Atlanta- A Fulton County sheriff’s deputy has been charged with murder after he shot a man during a violent argument while visiting a prostitute, authorities said.

Deputy Richard M. Jackson, 39, shot the man – described in an incident report as the prostitute’s boyfriend – after the two exchanged gunfire in the parking lot of a southwest Atlanta apartment complex late Saturday night, police said.

Jackson, who was off duty at the time, was arrested shortly after hiding in woods next to the Sky View Apartments on Beeler Drive. He was wearing his county-issued brown sheriff’s shirt, residents said.

Shortly before midnight Saturday, a prostitute, who was not identified, got into Jackson’s red pickup truck and the two began negotiating, authorities said.

Unhappy with the terms of the transaction, Jackson allegedly pulled out a weapon and shot at the woman, according to an account she gave police.

The woman ran to get her boyfriend, Alan Griffin, who was nearby, and the two men began arguing.

“There was possible gunfire exchanged; it’s not like one person went up and shot another,” said Atlanta police spokeswoman Sylvia Abernathy.

Residents heard four or five shots going off, and later saw Griffin – known in the area as Scooby – lying face-down near the apartment Dumpster, while his girlfriend screamed for someone to call police, said Emmanuel Thomas, 18.

Griffin, 22, had been shot once. Police found several different shell casings at the scene, but did not recover a second gun.

Residents at the Sky View Apartments said their small, rundown complex has been a hotbed of prostitution for some time.

Ever since the motels on Cleveland Avenue – off which Beeler runs – clamped down on women turning tricks in their parking lots, the prostitutes have set up shop at Sky View.

Pimps drop them off at the entrance to the complex and they wait for johns in the secluded back lot, said resident Najma Hunter.

The iron gate to the complex does not close. The keypad, where residents are supposed to punch in the gate code to enter, is broken and bent.

Hunter and other residents said Saturday night was not the first time they saw the deputy’s red Ford pickup truck parked at the complex.

Late Sunday night, authorities were canvassing the area around the apartments to see if Jackson might have been involved in other incidents, said sheriff’s office spokeswoman Nikita Adams-Hightower.

Jackson had been with the sheriff’s office “a couple of years” and was assigned to Grady Memorial Hospital, where he kept an eye on inmates when they were taken there for treatment, Adams-Hightower said. Before that, he worked several years at Atlanta’s Department of Corrections.

“To my knowledge, we have not had any disciplinary problems with him in the past,” Adams-Hightower said.

Jackson was married in December to a woman who has two children from a previous relationship.

He himself is the birth father of a 17-year-old girl from a relationship with Nancy Smith that ended several years ago.

“You don’t know how upsetting it is not knowing what to tell your daughter,” Smith said Sunday night. “This is so much not his character. He would take his shirt off for people. He’d give $2 to the homeless person outside Grady to catch the train. He was always looking out for people.”

Sgt. Charles Rambo, the national vice president of the International Brotherhood of Police Officers, said he had supervised and trained Jackson when the deputy began his career at the Fulton County Sheriff’s Office.

“When I got the call this morning, I sat up straight in bed,” Rambo said. “He’s a very fine officer. It’s a shock because, one, it’s a such a serious charge inside the ranks; and two, I was surprised that it was Richard.”

Jackson, who is expected to appear before a judge today, remained locked up Sunday night in the same jail on Rice Street whose inmates he is charged with overseeing.

He is, however, being kept in a cell to himself, away from the general population.