Robert Green wrote:

Harry, I admire the fact that you believe people will get a better
outcome from a judicial trial. However, my sister's a judge and I
can assure you, she can do bureaucracy like nobody's business. The
problem is often expressed as "they wouldn't arrest him if he wasn't
guilty." Judges often side with the government that also signs their
paychecks. It's a pretty common human failing.


As an aside, Alan Dershowitz posited the following rules:

1. Virtually every criminal defendant is guilty.
2. Rule #1 is known to the judge, the district attorney, and defense
counsel.
3. Few criminal defendants can be convicted without violating one or more of
their Constitutional rights.
4. Rule #3 is known to the judge, the district attorney, and defense
counsel.
5. Defendants are often convicted, not for what they did, but for what can
be proved. Much of the time what they did cannot be proved and what was
proved was not what they did.
6. Rule #5 is known to the judge, the district attorney, and defense
counsel.

Studying the above rules will demonstrate why almost everyone in prison
feels they are there on a bum rap.