Cops used to be held in check by the mob. Can you imagine them pulling any of this in an old Italian or Irish neighborhood? Nope. We ended up with just one gang and they walk around with badges.
No, they weren't.
Cops were a mob, and their primary purpose was originally to hold the other mobs in check.
> Can you imagine them pulling any of this in an old Italian or Irish neighborhood?
Yes. In the North, the original major police forces were basically ethnic gangs given government sponsorship and deployed first and foremost to do battle with other ethnic gangs, so that’s exactly the kind of neighborhood the police would be using major force on, if it wasn't the one they were drawn from.
That’s so what less the case now because the police became an independent political force with a union and lobby that tends to be decisive in local elections, so they became able to effectively pick their own targets, and going in strongest against soft targets and mostly avoiding the harder ones is a lot safer, if you have the clout to swing it.