Fully 70% of blacks say police departments around the country do a poor job in holding officers accountable for misconduct; an identical percentage says they do a poor job of treating racial and ethnic groups equally. And 57% of African Americans think police departments do a poor job of using the right amount of force.
Yet whites’ views of police performance in these areas are hardly positive. For instance, just 37% whites say police forces nationally do an excellent or good job of holding officers accountable for misconduct. And 38% say the same about police departments’ performance in treating racial and ethnic groups equally.
The survey finds little change since 2009 in public confidence in local police departments to do a good job enforcing the law, to avoid using excessive force against suspects and to treat blacks and whites equally.