Thursday, April 05, 2012

Poll on Trayvon Martin case shows racial divide – USATODAY.com

Poll on Trayvon Martin case shows racial divide – USATODAY.com: In one of the starkest differences, 73% of blacks said they think George Zimmerman would have been arrested if Trayvon was white, while only 33% of whites agreed. The majority of whites polled — 52% — said race made no difference in the way the case was handled.

Trayvon, 17, was shot and killed on Feb. 26 in Sanford, Fla., as he was returning to a gated community after buying candy at a convenience store. Trayvon's family says the young man was followed and then killed in cold blood because the gunman, Zimmerman, deemed him "suspicious" because the teen was black and wearing a hoodie.

"There are really profound differences in the worldviews of blacks and whites," said Vincent Hutchings, a political science professor at the University of Michigan.