How Many Different Criminal Justice Systems Are There in the United States?

There's no overarching prosecutorial entity binding together federal, state, and local prosecutors. When I was with the SDNY, we'd often learn that some other office, often our colleagues across the river in Brooklyn at the Eastern District of New York, were poking around the same targets as we were. At times, these discussions would get heated and territorial. We dramatically but aptly call these interoffice showdowns turf battles, jets and sharks without the dancing and the switchblades.