This week, Illinois state police released body camera footage of a sheriff’s deputy murdering Sonya Massey, a 36-year-old Black woman and mother of two, in the kitchen of her home. On July 6, 2024, Sonya called police to report a suspected break-in of her house. Officers from the Sangamon County Sheriff’s Office arrived and, after a quick search outside of the home, entered it. Body camera footage from one of the officers present shows Deputy Sean Grayson shooting Sonya at close range after she picked up a pot from her stove that Grayson had ordered her to remove from a burner.

In a statement made after the release of the body camera footage, President Biden said that Sonya’s murder by police “reminds us that all too often Black Americans face fears for their safety in ways many of the rest of us do not.” He described Sonya as “a beloved mother, friend, daughter, and young Black woman.” Sonya’s father said her last words to him had been “Daddy, I love you.”

Swift criminal charges

An Illinois grand jury has indicted Grayson on three counts of first-degree murder and a count each of aggravated battery with a firearm and official misconduct, with a pretrial hearing scheduled in the case for August 26. In the meantime, Grayson has pleaded not guilty and was denied pretrial release at a bail hearing. The sheriff’s department has fired Grayson and the federal Department of Justice has opened an investigation into Sonya’s murder.

Investigative reporters have revealed that Deputy Grayson was discharged from the Army in 2016 for committing an unspecified “serious offense (misconduct).” Grayson had also previously been convicted twice of driving under the influence, resulting in a two-year revocation of his driver’s license from 2017 to 2019. Since 2020, he had worked with six Illinois law enforcement agencies in both part-time and full-time policing roles.

Toward reparative justice

Grayson’s swift arrest contrasts with the lack of criminal legal accountability common in extrajudicial killings of civilians by American police. But the criminal legal system, with its narrow focus on incarceration as a catch-all solution, is ill-equipped to answer questions Sonya’s family has raised about her murder. In an interview, Sonya’s father, James Wilburn, asked: “The biggest question is: How did this man ever get hired in law enforcement? Here’s a man who, in 4 years, he’s been in 6 different departments.”

By demanding more than the criminal prosecution of Grayson, Sonya’s family seeks reparative justice: recognition of wrongdoing and redress that repairs, as much as possible, the consequences of a human rights violation.

International law identifies five core elements of reparative justice.

• Restitution: to restore victims and their loved ones to their original situations, as much as possible
• Compensation: to provide economic compensation traceable to physical or moral harm, lost economic opportunity, or necessary legal, medical, or social services
• Rehabilitation: to provide medical, psychological, legal, and social services
• Satisfaction: to investigate, sanction wrongdoers, formally apologize, and publicly commemorate with an eye toward restoring the dignity of victims
• Non-repetition: to ensure the human rights violation won’t happen again, including by guaranteeing that state officials observes codes of conduct and ethical norms  

Sonya’s family are advocating for legislation that would strengthen bars against hiring police officers with ethical red flags in their background. In his national address, President Biden urged passage of the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, which, among other measures, would mandate the creation of a National Police Misconduct Registry to track termination records, lawsuits against officers, and discipline records at the federal, state and local level.

When the state murders someone, complete restitution is impossible. Nothing can restore Sonya’s life. What is left is the hope that reparative justice, called for by Sonya’s family, can wring some meaning out of the terrible wrong that took her away from them.