Body-cam video shows Illinois officer fatally shooting Black woman in face | Illinois

I commend the swift actions that were taken by the Springfield state’s attorney’s office. While we wait for the case to be prosecuted, let us pray to comfort the grieving. Congress must pass the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act now. Our fundamental commitment to justice is at stake.”

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Massey leaves behind two teenage children, a son and a daughter. The pair played on a basketball hoop down the street from Massey’s home on the east side of Springfield, a racially mixed area of mostly low-income residents. Massey’s neighbor, Evans, said the mother of two was “such a nice girl”, who “was probably scared to death” when police began looking into her home with flashlights following her 911 call.

“I kicked myself for not asking them what they were trying to do over there,” said Evans, looking across the street to Massey’s home on Sunday afternoon, where flowers and cards had been left on her doorstep. “She was just scared and asked for help and they killed her.”

Massey’s death carries on a troubling legacy of racial violence in Springfield: 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.

“The more things change, the more they stay the same,” a family member said, noting that Massey was taken to the same hospital, St John’s, as her ancestor Donnegan, where she was pronounced dead, and where Donnegan also died after being lynched.

Massey’s family is being represented by attorney Ben Crump, who compared Massey’s killing to the murders of Floyd and Emmett Till.

If Grayson’s killing of Massey weren’t enough, Standage and others said, he not only didn’t try to help her after firing his fatal shots but tried to prevent his partner from doing so. Making matters perhaps even worse, someone appears to have tried to cover up the shooting. Police radio traffic obtained by the Guardian shows someone, apparently at the scene of Massey’s killing, saying her wound was “self-inflicted”. A dispatcher asks for clarification and a man confirms for a second time: “self-inflicted.”

Grayson also did not activate his body-worn camera until after the shooting, an apparent violation of protocol. He had been hired by Sangamon county despite two charges of driving under the influence, the Springfield State Journal-Register reported, and had worked for other law enforcement agencies in Illinois for seven years before arriving in Springfield.

Following Massey’s killing, Grayson was fired by Sangamon county sheriff Jack Campbell and was charged with three counts of first-degree murder, aggravated battery with a firearm and official misconduct.

Grayson’s defense attorney sought release for the deputy, who planned to marry his fiancee in the fall. Grayson’s lawyer also argued that the deputy’s colon cancer diagnosis and resulting medical treatments should prompt his release until trial. That plea was dismissed by Judge Ryan M Cadagin, who said Grayson posed a threat to society and should be remained locked up until his 26 August trial because his actions showed “such a departure from the expectations of a civil society”, according to the Associated Press.

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Massey’s murder comes at a fraught time for the Black community in Springfield, said Antwaun Readus Sr, a local community activist. Following the January 2023 death of Earl Moore Jr, Black man who was strapped to a gurney by paramedics as he suffered alcohol withdrawal and hallucinations and died of asphyxiation, activists worked with former mayor Jim Langfelder to ease tensions in the Black community, Readus said. Two paramedics were charged in Moore’s January 2023 death and await trial.

Then, in April 2023, Springfield elected Misty Buscher, a Republican, as the city’s new mayor. Since then, promises about refurbishing community centers in Black neighborhoods – where activities for youth are especially lacking in summertime, when violence rises, according to Readus – have gone unfulfilled, he said.

“Langfelder supported us after the ambulance debacle but the new mayor got into office and we have not heard anything from her,” Readus told the Guardian of the city’s former Democratic mayor and its new Republican one. “She had no boots on the ground [for Massey]; she just put out one statement.”

Readus and others gathered at a park not far from the state capitol building on Sunday afternoon, grilling food and watching children play on a playground. The night before, someone had burned a piece of playground equipment. Rumors spread that police were responsible in an attempt to dissuade protesters from gathering there after release of the video of Massey’s killing. Across the street, three buildings once used as community centers sat empty, Readus said.

A lack of recreational activities in Springfield’s Black neighborhoods is “75% of the problem” of violence there, Readus said. He criticized city officials for not spending enough money on community centers and other initiatives for Black youth while supplying police with new equipment.

“They militarized the whole police department,” Readus said.

As word spread through the Black community and the city of the shocking contents of the video showing Massey’s killing, Readus worried about its impact.

“The whole country can go upside down tomorrow,” he said.