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The number rises to 45 percent among African-Americans.
The findings come as scrutiny on police has been heightened in
recent months by the killing of unarmed blacks by white
officers, which has raised questions about police treatment of
racial minorities.
While distrust is significant, nearly three-quarters of
respondents approve the job done by their local police, the
survey said. The survey showed that 56 percent of
African-American respondents approved of their local police.
MarQuis McClee, a small-business owner from Bloomington,
Indiana, who took part in the poll, said that he generally
trusts police and has officers among his relatives, but as an
African-American, he can also be wary around law enforcement.
"I have been involved with officers who give police a bad name,"
McClee, 38, said, pointing to a recent incident where he was
pulled over by an officer be believes was profiling him.
Nearly 70 percent of African-American respondents believe that
police target minorities.
In November, simmering tensions exploded with violent protests
in several U.S. cities following a grand jury decision not to
indict a police officer in the St. Louis suburb of Ferguson for
shooting an unarmed black teenager.
When asked about the Ferguson police, 60 percent of respondents
had a favorable impression but among black American respondents,
only 32 percent had a favorable impression.
When a gunman fatally shot two police officers in New York in
December in apparent retribution attack, the public was reminded
of the dangers police face on a daily basis in trying to keep
the streets safe.
While attention on policing has been in the spotlight, racial
disparity in the criminal justice systems has become a fact of
life in the United States. A study by the Sentencing Project
research group showed that one in three black men are likely to
be imprisoned sometime during their life. The figure for white
man is one in 17.
Proactive tactics aimed at keeping crime rates down in
economically stressed areas with a high number of racial
minorities can also cause friction between police and minority
youth who are likely to be stopped and questioned, said Larry
Hoover, director of the Police Research Center at Sam Houston
State University in Texas.
"There is no way that is going to be a pleasant experience, no
matter how courteous an officer is," Hoover said.
(Reporting by Jon Herskovitz in Austin, Texas; Editing by Lisa
Shumaker)
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