A dramatic narrative account of the life of William Juneboy Outlaw III, whose journey from housing-project youth to ruthless gangland kingpin to change-making community advocate represents a vital next chapter in the ongoing conversation about race and social justice in the us.

When he is at his early twenties, William Juneboy Outlaw III was sentenced to eighty-five years in jail for homicide and armed assault. The sentence brought his short but prolific criminal career as the head of the about Resident Outlaw: One Man’s Journey from Gangleader to Peacekeeper forty-member cocaine gang in New Haven, Connecticut, to a detailed. But behind bars, Outlaw quickly became a feared prison “shot caller” with 150 males under his sway.

After that everything changed: his original phrase was reduced by sixty years. At the same time, he was delivered to some one of the most notorious federal prisons in the country, where he endured long stints in solitary confinement-and where transformational relationships with a fellow inmate and a jail therapist produced him recognize that he wanted more for himself.

Upon his release, Outlaw took a job at Dunkin’ Donuts, volunteered in the New Haven community, and began to rebuild his life. He now could be an award-winning community advocate, leading a group of former felons who work out truces between gangs on the very streets that he once terrorized. The homicide rate in New Haven provides lowered 70 percent in the decade that he’s run the team-a drop as dramatic as in virtually any city in the united states.

Written with exclusive access to Outlaw himself, Charles Barber’s Resident Outlaw may be the unforgettable story of how a gang leader became the catalyst for just one of the best civic crime reductions in the us, and an motivating argument for love and compassion when confronted with insurmountable odds.