The US system of prosecution and punishment responds to public pressure, but mainly the powerful part of the public. This means it has evolved to support racism and the power of the rich, and (on some issues) sexism too.

The system isn't "broken", rather it evolved under pressure to do suppression rather than justice.

The article uses the word "designed", but I think that is a misnomer, for their punishment system just as for the genomes of living species. Neither one was designed as a whole; rather, decisions were made, step by step, under the selective pressures of the moment.