The difference is that if you're an american and something like this happens to you in the US, you aren't in a foreign country whose economy is almost entirely run by tourism, with a police force that is in cahoots with the local tourism businesses and just waiting for you to go back home and they will not press charges because they want to keep the crime statistics as low as possible.
EDIT: Although I'm sure this exact same scenario can easily play out in the US, it greatly depends on where in the country it took place, and it isn't practically guaranteed to happen like in the bahamas.