Body-camera footage showing the fatal police shooting of Sonya Massey, a 36-year-old Black woman who had called 911 for help, was released Monday in a case that has led to murder charges against a deputy.
The 36-minute video released via the Illinois State Police includes body-camera footage from each of the two Sangamon County sheriff’s deputies who responded to Massey’s house after midnight on July 6 after Massey called 911 to report a possible “prowler” at her home in Springfield, according to a court document filed by prosecutors. In the footage, deputy Sean Grayson and another deputy speak calmly with Massey in her home when she goes to the stove to turn off a pot of boiling water. She then picks up the pot and the other deputy steps back, “away from your hot steaming water,” he says.
“I rebuke you in the name of Jesus,” she says in response.
The release of the video comes about two weeks after the fatal shooting and just days after Grayson was charged in her death.
Grayson, 30, was indicted by a grand jury last week on three counts of first-degree murder and one count each of aggravated battery with a firearm and official misconduct. He has entered a not guilty plea and was denied pretrial release, according to court records. Massey is one of a number of Black women who have been killed by police in their own homes in recent years, including Breonna Taylor and Atatiana Jefferson. In a news conference Monday afternoon, civil rights attorney Ben Crump, who represents Massey’s family, connected her death to other cases of police violence against Black people across the US.