Yes, we can talk about the trial and the evidence presented, and give our opinion on both. We cannot adduce hearsay or evidence of our own, lest a juror sees it.
Any counsel instructed would defend these men. That is in the job description; it is what counsel do. Their task is to get a better result for any client than the client would get on his own. So much were our ancestors struck by the unfairness of a man being prosecuted by skilled counsel that, although he had a skilled counsel of his own, he was not allowed to give sworn evidence himself until 1898; thus he was not exposed to cross-examination, but made a 'statement from the dock instead. This practice of 'dock statement' persisted until well into the 1970s. It was usually drafted by his counsel, putting into more careful and persuasive words what the client wanted to say.
Here, counsel could be running diminished responsibility, or, perhaps, that the defendants were insane at the time. Or it may simply be an exercise in seeing how the evidence comes out in court, and seeing what mitigation you can get out of it. Anyway, you can't force any client to plead guilty; the law allows him to put the prosecution to proof.. You'd be surprised, perhaps, but every barrister will have had at least one case which looked overwhelming on paper but which proved the opposite in court ; I have seen a case which the judge stopped for no case to answer, and another in which he told the jury that they could acquit without hearing prosecuting or defence speeches or any summing up (they did, of course), both of which were overwhelming for the prosecution, on paper.