What primarily lies behind plea bargain is the push by both prosecutors and judges to dispose of cases. With the relentless upsurge of crime in the last two decades, city courts and prosecutors’ offices have been burdened with au ever-mounting case load. The simple fact is that cases somehow have to be cleared. And be cause the judicial system would grind to a halt ff the bulk of defendants were to insist on their constitutional right to a trial, the quickest and easiest way to clear those cases is by obtaining a guilty plea. But, in their rush to dispose of cases, prosecutors can end up 'giving away the courthouse'. The same pressure influences judges, who are often more lenient with defendants who plead guilty than with those convicted after trial. Legal purists find this discrimination intolerable, for no one should be penalized for exercising his constitutional right to a trial. Yet the practice occurs in many courts, and the consequence is that au innocent defendant can be victimized. The report of the National Advisory Commission ob served, 'An innocent defendant might be persuaded that the harsher sentence he must face if he is tumble to prove his innocence at trial. It means that it is to his best interests to plead guilty, despite his innocence.' Another problem with plea bargain is that in the rush of a big-city criminal-justice system, a defendant is likely to see a lawyer from the public defender’s or legal aid office for only a few mutes before appearing in court. With such brief contact, the lawyer may have little notion of whether the client is guilty or not, and is quite likely to present the plea bargain as the most desirable alternative. A survey in 1972 of 3,400 criminal justice practitioners in four states showed that 38 percent thought it probable that defense lawyers pressure clients into entering pleas which the clients regard as unsatisfactory. Plea bargaining also encourages widespread cynicism toward the entire criminal-justice system, among defendants, the public and crime victims. Moreover, the plea-bargaining system encourages prosecutors to 'overcharge'--leveling more serious charges than the crimes warrant--in order to enhance their bargaining power. Which of the following is the passage mainly concerned with?