Interesting article. Clearly the FBI is running a protection scam. They're protecting criminal organizations in exchange for some occasional sacrifices that can be flaunted in front of the cameras to make the FBI look good. They're not exchanging cash in their protection scheme; they have the best money laundering scheme that ever existed in the history of mankind: the Federal payroll system. Protect a criminal, look good on camera, keep your job. Protect a criminal, look great on camera, get a promotion. Of course the benefit for the protected criminal is that they turn in their competition and their FBI protectors arrest the competition and put them in prison.
The article hints at the same kind of operation in the state and local agencies but doesn't really talk about it.
These stories show why there should never have been a standing police force in the US. The Founders never would have accepted it - especially at the federal level. There should never have been a federal law enforcement agency.