"Hints" are useless

[kgf]

The hints for this puzzle type are worthless. I got to a point where I needed two more guilties with something like 7 possibilities. i asked for a hint and told me "this person can't be guilty because of clue 7", which told me how many were on the edge. The only way that clue could tell me that person wasn't guilty would be if I already knew which ones on the edge were guilty. This is not the first time I've experienced that.

[dotnich]

When I feel like that, it's usually because either:

• there are only guilty folks left, or
• some other clues have eliminated some candidates and I haven't marked them as innocent