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Bodycam footage of Sonya Massey shooting will ‘shock the conscience of America’

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The family of Sonya Massey held a memorial and funeral service Friday, two days after a Sangamon County grand jury indicted a former sheriff’s deputy in her fatal shooting.

It was a standing-room crowd at Ruby Funeral Services and Chapel on East Washington Street, with many family members and friends dressed in purple. And while there were tears, the family wanted the crowd to celebrate the 36-year-old and remember her for who she was: a loving mother of two, devoted to her faith and an incredible cook.

“She was focused on her children, her family and God,” Raymond Massey, Sonya’s uncle, told reporters at a news conference at NAACP headquarters in Springfield.

The funeral comes nearly two weeks after Massey was shot and killed by a Sangamon County sheriff’s deputy in her Woodside Township home. Sean P. Grayson was named this week and charged with three counts of first-degree murder and two other charges in the case.

More: Court documents show an Illinois police officer shot Sonya Massey in the face in her home

Charging documents unsealed in court Wednesday show that on July 6, Grayson, 30, pulled out his 9-millimeter and threatened to shoot Massey in the face. Grayson “aggressively yelled” at Massey, who had made the 911 call, to put down a pot of boiling water before shooting her three times, once in the head.

Civil rights attorney Ben Crump said Grayson told his fellow deputy, so far unnamed and not charged in the case, not to render aid to Massey, who later died at HSHS St. John’s Hospital. Sheriff Jack Campbell fired Grayson on Wednesday, saying his actions “do not reflect the values ​​and training of the Sangamon County Sheriff’s Office or law enforcement as a whole,” in a statement.

‘Shock the conscience’: Bodycam footage to be made public on Monday

The Massey family first saw the bodycam footage on Wednesday, which was released Monday by the Illinois State Police. Sangamon County District Attorney John Milhiser said a review of the state police investigation, including bodycam footage, “did not support a finding” that Grayson was justified in his use of deadly force.

Not only the video, but the audio itself is considered particularly disturbing, said Crump, who is representing the family in the case.

Crump, who previously represented the family of Earl Moore Jr. in the wrongful death lawsuit, said what will be revealed will “shock the conscience of America,” just like Emmett Till and George Floyd.

“It’s so senseless, so unnecessary, so unjust,” he told the funeral crowd. “I mean, this video is tragic on every level.”

Grayson also had a significant size difference compared to Massey, standing more than a foot tall and twice her height. The difference raised the question of why he needed a gun at all, Crump said.

There have been several protests in Springfield, beginning last Friday outside the Sangamon County building, and the case is now beginning to gain international attention. All of the protests have remained peaceful, and ahead of the footage’s release, Springfield NAACP President Austin Randolph, Jr. is urging the community to keep it that way.

“If you saw it, you know something went wrong, very wrong,” said Randolph, who has reviewed the bodycam footage. “I’m asking the citizens, I’m asking the city and law enforcement, let’s do the right thing. Let’s be positive, let’s be understanding and most importantly, think before you act and hopefully everyone goes home safe.”

“We don’t need any distractions,” he added. “We want this trial to go all the way and we want full discipline and justice to the fullest extent of the law.”

Grayson came to the Sangamon County Sheriff’s Office after working for several nearby law enforcement agencies. But perhaps most notably, he was hired despite two DUI charges in Macoupin County.

Wilburn called on Sen. Doris Turner, D-Springfield, who introduced a proclamation to be read during the service, to spearhead a bill that would prohibit sheriff’s offices from hiring deputies with criminal records.

“If a black man has a blemish on his credit because he’s late on his credit card payments, or late on his house bill, you know he can’t be hired as a member of the police force,” he said, questioning why he hired the now-former officer in May 2023.

“But here’s a man who killed my baby, he had two DUIs on his record… there were all kinds of red flags, and yet he was appointed a deputy in this county,” Wilburn continued.

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Gov. JB Pritzker said Thursday in Decatur that an evaluation of police training may be needed.

“Look, if you talk to police officers and leaders in law enforcement, they will tell you that they think there needs to be more training, that we need to spend more resources on training, and that their officers need to get more training,” he said at an unrelated event. “And I can’t agree more.”

Contact Patrick M. Keck: [email protected], twitter.com/@pkeckreporter.