This is written for a lawyer who's on a side, not a curious investigator that's trying to maximize their own knowledge of the truth.
"... a curious investigator that's trying to maximize their own knowledge of the truth."
Do we actually have anything like this in the 'justice' system? Lawyers are on sides. Police only investigate to prove guilt, not innocence (most of the time). Judges are basically referees. Juries don't get to investigate, only view what the court allows them to (and society in general has a bias against defendants). In my experience, nobody is interested in the truth.
When your goal is to "discover truth" as Chief Truth Discoverer of the DOJ the only way to audit you is with grander truth discoery.
You could use things like transparency and metrics released to the public. Right now complaints against the judiciary and many other positions in the system are considered so secret that they wont even release them if the contain exculpatory evidence. The reasoning is that the secrecy is necessary to preserve public trust of the system, and the system itself is more important than any individual's rights or justice. We could evaluate the complaints, wrongful convictions, etc to create better procedures and policies to find the truth.
The adversarial system is supposed to produce the truth in a fair fight. In my opinion, the system does not allow for a fair fight. Usually the party with the most money can win. There is a lot bias that exists as well. The people in the system continue to grant themselves more privileges that those not part of the system.
The system even situates itself to where it costs more to defend ones innocence than to just plead and pay a fine. One cannot say that our system provides truth or justice when it allows this to occur.
I used your comment as a jumping-off point for what I thought was an interesting question about whether this adversarial approach should be extended to other areas.
I don't blame you for assuming I was trying to say you're wrong about something -- usually people are trying to argue! I just wanted to shift focus because your comment made me think about something related, yet on the other end.
Even in the more inquisitive role, they aren't actually investigating anything - like finding new info or evidence.
Aren't there things like children's advocates in family court? Review boards at every level who check up on accusations against lawyers/judges/etc.?
I'd venture to guess there are dozens of such entities sprinkled throughout the legal system.
"Review boards at every level who check up on accusations against lawyers/judges/etc.?"
Do they? Do they actually do anything? I have experiences with these and they were mind blowing if you come in thinking they're about justice. Don't forget, they keep these secret because they want to protect the system, even if it means sending an innocent person to prison (no requirement to turn over exculpatory evidence even if subpoenaed). The Bar won't even investigate misconduct by prosecutors unless the court has already declared that misconduct occurred.
I would really love to hear about one of the dozen or so boards or whatever that could help me right some past wrongs. Because I've gotten nowhere.