It was no secret that Gotham City was a criminal's haven. Pickpockets, stalkers, drug dealers, serial killers, gang hitmen, rapists…the list of unsavory characters that prowled Gotham's streets went on.
It was also no secret that the Gotham City Police Department was incredibly corrupt, with cops at all levels of the department routinely accepting bribes, cutting deals, and otherwise helping the mob. Gotham had been this way for years; the corruption and crime was so rampant and ran so deep within the city's institutions that most of Gotham's citizens had accepted it, even growing accustomed to it.
But not everyone. A certain billionaire had decided to take action, to return the city to a time when it was safe to walk the streets. During the day, Bruce Wayne was the life of the party, a playboy who would stop at nothing to get the best seat in the house, the hottest girls in town, and the nicest car in the city. At night, he was a masked vigilante who made the scum of Gotham afraid to go out after dusk.
Only a select few people knew the Batman's true identity: the loyal, good-humored butler Alfred Pennyworth, Bruce's guardian and mentor ever since Bruce witnessed the brutal murder of his parents; Lucius Fox, the caretaker of Wayne Enterprises, which was not just the Wayne family's fortune but the economic backbone of Gotham City; and Rachel Dawes, Assistant District Attorney and Bruce's best friend since childhood. These were the people the Batman knew he could trust with his identity.
But there were others who were willing to stand up in the face of sleaze and misdeeds. Among these were Lieutenant Jim Gordon, sometimes referred to as the last good cop in Gotham, and head of the Major Crimes Unit at GCPD. A lot of citizens were also placing their hopes for a better future on a candidate for District Attorney, Assistant D. A. Harvey Dent, who was fondly nicknamed Gotham's "White Knight" by his admirers.
These three men in particular had decided to act against the mob lords of Gotham City, chief among them Salvatore Maroni, the new head of Carmine Falconi's crime family. Ever since Falconi had been driven mad by Dr. Jonathan Crane, the "Scarecrow" who had nearly destroyed Gotham in a terrorist attack on Gotham but was stopped in time by the Batman, the family had been leaderless, lacking direction. Compounding this predicament were the seemingly never-ending wars with rival mob families. A lot of blood was shed in these wars.
Then Maroni stepped in, proposing that the various mobs of Gotham stop infighting and instead band together. As a multinational conglomerate of a mob, the law would be powerless to stop them. They could have their way, any day of the week.
Unless, of course, people outside the law had something to say about it. People like the Batman. The mob had to be careful, because they knew the Batman operated at night. So they held their meetings in the daytime.
It didn't help Maroni's mob that a lot of people didn't seem to be afraid of them anymore. Victims were scarred and traumatized, sure, but they weren't afraid. The Batman had been responsible for this. If people had lost faith in their legal institutions, they hadn't lost faith in their self-appointed guardian. '
Well, not yet, anyway.