Candlelight vigil at CT Capitol honors beloved mother, grandmother and visiting nurse killed during a patient visit

Every holiday season, Joyce Grayson made her signature doughnuts for the annual Sugar Plum Fair at her church in Brooklyn, mixing the dough in the church kitchen with her grandchildren while donning a festive Christmas sweater. This year, the doughnuts are being donated to the holiday bazaar in her honor as her family mourns the nurse killed while visiting a patient in October.

“It sounds like a small thing, but there’s going to be such a big absence that day,” said the Rev. Jane Emma Newall from Federation Church of Christ after a candlelit vigil for Grayson at the state Capitol on Tuesday. Newall said the entire church community will miss Grayson’s caring spirit and delicious cookies this holiday season.

“We’d ask Joyce for cookies and she’d make five batches instead of one,” Newall said. “She was that kind of person.”

Newall was just one of dozens of people — family, friends, fellow nurses and lawmakers — who mourned Grayson in Hartford.

With candles glowing beside a framed photo of Grayson smiling brightly, mourners wiped tears from their eyes and passed around tissues as poems, songs and stories were shared about the 63-year-old mother, grandmother and dedicated nurse.

The Connecticut Nurses Honor Guard, each clutching a white rose, paid tribute to Grayson, who was working as a visiting nurse for Elara Caring at the time of her murder.

Laura Crean, a member of the guard and a retired registered nurse, worked with Grayson for at least a decade.

“She was more caring than you could put into words,” said Crean. “She was kind and funny and empathetic. She just cared about people and it showed in everything she did.

“I can’t say enough about her as a nurse. She was hard working and if something had to be done, she didn’t mind doing it. She just rolled up her sleeves and did what had to be done no matter how long it took,” said Crean, who noted that Grayson put in the long days of work even while raising her own family.

Grayson and her husband had six children and helped raise more than 35 foster children, from infants to teens, over the span of two decades as foster parents.

At the vigil, Connecticut Department of Children and Families commissioner Vannessa Dorantes officially honored Grayson and extended condolences to her loved ones.

“May you all continue to spread the care, compassion and kindness of Joyce,” she said.

Grayson was found dead in Willimantic on Oct. 28 after she went to see a patient, Michael Reese, for what was supposed to be a quick visit to administer medication, according to court records.

Reese, a convicted sex offender on probation, was living in a transitional home. Grayson was found dead in the basement after her family called the police to report that her phone’s GPS tracker showed that she had never left Reese’s home, records show.

Reese was arrested at the scene and charged with violating his probation after police found him trying to leave the house after reportedly tampering with his court-ordered GPS monitor, according to court records. Police searched Reese and said they found a crack pipe, a knife and someone else’s credit and debit card on him.

Reese remains in custody on violation of probation charges but has yet to be charged in connection with Grayson’s murder. Court records show that, according to his probation officer, he is allegedly the prime suspect in Grayson’s death, records show.

The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner has not yet released information about how Grayson died, but her death was described as violent by police and health care advocates.

“Nobody deserves what happened to her, but she would be the last person you would ever expect that to happen to,” said Crean.

Grayson’s death prompted state legislators to call for better protection for health care workers. Elara immediately implemented some changes in their practices to help health care workers feel safer when going into patient’s homes.

Crean spoke during the vigil and said that she hopes Grayson is remembered not by her years as a nurse, “but by the difference she made during those years by stepping into people’s lives.”

The crowd echoed the response of “Joyce was there” as Crean called out the many moments, birth and death and sickness, that Grayson helped guide patients and their families through.

“Your legacy of caring and compassion will live on in all of us,” Crean said through tears. “You will never be forgotten.”

Crean also worked for Elara and said that home visits were often frightening.

“It’s terrifying sometimes,” she said, recalling times when she showed up at a home to find a house full of unfamiliar people or patients experiencing mental health or substance use crises. She’d sometimes find herself circling the block, afraid to go inside, she said.

Crean said that when she heard about Grayson’s death, she called her husband, who said he had always worried that he would get a call about something terrible happening to her on a home visit. She said she’s confident that every in-home health care worker has felt the same at one point, or many points, in their careers.

“My only hope is that something changes,” she said.

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While health care workers and advocates have gathered to call on lawmakers to make changes immediately after the murder, Connecticut Association for Healthcare at Home president and CEO Tracy Wodatch said the point of the vigil was to support and recognize the value of home care providers and to support fellow caregivers.

“For today, we’re here for all of you, hoping to give you some comfort, some assurances and some much-needed recognition,” she said.

Cassandra Esposito, president of the Connecticut Nurses Association, said that there is an unspoken bond between nurses. Grayson’s murder rocked the entire community of caregivers, whether they had worked with her or not.

“When we heard about Joyce, even though we didn’t know her, we felt that because of that unspoken bond, that magnet that clicked, because we’re all nurses,” she said.

She said a wave of anger, pain, loss, grief and sadness rippled through the health care network in Connecticut.

Rev. Newall said that the death sparked those emotions in everyone who knew her.

“Joyce’s death has left a void in the lives of those who knew and loved her,” said Newall. “Her senseless and preventable murder has left the rest of us with both fear and anger.”

Newall described Grayson as a “minister of hope” who left everyone she met feeling comforted and cared for even in their moments of despair and sadness.

Those who loved her, she said, are “left wanting something good to come from something bad so it will not happen again.”

Rep. Jillian Gilchrest ended the vigil by recognizing that what happened to Grayson is, for many home health care workers, a fear coming true. She pledged her support to better protect visiting caregivers.

“It’s not fair that we are not protecting you the way you should be protected. And I’m just so sorry that we were not able to protect Joyce,” she said.

State Sen. Matt Lesser echoed sentiments from lawmakers like state Sen. Martha Marx, also a visiting nurse, that Grayson’s death was not altogether shocking for those who have been advocating for better protections for health care workers.

“Unfortunately Joyce was not the first visiting nurse in the country to be the recipient of a despicable act of violence,” he said.

But his goal is that in Connecticut she will be the last.

Attorney Kelly E. Reardon, who is representing Grayson’s family and estate, said she expects a civil lawsuit to be filed soon in connection with Grayson’s murder. No criminal charges have been filed yet in her death.