[hliyan]

You're probably right. Plus I wasn't exactly fair in comparing a population of 300 million to one of 20 million. But where I come from 'going by the book' usually results in the guilty going free, not the innocent getting screwed. IANAL, but I wonder whether this is due to some difference between US law and Roman-Dutch/British law?

[austenallred]

Yes, that's right. What you hear about are the extreme edge cases of society - the places where things fall through the cracks. As a whole the US Justice system is incredibly effective.

That being said, in a population of 300 million edge cases start to add up, and they are significant problems we should figure out how to fix.

[fraserharris]

The function of the Supreme Court is to decide edge cases. Anything they hear is either a question of overlapping laws and/or an area without significant precedents.

[austenallred]

Very, very little makes it to the Supreme Court