“In the name of Jesus, I rebuke you.”
These were some of the last words of Sonya Massey, 36 , according to police body-camera video taken inside her home in Springfield, Ill., on July 6. Massey had called 911 to report a disturbance. Sangamon County Sheriff’s Deputy Sean Grayson responded. After a short time inside Massey’s home, Grayson ordered her to take a pot off the stove. When she complied, Grayson’s energy changed. “You better f---ing not,” Grayson said, gun drawn. “I swear to God I will f---ing shoot you right in your f---ing face.”
Though Massey posed no apparent threat (a breakfast bar separated the kitchen from the family room where Grayson leveled his weapon), the deputy then shot the unarmed mother in the face. Seconds later, according to the video, Grayson refused to call for medical aid.
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There is something particularly odious about the mixture of murder and the mundane. Black women are killed in their homes by police officers while doing the most banal of domestic activities. Massey, dressed in a robe and pajamas, was shot while taking a pot off the stove. Atatiana Jefferson was killed in Fort Worth in 2019 while playing video games with her nephew. In 2020, Breonna Taylor was killed by Louisville officers executing a no-knock warrant. She had been asleep next to her boyfriend.
A study published by The Post in 2020 found that nearly 250 women had been killed by police in the United States since 2015 — 89 of them in their home or the home of someone they knew.
Grayson has been fired, arrested and charged with first-degree murder and aggravated battery with a firearm. He entered a plea of not guilty. His employment record shows one short stint after another in the U.S. Army and various law enforcement agencies, but his failure to distinguish himself never prevented him from landing another badge-carrying, gun-toting, order-giving job. People in cities across the country see this as a systemic failure, even if people in power cannot. Outraged citizens marched and held vigils for justice for Massey this past weekend.
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As activist and educator Alicia T. Crosby said in 2020, Black women killed by police deserve uprisings, too.
Vice President Harris, the presumptive Democratic nominee for president, has a choice to make: whether she will be with the marchers or with the people in power? Since President Biden’s exit from the presidential race, and as Harris moved quickly to sew up the nomination, her fellow liberals are scolding those who are raining on the parade by demanding clear policy on this issue. In the lush throes of the Harris honeymoon, they are enjoying the excitement of a Black and South Asian woman with a path to the presidency. At the same time, they are aht-aht-ing those of us who would push Harris to stake out strong, humane positions at home and abroad. Wait until she beats Donald Trump, until she takes office, until, until, until. But, as James Baldwin famously asked, “How much time do you want for your progress?”
The harsh reality is that police brutality and racism against Black women never take holidays.
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Knowing the Massey case is important to address, Harris called the Massey family on Friday. In the call, according to NBC News’s Yamiche Alcindor, Harris reportedly mentioned the George Floyd Policing Act, which aims to ban racial and religious profiling in policing, reform qualified immunity, and ban chokeholds and no-knock warrants. That was weak consolation, as the bill has been held up in Congress for years.
That’s the problem with America, as it has been for generations. Killings of Black people are not seen for what they are: crimes. They are “race” issues, they are “police training” issues, they are bad apples among otherwise good public servants. Very rarely are police shootings of unarmed people considered murder, the ultimate failure of law and order. Because in this country, the law killed Black people to maintain the racial order.
As a former prosecutor, Harris has law-and-order credentials that can appeal to voters in the center and on the right. During her time as attorney general of California, she did not support legislation that would have empowered investigations into police shootings by the Justice Department. Harris’s presidential campaign is using her past to say she’s not afraid to take on criminal bad guys — including, of course, the felon Donald Trump.
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But will “Kamala the cop” take on criminal cops?
There is no denying that Black candidates at the national level must tread a tough line on what are seen as racial issues. But they must be on the right side of the line. Though burdened in their grief, Massey’s family said they would enthusiastically vote for Harris. The vice president must earn that vote by committing to address race and police brutality in her future administration. It’s the very least that Massey, and other Black women killed by police, deserve.
