T.I. arrested on weapons charges

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Atlanta rapper T.I., whose given name is Clifford Harris Jr., was in federal custody Saturday night in his hometown. His arrest came at 2:30 p.m. Saturday, four hours before the BET Hip-Hop Awards show got under way downtown.



unregistered machine guns and two silencers, and possession of firearms by a convicted felon. The arrest was made in the parking lot of a downtown shopping center, which a witness identified as the Walgreens drug store at the corner of North and Piedmont avenues.

Harris was arrested after allegedly trying to purchase the guns from a "cooperating witness" with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. According to federal officials, the witness had been cooperating with authorities since Wednesday, when he was arrested on charges of trying to purchase guns from a federal agent.

"This investigation developed very quickly," Vanessa McLemore, an ATF special agent, said in a statement Saturday night. "We learned only this Wednesday that the cooperating witness was allegedly buying the machine guns for Harris. The cooperating witness told Harris on Thursday that he had obtained the items, and on Friday Harris made it clear that he wanted them delivered to him [Saturday]. Harris then agreed to meet and took possession of the machine guns [Saturday] afternoon."

McLemore said Harris could face "a potentially long prison sentence." He's scheduled to make his initial appearance before U.S. Magistrate Judge Alan J. Baverman on Monday at the federal courthouse in Atlanta.

Neighbors react

Following the arrest, agents searched Harris massive brick home at 429 Creekview Lane in College Park, where they found three rifles, two pistols and a revolver in a walk-in closet. Three of the guns found during the search were purchased by the cooperating witness and delivered to Harris, according to authorities.

About 7 p.m. Saturday, a handful of ATF agents, most of them wearing medical gloves, carried about 10 boxes out of the rapper's open garage and loaded them into an unmarked police car at the bottom of the sloping driveway. They also carried papers and folders and put the contents in a brown paper bag before placing them in a tan sedan.

At 8:30 p.m., a woman in a GMC Yukon pulled up and identified herself as T.I.'s mother. She told an ATF agent she had T.I.'s attorney on the phone, and asked the agent for the inventory list of the items seized in the search. The woman waved off an AJC reporter who approached her car.

Throughout the day, while celebrities speculated about T.I.'s whereabouts from the red carpet at the BET awards, a row of unmarked police cars and TV news trucks clogged the end of the cul-de-sac where T.I. lives.

Neighbors described Harris as a good guy who is not home often, but who rolls down his window and chats with them as he drives by. He has a guard who watches his gated property and occasionally has a lot of visitors.

"He travels quite a bit," neighbor Michael McCrimmon said. "Living next door to him, I have a better chance of seeing him on TV than I do here."

'Out of nowhere'

Hassan Musaddiq, a cameraman for the Atlanta public access hip-hop show "Severe Entertainment," said he was in the Walgreens parking lot and witnessed the arrest. He was there to pick up a video camera for red carpet interviews.

"I saw the ATF come out of nowhere," Musaddiq said. "They had them all on the ground. At first, I didn't even realize it was T.I. It was crazy. There was an unmarked black van and then about 10 squad cars came in."

The cameraman said he didn't have his equipment at the time of the arrest. He said he had seen the rappers together earlier in the day up the street at the Atlanta Civic Center, where rehearsals were under way for the BET awards show.

Musaddiq said he was there to get his media credentials for the red carpet. He said he watched while officers towed off a black Range Rover and a tan Suburban from the Walgreens parking lot as well.

"I didn't see T.I. with any weapons but the ATF officers had guns out," Musaddiq said. "It was total drama."

'Free T.I.P.'

T.I., who was nominated for more awards (nine) than any other artist, was the co-winner of Saturday night's first award, sharing CD of the year with Common, who accepted on both's behalf.

The rapper, who was scheduled to perform, wasn't forgotten during the taped show. Shortly before 8 p.m., two acts took to the stage to perform T.I. songs: Wyclef Jean and DJ Drama did "You Know What It Is" followed by Busta Rhymes and Alpha Mega sharing the mike for T.I.'s "Hurt."

When they finished "Hurt," the two artists raised their fists to the crowd and shouted, "Free T.I.P," in reference to the embattled rapper's hit.

BET officials stood firmly behind T.I. "[T.I.] not only has a great career in music but a great career in television, film and anything he sets his mind to," said Reginald Hudland, president for entertainment for BET.

"What strikes me about T.I. is the goodness of his spirit. I think T.I. is a great person and a gigantic artist and he has our utmost support."

But this isn't the rapper's first brush with the law.

In 1998, Harris was convicted on crack cocaine charges. In May 2006, T.I. and his entourage were reportedly involved in a shooting in Cincinnati after an altercation at a nightclub in which three were wounded, and T.I.'s friend and personal assistant Philant Johnson was killed.

-- Staff writers Richard Eldredge and Sonia Murray contributed to this article.