Cop Kills Black Musician Whose Car Broke Down, Police Leave Family in the Dark About Why

Musician Corey Jones, 31, was driving home from a show when his car broke down on a Florida interstate. He called his brother to tell him he was about to call a tow truck, and that's the last thing anyone in his family heard from him, family members told CBS12.  Thirteen hours later, a Palm Beach County Sheriff's detective informed them Jones had been killed in an officer-involved shooting.

That's about all the family was told, CBS12 reports. 

"We don’t know where his body is, we don’t know what’s going on, all we know is someone knocked on the door and said this has happened," Jones’ cousin, Ava Wright, told CBS12. 

According to a police statement released Monday, the plainclothes officer went to investigate what he thought was an abandoned vehicle. Police claim the shooting happened after the officer was confronted by an "armed subject," but Jones' family and friends describe the musician as unlikely to start a fight with police. They told the Washington Post he didn't carry a gun.

A bandmate who performed with Jones that night told CBS12, "I don't understand how anyone could ever perceive Corey is a threat; he's the most level-headed, calm, kind-hearted person."

On the website Patheos, a man who says he was a close friend of Jones talks about the pain of seeing a loved one's name become a hashtag: 

I wasn’t ready to see someone I knew, someone I worked with, and someone I considered to be a friend in a hashtag.

When I saw his name behind a hashtag, the reality of every story of police shootings over the past year weighed down on me so heavily that all the work in the world could not distract me from the realization that someone I knew had been taken away from us by the very people deputized to protect and serve us.

The officer is on paid administrative leave.

Watch the news report from CBS12 below. (h/t Raw Story)