I always hear people talk about how great Death Note is so I tried watching it a few years ago and it just made me very uncomfortable the whole time. The show made sure to point out how great things are goin in the world when ever it could, like one point after the time skip it said that wars have stopped(???). At no point did it ever try making a point about how there could be a flaw in the justice system where someone innocent could be in jail and thus a casualty of the MC. Every non “criminal” he kills is someone who could potentially put a stop to his actions and thus comes off as as antagonists that the viewer Shouldn’t feel bad about dying. The whole thing feels like the author thinks that Light is actually a good guy.
The intended message is not that killing them is better than jail but that while Light did make progress because people stopped committing crimes out of fear a god they couldn't escape would kill them, that still made Light a bad person and the "progress" he made was only by happenstance of that fear.
I'm not gonna say the author was particular good at getting their message across as the series definitely hits a point where they just didn't know how to wrap it up, but the intent is that you do take issue with the presented stance as the story's heros do in their pursuit of catching him and be evident as Light becomes willing to kill anyone in his way, family included.