The New York Times Magazine recently explored the life of Stanley Williams, an original founder of the “Crips” gang and a convicted murderer who has been on death row in San Quentin prison for more than two decades:
It isn’t easy to reconcile the image of the new Stanley Williams, a children’s-book author and youth advocate, with that of the old Stanley Williams, a gang leader and convicted murderer. The arc of his life raises fundamental, perennial questions about human nature: Is character fixed or mutable? Can a person who is capable of tremendous harm also be capable of tremendous good?
(The New York Times Magazine, August 10, 2003). See Resources.