceived this irregularity, and desired to have the point argued by counsel: the chief justice told him, that this favor could not be granted, unless he previously confessed the facts charged upon him.

The artificial confounding of the two species of treason, though a practice supported by many precedents, is the chief, but not the only hardship of which Russel had reason to complain on his trial.

His defence was feeble: and he contented himself with protesting, that he never had entertained any design against the life of the king: his veracity would not allow him to deny the conspiracy for an insurrection.

The jury were men of fair and reputable characters, but zealous royalists: after a short deliberation, they brought in the prisoner guilty.
Applications were made to the king for a pardon: even money, to the amount of one hundred thousand pounds, was offered to the duchess of Portsmouth by the old earl of Bedford, father to Russel.

The king was inexorable.