It probably depends who you ask, but I would define it as a
court system that overwhelmingly uses plea bargains as a means of settling cases, so that the
time and expense of a trial is avoided, some measure of punitive sentencing can be guaranteed,
and so a system can process many, many more cases than it would ordinarily be able to. Cases, in
other words, receive only superficial attention.
Owing largely to
the huge number of drug cases now before US courts, something we have only witnessed during the
Prohibition Era and the last forty years of the Drug War, many people would argue the US justice
system has devolved into assembly line justice, in the plea bargain fashion, and is
unrecognizable in the modern day.
Besides being faster and cheaper,
it also saves the witnesses from having to testify, which is often for the
best.
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