GWINNETT COUNTY, Ga. — Gwinnett County commissioners voted Tuesday night to pay $650,000 to settle a federal lawsuit filed by a former jail lieutenant who claimed he was fired for being white.
Joe Buice, a 22-year veteran of the Gwinnett County Sheriff’s Office, said he was forced to retire in March 2021 after Sheriff Keybo Taylor took office that January.
The lawsuit filed in 2022 contained explosive allegations about what Buice claimed happened behind the scenes at the sheriff’s office.
According to the federal complaint, Buice alleged his supervisor called him after he received a termination notice and told him he had gotten caught up in a “political racial war” in the sheriff’s office.
The lawsuit also alleged Taylor systematically replaced white employees with African American employees in what the complaint called a “race-based spoils system.”
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In a 2021 interview with Channel 2 Action News, Taylor outlined his vision for changing the department.
“It’s about changing the complete culture of this agency,” Taylor said. “We wanted to make sure it was more in line and representative of the community.”
The lawsuit stemmed from a controversial confrontation with a wheelchair-bound inmate in 2020. The previous sheriff fired the deputy directly involved, but Buice was the supervisor at the time.
In a previous internal affairs interview about the wheelchair incident, Buice said he was upset because the deputy “used techniques I taught him, and he used them inappropriately.”
The lawsuit claimed the allegations against Buice were false and that he had initiated the investigation he was accused of interfering with.
No one from the county or the sheriff’s office would comment on Wednesday about the settlement.
In a 2022 statement, the sheriff’s office said, “race is not a factor in determining the employment, termination, or promotional advancement of employees within our agency.”
The settlement allows the county to avoid a federal trial on the discrimination claims.
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