Less than six months into his 20-year prison sentence, the former sheriff’s deputy convicted of second-degree murder for the fatal shooting of an unarmed Sangamon County woman is asking the state to release him from prison on medical grounds.

Sean Grayson, 32, filed for release under the Joe Coleman Act last month.

Under the act, a person in custody who is terminally ill or is medically incapacitated could be considered eligible. Medically incapacitated is defined as having a medical condition that prevents them from completing daily living activity behind bars without assistance and will likely not improve in the future.

Doctors diagnosed Grayson with Stage 3 colon cancer in 2023, his attorney Mark Wykoff told the judge at his sentencing in January but added that the cancer had progressed to Stage 4 and spread to his liver and lungs.

At his trial last October, Grayson appeared to have lost between 40 and 50 pounds from the time of the shooting and appeared gaunt. This is a much different Grayson than the one that appeared at Sonya Massey’s door almost two years ago on July 6, 2024.

Grayson, then 6-foot-4 and weighing 225 pounds, answered a call to Massey’s home after she called 911 to report a prowler outside her home.

A video released after the shooting depicted Grayson and his partner clearing the outside of the house, finding no prowler, and entering Massey’s home to question her further. During that exchange and under Grayson’s direction, Massey went to the stove to remove a pot of boiling water. As Massey did so she said, “I rebuke you in the name of Jesus.”

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Grayson responded, “I’ll f—ing shoot you right in the f—ing face” and drew his gun. Seconds later, Grayson fired three times, fatally wounding Massey with one shot in the head.

“He’s a killer. I apologize that he must suffer, but he has to pay for what he did,” said Sontae Massey, Sonya Massey’s cousin.

Grayson was indicted on multiple counts of first-degree murder. He later was convicted by a jury of second-degree murder.

At his sentencing hearing three months later, Wykoff cited Grayson’s worsening medical reason in his plea for leniency.

The decision to release Grayson will be made by the Prisoner Review Board. The PRB will review a medical evaluation from the Illinois Department of Corrections, identifying the diagnosis, life expectancy, activities of daily living that require assistance, and the level of medical care required by the incarcerated person.

A three-member panel will make a decision within 90 days of receiving the application.

The decision is at the sole discretion of the Prisoner Review Board.

Under the statute, the PRB can consider the diagnosis and likelihood of recovery, the potential cost of healthcare if there is continued incarceration, the impact that may have on the provision of medical care throughout IDOC, the present likelihood of and ability to pose a danger, and victim statements.

The PRB can also weigh whether the person’s condition was explicitly disclosed to the original sentencing judge and taken into account at the time of sentencing, as it was in Grayson’s case.

One of the factors that isn’t specifically mentioned in the review process but often considered is the length of the sentence a person has served before making the application.

Here’s how the act came about

The act, which was approved by the Illinois legislature and became law in 2022, is named for 82-year-old Joe Coleman, a decorated Army veteran and incarcerated father who died of prostate cancer in prison. The law was created so that dying and severely incapacitated individuals do not have to die behind bars.

There are approximately 30,000 incarcerated people in Illinois. A total of 34 were approved for compassionate medical release in 2024, according to report by IDOC. Most were released to private residences; others went to nursing homes, transitional housing or rehabilitation centers.

But eight who applied were not released because they failed to find an approved living site.

The number of compassionate medical releases approved warrants a call for more transparency from the Prisoner Review Board, according to Jennifer Vollen-Katz, the executive director of the correctional watchdog John Howard Association of Illinois.

That transparency could result in changes in IDOC policy that would better serve the people in custody, especially the sick and elderly, shifting resources from security to providing medical care at designated facilities.

“If the vast majority of people in custody in this facility are incapacitated in some way, shape, or form, it is silly to continue paying security costs for people that don’t require that kind of security for any reason, right?” Vollen-Katz said.

Ben Crump, a nationally renowned civil rights attorney who represented Massey’s family in a successful civil claim, urged the PRB to deny the petition.

“Her family remains in deep grief from the trauma and loss. And importantly, the community deserves justice to be upheld, and that Sean Grayson needs to be held fully accountable for his actions,” Crump said in a statement to the media Thursday.

Grayson’s hearing before the PRB is scheduled for July 31.

Capitol News Illinois is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news service that distributes state government coverage to hundreds of news outlets statewide. It is funded primarily by the Illinois Press Foundation and the Robert R. McCormick Foundation.