Sonya Massey was a “daddy’s girl” who never ended the conversation without saying, “Daddy, I love you.”
The 36-year-old was shot and killed in her home by an Illinois sheriff’s deputy in 2024 after she called 911 for help.
On Wednesday, on what would have been Massey’s 37th birthday, her family announced a $10 million wrongful death settlement with the Sangamon County Sheriff’s Office and Sangamon County.
“My heart is heavy today. This is my daughter’s birthday,” said her father, James Wilburn, as tears fell from his eyes during a Zoom press conference.
The Sangamon County Board approved the settlement on Feb. 11, according to an emailed statement from civil rights attorney Ben Crump. This is the largest civil lawsuit settlement of any kind in the county, said Antonio Romanucci, another attorney for the Massey family.
The officer, Sean Grayson, 30, has been fired and is being held in jail without bail after a grand jury charged him on July 17, 2024, with first-degree murder, aggravated battery with a firearm, and official misconduct. Grayson has been incarcerated in a local jail without a bond amount set since his initial court appearance and is awaiting trial.
Wilburn thanked state lawmakers for introducing the Sonya Massey Bill, which aims to prevent what he called “frequent fliers” — officers who are able to get employed at different law enforcement agencies despite having a troubling employment record.
“I can’t say the same [thanks] for Sangamon County, because they were responsible for this occurring … and the other smaller departments that this guy was at when they should have taken his certification to be a law enforcement officer in Illinois,” Wilburn said.
During a July 2024 press conference, Wilburn fought back tears as he recalled the last voicemail he got from his daughter. In an emotional interview on CNN after body-camera footage from the July 6, 2024, fatal shooting was released, he spoke about the devastating loss and his family’s call for accountability.
“I know I won’t see her again in this world, but there’s another world that I will see her in.”
Wilburn, who had quadruple bypass surgery in 2022, also said during the CNN interview that he’s thankful to be alive today, but had this happened two years ago he may not have survived the level of pain he says he feels daily from losing Massey.
Massey’s family, alongside Crump, reviewed the police body-camera footage before it was released to the public. Crump compared the “heinous” and “senseless” footage to the May 2020 murder of George Floyd by former Minneapolis police officers. After watching his daughter’s last moments alive, Wilburn concluded that “the talk” Black families have with their boys must be extended to “our girls about their interactions with the police.”
Massey’s killing is a similar tragedy to what happened weeks before Christmas 2023 in Lancaster County, California. Niani Finlayson was shot and killed by a sheriff’s deputy in front of her 9-year-old daughter after she also called 911 for help in a domestic violence incident. Finlayson, 27, was holding a knife when police arrived and within seconds, she was shot and killed. Multiple law enforcement agencies are still investigating Finlayson’s case.
In Massey’s case, “Grayson had other options available that he should have used. … [He] had the training, tools, and experience to know better,” Sangamon County Sheriff Jack Campbell wrote on the agency’s Facebook page in 2024. “The public can see what we saw: Sonya Massey lost her life due to an unjustifiable and reckless decision by former Deputy Sean Grayson.
“He will now face judgment by the criminal justice system and will never again work in law enforcement,” Campbell wrote, adding, “Ms. Massey needlessly lost her life, and her family deserves answers. I trust the legal process will provide them.”
Capital B has reached out to Grayson’s attorney, Daniel Fultz, who declined to comment on the settlement or provide an update on his client’s criminal case.
Crump is also calling for legislative changes in Sangamon County similar to measures included in the settlement in Louisville, Kentucky, following the fatal police shooting of Breonna Taylor. The Sonya Massey Bill, introduced on Feb. 7 by Democratic Illinois State Rep. Justin Slaughter, seeks “to make substantive changes to how law enforcement applicants are reviewed before they are hired.”
“This robust process is nothing short of what our communities deserve, so that the right people are in these critical public service roles,” Slaughter said in an emailed statement.
Grayson worked for six police departments in four years before being hired by the Sangamon County Sheriff’s Office, according to multiple reports, and has a history of misconduct while serving in the U.S. Army.
“Sean Grayson never should have been hired had he not been hired because of his background, which was a red flag,” Romanucci said during Wednesday’s press conference. “This shooting never would have happened. What did happen is that when Sonya called 911, she didn’t know it, but that was her death sentence. She called in her own death when she called for help on the night that Sean Grayson came to her home.”
Massey’s Final Moments
“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 there was a deputy who shot,” Wilburn said during the CNN interview.
During the early morning of July 6, 2024, Massey called 911 to her home on Hoover Avenue in Springfield for a possible intruder. Two Sangamon County sheriff’s deputies arrived and searched around her home with flashlights, and found a broken driver’s side window of a car parked in an adjacent driveway, according to police body-camera footage.
The 36-year-old mother took a few minutes to open her front door for the deputies before she let them inside to further discuss her concerns. One of the officers asked for her identification after telling them that the broken window was from an earlier incident. As she looked for her ID, Grayson asked her to turn off the fire from the stove.
“We don’t need a fire while we’re here,” he said.
As Massey picked up the pot of hot water to move it to the nearby sink, Grayson began to back away.
She asked, “Where are you going?”
“Away from the hot steaming water,” Grayson said with a chuckle.
“Away from my hot steaming water?” she asked, adding unexpectedly, “I rebuke you in the name of Jesus.”
Massey’s living room and kitchen were open, with an island separating the two rooms. There were no walls obstructing Grayson’s view.
Grayson immediately responded with f-bombs and swore to God: “I’ll fucking shoot you in your motherfucking face.”
“OK, I’m sorry,” Massey said as Grayson pulled out his service weapon while ordering her to drop the pot. She ducked to the floor with her hands up and was shot in the head.
Grayson’s partner radioed that shots were fired and verbalized his intent to get his medical kit to aid Massey’s wound and to try and stop the bleeding.
“She done, she done. You can go get it, but that’s a headshot,” Grayson told his partner. “There’s nothing you can do, man.”
“What else do we do? I’m not taking hot fucking boiling water to the fucking face,” Grayson later said.
The other officer eventually went to get the kit as Massey was still breathing before the ambulance arrived. She died at a nearby hospital.
“Where’s the gun?” Grayson was asked by another officer who arrived at the scene. Grayson responded with his continued baseless defense of the threat of being rebuked in the name of Jesus with hot water.
The Illinois State Police investigated the fatal police shooting at the request of the Sangamon County Sheriff’s Office.
The Department of Justice said in an email to Capital B last year that they are “aware of and assessing the circumstances” of Massey’s “tragic officer-involved death,” and “will continue to track the criminal case opened by the Sangamon County State’s Attorney.”
“This incident does not reflect the values or actions of our law enforcement community,” Campbell, the Sangamon County sheriff, said.
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