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Sheriff's firings excite racial tension in Clayton County, Ga.

JONESBORO, Ga. - When a spate of black officials were sworn into office in Clayton County, it was supposed to be a sign of progress for the historically white, rural county that was the setting for Gone With the Wind.

Then, one of the new officials made waves hours after taking office.

On Jan. 3, Sheriff Victor Hill called 27 of his employees into a jail holding area, ordered them to hand over their badges and gun, and told them they were fired. They were then escorted out of the building as snipers were perched on the roof.

The sheriff called the move necessary, part of a plan to reorganize a dysfunctional department. Those fired - most of them white - say they were let go because of their race, age or support of Hill's opponents, including the white sheriff he unseated.

The firings have touched off a racially charged uproar.

All but one of the employees returned to work this week following a judge's order that said the firings were probably illegal. But Hill gave them different jobs and said he would try to persuade some of the officers to retire or transfer to other agencies.

Hill disputes any claims that the firings were racially motivated, but he still refuses to say exactly why those 27 employees were fired among the 345 people on his department's payroll.

Of the fired employees, 19 were white, including four of the department's highest-ranking officers. Hill replaced at least four of the white officers with black ones.

"If you take the hype and emotion out of it, everything I've done is within the scope of the law," said Hill.

In Clayton County, race matters. Over the past decade, it has rapidly shifted from mainly white and rural to a popular black suburb. Suddenly blacks became the majority, making up nearly 57 percent of the population. The county elected its first black sheriff, district attorney, solicitor general and commission chairman last year.

"We've gotten a lot of black folks out here, so we want African-Americans to represent us," said resident Nate Ryles, a 31-year-old black barber. "But we don't want the controversy."

[Last modified January 16, 2005, 00:34:19]