Trooper Sean Groubert shoots an unarmed Levar Jones

Let us give Sean Groubert every benefit of the doubt.

Let us assume he is a good person. Let us assume he is kind to children, well liked by neighbors. And by all means, let's assume he has a black friend. For good measure, let's assume he has two.
Now, with those assumptions in force, let's ponder why Groubert, a white South Carolina state trooper, shot an unarmed black man last month at a gas station in Columbia. The incident has received less notice than did the shooting of Michael Brown, probably because the victim, 35-year-old Levar Jones, survived. But it deserves attention because it promises to enlighten us in ways the Brown killing did not.
Groubert, who has been fired and charged with assault and battery, tells his side of the story in audio obtained by MSNBC. He explains how he stopped Jones for a seat belt violation, how Jones "jumped out," of his car, and "stared at me." Groubert says that "as I approached him, he jumped headfirst into his car" and that when he ordered Jones out, "he jumped out of the car. I saw something black in his hands. I ran to the other side of the car, yelling at him, and he kept coming towards me. Apparently it was his wallet."
But that is not what happened. Groubert's story is contradicted by an unimpeachable witness - his own dashcam video. You can see it online for yourself. Groubert pulls up as Jones is exiting his vehicle. The officer asks to see Jones' license. Jones reaches into the car to get it. The officer, voice rising in panic, orders Jones out of the vehicle. Jones is complying with this when Groubert opens fire. He's still shooting as Jones falls out of frame, hands raised.
If Brown had survived to testify about what had happened, would it even have made a difference? After all, there are six readily-available witnesses in that case, and their consistent story still hasn't brought an indictment.  But if there had been cameras trained on the events in Ferguson...
The Groubert video offers an unusually stark image of that fear in action. Viewing it, it seems clear the trooper is not reacting to anything Jones does. In a very real sense, he doesn't even see him. No, he is reacting to a primal fear of what Jones is, to outsized expectations of what Jones might do, to terrors buried so deep in his breast, he probably doesn't even know they're there.
Jones, like Brown, wasn't just a black man, he was The Black Man in that instant. And for some people, The Black Man is a monster.

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