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Notes -
Also, the prosecution becomes involved with cases much earlier than a PD, at least that is my understanding from watching The Wire.
By the time the case actually goes to trial, the prosecution already has established what they believe to be a winnable case.
On the other hand, technological evidence will probably make the DAs job much easier in many cases. If a guy is caught committing a felony on video, I could imagine that the prosecution may actually have less of a workload than the PD. Watch the video, notice it will convince a jury, charge him. On the other hand, the PD will still have to talk with the defendant a few times, try to persuade him to take a deal and so on.
At the end of the day, the PD are funded through taxpayer money, so they owe the public an account of how they spend their time. How many hours did they spend on which case. Did they go after likely leads, or go on every wild goose chase their client set them on? These are facts which could be established from statistics.
There is a lot of a difference between "no PD can meet the accused because they are overworked" and "actually they were busy trying to investigate if Elvis was alive and had committed the crime because that is what their client suggested". From the outside, it is hard to say which one it is.
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