Johnny Outlaw works on the right side of the law helping ex-cons stay out of prison

Published: September 9, 2014

Chicago — Outlaw’s his name. Getting ex-felons on the job rolls is his game.

Contrary to what his name may suggest, Chicago’s Johnny Outlaw doesn’t wear a six-shooter or black cowboy hat. That’s because he operates on the right side of the law. For more than 10 years, he has dedicated his life to providing legal aid and job-finding help in the city’s most impoverished areas, driven by a core belief: Those who have served their time in prison deserve a second chance.

“The most discriminated [against] class of people in our society are these guys on release from state and federal prison,” he says. “Whatever happened to paying your debt to society?”

Mr. Outlaw operates out of a tiny cramped office on the campus of Kennedy-King College, a city-run community college on Chicago’s South Side, where he shifts between two phones that seem to never stop ringing. He is a one-man shop: On a recent Thursday, he mentions that he has fielded 43 phone calls so far that week, and 23 letters from inmates sit on his desk awaiting replies..

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