The Sangamon County Sheriff’s Department released dashcam footage Friday evening of a lieutenant striking a pedestrian with his vehicle as the man crossed the street in downtown Springfield.
The man was walking in the crosswalk heading northbound on Ninth Street at the Monroe Street intersection on Sept. 24 when he was struck by an off-duty Sangamon County sheriff’s deputy, Andrew Henton, driving a work-issued vehicle.
Henton was making a left turn on Monroe Street on a green light when he struck the pedestrian shortly before 9 a.m. according to a statement from Jeff Wilhite, the assistant county administrator.
Henton was issued a citation for failure to yield to a pedestrian using a crosswalk.
The Springfield Police Department handled the investigation and has not released the name of the victim nor the status of his injuries.
Several social media posts identify the man as an unhoused individual who suffered “a ruptured spleen and several broken ribs.”
The Springfield Police Department told the Sheriff’s Office that he suffered “non-life-threating injuries.” The Sheriff’s Office sought information about the status of the victim at the hospital, but were denied the information, according to the statement.
“The incident was an unfortunate accident and we wish the pedestrian a speedy recovery,” states the Sheriff’s Office in the press release.
In Henton’s dashcam video footage, the pedestrian is in clear sight and walking at a regular pace, about halfway to the other side of the street, when he is struck.
Henton gets out of his vehicle to check on the man and returns to call for medical services.
Footage inside Henton’s vehicle doesn’t show the lieutenant using his phone or his computer at the time of the accident.
Vanessa Knox, a Springfield resident, said she was parked on Monroe Street and witnessed the man get struck by the vehicle.
She said Henton was driving an unmarked vehicle and turned on the vehicle’s emergency lights after the incident. Sangamon County Sheriff Paula Crouch and other officials from the sheriff’s office also arrived at the accident scene, she said.
“Police officers — I don’t care which force they’re with — are very trained in driving and they’re extremely observant and all of that,” Knox said. “So, what would make him just run right into him like that?”
She said she’s concerned about the number of recent cases involving law enforcement injuring or killing residents.
“You have officers knocking young girls in the face with their fists and the Grayson incident, nobody’s over that yet,” she said, referring to a Springfield police officer punching a 19-year-old woman during an arrest earlier this year and the shooting of Sonya Massey, 36, killed by former sheriff’s deputy Sean Grayson in 2024.
“It’s an awful lot of harm that has come from police officers,” she said. “There’s good that comes from them as well, but this is just an unusual amount.”
Knox spoke at Tuesday’s Springfield City Council meeting during public comments, upset that the incident wasn’t being discussed by the council nor reported in the news media. Her testimony and the pictures she took of the incident brought it to the public’s attention. However, she later declined to provide photos to an IT reporter, saying she wanted to respect the victim’s privacy and it was her understanding that he didn’t want to be identified.
Illinois Times has requested information from the Springfield Police Department several times about the incident, but was told to file a request through the Freedom of Information Act, which gives the department up to five days to respond.
“…the Grayson incident, nobody’s over that yet.”
I’m over it.
Yeah but you’re a huge racist, so nobody is worried about your opinion
I am speaking as someone whose ancestors were early pioneers to the county 200 years ago.