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Three guards suspended over jail rap video

By The Associated Press
Posted 11:15AM on Friday 25th June 2004 ( 20 years ago )
<p>Three guards involved in letting a rapper make a video at the Fulton County Jail have been suspended.</p><p>Sheriff Jackie Barrett punished the deputies for their roles in allowing rapper Clifford Harris, known as T.I., to use a maximum security cell, guards and inmates as props for his video.</p><p>Clemon Floyd and Claude Neely were suspended Thursday for 10 days without pay, said their boss, Sgt. Robert Sullivan. Rick Jones, who says he is T.I.'s godfather, was suspended for 15 days.</p><p>Sullivan told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution the deputies were unfairly targeted because they believed the video had been approved.</p><p>None of the suspended guards would confirm the discipline. A spokesman for the sheriff's department didn't immediately return phone calls from The Associated Press on Friday.</p><p>A fourth deputy who organized the video shoot, Lt. Dwayne Turner, was to meet with Barrett on Friday.</p><p>Sullivan said he hasn't been notified if he'll be punished for his role.</p><p>"I expect some form of discipline but I just try and remain optimistic," he said. "The blame has to go somewhere. My stance has been that it should go where it originated. We just followed instructions."</p><p>Turner has said he got permission from the sheriff's second-in-command, Chief Deputy Caudell Jones, to allow the video shoot. Jones has said he only approved permission for a nephew to tour the jail to show where criminals end up.</p><p>Harris was transferred on work release from Cobb County Jail to Fulton County Jail to film the video. He's imprisoned for violating his probation on a drug conviction.</p><p>The video became controversial because a convict dressed in hospital scrubs escaped during the shoot. Barrett has said the video had nothing to do with the escape.</p>

http://accesswdun.com/article/2004/6/165941

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