When I was a kid, I lived in a shitty neighborhood. Cops were seen as a thing to avoid.
I was a kid though and I enjoyed the cops, especially when the cops use to walk our streets. I always admired that. One night, the man upstairs was in the process of beating his wife and this young, skinny Chinese cop heard it through the windows while walking this beat. I was sitting at my window, downstairs, watching the street when he asked me to let him in. We had a front door and then a security door which was steel and a cop on foot wouldn't have the tools to get around it.
I went to ask my mom, she was on the phone and wouldn't listen to me, so I ran back to the cop and asked him to see his police ID (I saw someone do this on TV) and he did. I ran, unlocked my door, opened the security door and opened the outside door and let him in.
He told me to go back inside, close my door and not come out for any reason other than the police or fire department. I actually got scared. The shit that happened upstairs was normal, this wasn't.
He bolted up the steps and I never remember him banging on the door and yelling "police" or "open up", none of that. I remember him flying up the stairs and barging through the door. There was clearly a fight happening, and the man who lived upstairs, Johnboy, was a big Irish man, not one to fuck with. The fight was so heavy, my mother came running to me standing at the door listening with my ear to the door and pulled me away.
It felt to me that this fight went on for hours, but it was just minutes is guess. After a while, more and more cops came flying into the apartment, all running up the stairs. Then ambulances showed up, more cops and even a fire truck.
I can't remember the exact time that passed, but I remember watching first the daughter being carried down. She was about 3 yrs old and was being held by a fireman. Then a cop came down holding the oldest son, he was about 8 years old, but he looked dead in the cops arms. After that followed the two younger boys, all my friends, being helped down the stairs by a random woman and more cops.
After that followed the stretchers. The first stretcher was the mother/wife. It was covered in blood and they weren't rushing to bring her down, they were very careful. I recall seeing her face and she was unrecognizable, just a bloody pulp.
Then the other stretcher had John. Beaten, but not defeated. Cursing and screaming the whole way down and grabbing the railings, fighting tooth and nail. Punching, spitting, ready to kill. I can't say for sure, but he was at least handcuffed somehow. He was a tough MF'er, but never scary. At least not till he was drunk, but as a kid, I didn't know. .
Then came the cop I let in, the man who had to fight big John came down the stairs. He was being helped by two others. He was limping, his face was a swollen mess, he couldn't even walk on his own. He was so fucked up that even to this day, I remember his face. He was Asian but you wouldn't have known. He was beaten in a way I wouldn't see again for years. I can only imagine this man going home to his wife and kids, unable to see, probably unable to speak and move. He was in bad shape.
I later found out that my mother was ignoring me because she was on the phone with 911 (which would be rare in the town, but it will happen.)
Big John had beaten his wife so hard with a tool belt he had actually cut a major in her throat where she almost bled to death. He had also beaten his kids with the same belt causing the daughter to mostly lose an eye. When the cop came, they fought and He had beaten the cops face into a pulp as well, but I believe the cop had shot him in the knee or shin while he was trying to kill him, saving both of their lives.
I saw both of them again a while later. I ran across the cop randomly at the florist shop that had just gotten robbed on my walk home from school. He remember me and I won't ever forget that.
I had to live with my upstairs neighbor for a few more years, not much changed with him, but his time ran out a while after that when he returned home.
Tl;dr: cops can have a surprisingly fucked up job and sometimes that job is protecting the people they protect from each other.