On Monday, as Nassau's film commission hosted a tour of local landmarks for various production companies, the president of the county's correctional officers union took aim at county leaders for allowing a trio of rappers who have rapped about killing cops to film a music video at the East Meadow county jail.
John Jaronczyk, president of the Nassau County Sheriff's Correction Officers Benevolent Association, told Newsday, the union is "researching" its legal options to see if they can have the music video "Be About It" taken down from websites such as YouTube, because it briefly features uniformed Nassau correctional officers in the background who Jaronczyk said were filmed without their consent.
The video by Brooklyn based rappers Uncle Murda, Maino and Vado, shows two actresses playing the role of female correctional officers, stripping down in a jail cell and dancing provocatively for the rappers.
Jaronczyk's main contention is that Uncle Murda, whose real name is Leonard Grant, and the rapper Maino, whose real name is Jermaine Coleman recently released a separate music video titled "Hands Up" where they each have guns pointed at a police officer and recite lyrics such as "a cop got to get killed."
The "Hands Up" video came in the wake of the controversial shooting of Michael Brown by a Ferguson, Missouri police officer, and the death of Eric Garner who died after being placed in a choke hold by a NYPD officer in Staten Island.
"It's disgusting that Nassau county allowed this to happen, that they made money off of this," Jaronczyk said. "It's a slap in the face to all law enforcement."
Jaronczyk's complaints were first aired in a Daily News article. Reached for comment, Brian Nevin, spokesman for County Executive Edward Mangano deferred to an e-mail response sent to Newsday by Nassau Sheriff Michael J. Sposato, who said "all persons participating in film projects at the jail are subject to limited background check for security reasons."
"The background checks and supervision of the film projects are performed by uniformed personnel of the Sheriff's Department who are also members of the Nassau County Sheriff's Correction Officers Benevolent Association." Sposato wrote. " As an aside, at no time are film crews permitted to be in active and inmate-occupied areas of the jail, and they remain under the supervision of uniformed facility personnel at all times." Grant, in a phone interview said he believed the union's concerns were "blown out of proportion," saying his "Hands Up" video was not promoting violence against police officers. "All we're saying is, 'what if we take it there instead of protests, instead of music?' Grant said. "That wouldn't work for anyone. It's not saying, go ahead and do that, it's saying we have to correct the system."
Jaronczyk said the county should improve it's "quality control" over which projects are allowed to shoot at the jail. "What's next? An adult porn film?" Jaronczyk said. "Where's the line in the sand?"
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