Sonya Massey – Say Her Name

  • Post last modified:July 24, 2024
  • Reading time:10 mins read


New body camera footage released by the Illinois State Police shows officers shooting dead unarmed Black woman Sonya Massey in her home. She had called the police for help over a possible intruder. One of the police officers involved in the case has been charged with murder. Sonya had called 911 to report a possible intruder, and police arrived at her home after midnight.

In video footage released Monday, Massey is seen talking to two officers in her home, while they ask for ID and she searches through paperwork.

The sheriff’s deputies then ask her to check on a pot of boiling water on her stove, saying “we don’t need a fire while we’re here.”

When one of the deputies’ steps back, Massey asks why, and he responds with a laugh: “away from your hot steaming water.”

Holding the pot, Massey calmly responds “Oh, I rebuke you in the name of Jesus” — prompting a deputy to respond “You better fucking not. I swear to God I’ll fucking shoot you at your fucking face,” drawing his weapon.

Apologising, Massey crouches behind a counter as officers scream “drop the fucking pot.” They then round the corner of the counter and open fire.

Afterward, one of the officers said they were afraid of “taking fucking boiling water to the fucking head.”

Officer Sean Grayson, who is white, has been charged with murder.

Sonya Massey: a ‘tragedy’?

Civil rights attorney Ben Crump, representing the family of Massey, called it “one of the worst videos of a police shooting ever.” He continued:

Just like George Floyd was a catalyst for the 2020 election, we believe this will be similarly impactful on the 2024 presidential election, especially for our Black community. There’s a narration to the tragedy. It’s just troubling on every level. Black women don’t get the respect and consideration they deserve in America.

Sonya’s family have told press that she is a descendant of William Donnegan. As the Guardian reported:

Massey’s family said she is a descendant of William Donnegan, a Black man who was lynched by a white mob but survived during the city’s infamous 1908 race riots that took 17 Black lives over a two-day period in mid-August of that year. As a result of the violence and carnage, a group of white and Black Americans banded together to create the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). Massey’s family said that the irony of having to reach out to the NAACP for help after her killing is not lost on them.

One of Sonya’s family members said:

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Massey’s family have since confirmed that she had schizophrenia. However, as Sonya’s father James, explained:

I was under the impression that a prowler had broken in and killed my baby. Never did they say that it was a deputy-involved shooting until my brother read it on the internet.

We were led to believe that the intruder – or someone from the neighborhood – may have killed her. We were absolutely shocked to find out that it was a deputy who shot her.

‘Don’t hurt me’

As more details emerge of Sonya’s murder, the failings of the police are laid bare. NBC reported that when Sonya answered the door she immediately told the police “don’t hurt me.” After shooting Massey, who was standing in her own home wearing a robe, Grayson told arriving police officers that Sonya was a:

crazy fucking bitch.

It also appears that Grayson’s body camera was turned off for the majority of the murder. The footage that has revealed the above details is from his partner’s body camera.

First Assistant State’s Attorney Mary Rodgers said of Grayson:

At no point did this defendant show anything but callousness to human life.

Grief

Activist Nina Turner shared an image of Sonya:

Grassroots organisation Critical Resistance called for the dismantling of police:

Artist Solange Knowles expressed how unsafe Black women are in America:

Journalist Melissa Sigodo shared another image of Sonya, this time smiling whilst holding a baby:

The Palestinian Youth Movement called for justice for Sonya Massey:

Disability justice – and justice for Sonya Massey

One social media user pointed out that Sonya having schizophrenia makes her part of the many Black people with mental health issues who have been killed by police:

An academic paper from Sonya Shadravan, Matthew Edwards, and Sarah Vinson explains:

 the compounding risk of having mental illness and being Black, which increases the likelihood of interactions with mental health and legal systems that are replete with an interplay of structural racism and mental health stigma.

Disability activist Vilissa Thompson writes:

Freddie Gray, Laquan MacDonald, Kevin Matthews, Tamir Rice, Eric Garner, Charleena Lyles, Sandra Bland, Quintonio LeGrier, Stephon Watts, Korryn Gaines, Natasha McKenna, Eric Smith, and Daniel Prude are all Black, disabled victims of state violence. In the United States, 50 percent of people killed by law enforcement are disabled, and more than half of disabled African Americans have been arrested by the time they turn 28—double the risk in comparison to their white disabled counterparts.

Thompson outlines how:

racism and ableism have been intimately woven into the fabric of this country since enslaved people first arrived on the shores of this stolen land.

Thompson states that 61 million people are disabled in the US – or, one in three households. Police are already trained to see Blackness as a threat. Disability is also misread as hostile, difficult, or unpredictable. For Sonya Massey, and many other Black folks, this is not a question of training. Grayson behaved despicably, not as a rotten apple but as a product of a rotting system.

Police will keep murdering Black people with wanton disregard for basic humanity. Reform isn’t going to cut it – what could you possibly reform about a system that keeps shooting down Black people? Abolition must be the way forward.





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