The origins of modern-day policing in the USA can be traced back to the "Slave Patrol." The earliest formal slave patrol was created in the Carolinas in the early 1700s with one mission: to establish a system of terror and squash slave uprising with the capacity to pursue, apprehend, and return runaway slaves to their owners. Tactics include the use of excessive force to control and produce desired slave behavior. Their brutality and cruelty brought fear to every black person who came in contact with them.
NAACP: The Origins of Modern Day Policing