How the judiciary broke
Unfortunately, the system of justice as presented in many Western countries is fundamentally broken.
Robert Simels, a 50-year veteran of the system as a prosecutor, defense attorney, and inmate, states, "It doesn't work is the bottom line. It doesn't work. And all of us who are in the system know that it doesn't work."
This article explores the fundamental reasons why and provides a roadmap to solve those problems.
Imbalance of power
Both parties often pursue winning at the cost of justice itself. Prosecutors believe they're doing good by prosecuting people, but because they want to win they push it. Defense attorneys often believe their clients and want to vindicate them and often push it.
Prosecutors, like defense attorneys, advance their careers not by losing, but by winning cases. This push from both sides is intended to create equilibrium. In reality because the prosecution has more resources and tools at its disposal in some Western nations the push is unequal.
Evidence: Prosecutors usually have access to the overwhelming majority of evidence and have every incentive to bury evidence favorable to the defense, even though they are required to hand over such evidence.
Immunity: Prosecutors are immune (in the US) incentivizing them to fabricate evidence with impunity.
Speed over justice: The justice system is so overwhelmed with cases that defendants are pressured to plea guilty regardless of being guilty or not to avoid overwhelmingly harder sentences if they go to trial.
Solutions
Proper incentives: One needs to create a system in which every neutral party, especially judges, are incentivized to work toward justice, not jail time.
Adversarial balance: For an adversarial system which has a defense and a prosecution to work out, the defense and the prosecution need to have equal access to funding, resources and legal mechanisms.
Reform: Rather than simply inferring from statutes written long ago, one needs to create a system in which competing systems of justice are selected for their just outcomes and that those systems become the system which dominates the land.
The key is to come up with an unbiased selection system not influenceable by politicians, defendants, or prosecutors.