Larry Hoover

• 1. Introduction

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  Larry Hoover Sr., born on the 30th of November 1950, is an American former gangster who founded the Gangster Disciples, a street gang from Chicago. On the 28th of May 2025, President Donald Trump commuted his federal prison sentences. Yet the decision did not free him, because a separate state sentence still holds him in custody. His case raises several questions. How does a man behind bars keep shaping a gang for decades? Why did he later insist that the gang's initials stood for something else? And why would two of the biggest names in rap put on a concert in his name?

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• 2. Rise to Chairman

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  Jackson, Mississippi, is where Hoover was born, and he moved to Chicago, Illinois, at the age of four. At 13 he dropped out of junior high and joined a gang called the Supreme Gangsters, where he took part in petty theft and muggings.

  In 1969, a truce reshaped the map of Chicago's gangs. Hoover and David Barksdale, the leader of the Black Disciples, agreed to merge their rival groups into one organization. The result was the Black Gangster Disciple Nation, often shortened to BGDN.

  Barksdale died in 1974 of kidney failure, a result of injuries from a 1970 assassination attempt. Hoover took over the Black Gangster Disciple Nation and named himself its chairman. The Disciples already controlled the South Side of Chicago, and under Hoover the gang took over a majority of the city's drug trade. The Disciples held the South Side, but Hoover's ambitions were about to reach well beyond it.

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• 3. The Folk Nation

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  In 1978, while he was in custody, Hoover formed an alliance called the Folk Nation. It gathered gangs that shared his interests and likeness, including the Spanish Gangster Disciples, the Simon City Royals, the Two Sixers, the North Side Insane Popes and the Latin Eagles. The alliance held its ground both inside prison walls and on the streets outside.

  From his cell, Hoover ran the gang's drug trade in prison and on the streets. The business began on Chicago's West Side and later spread across the United States. Parts of the Folk Nation alliance also expanded into the Midwest. As of 2022, the Gangster Disciples had confirmed expansions to Indianapolis, Kansas City, Minneapolis, Detroit, Milwaukee, Birmingham, Cincinnati and Memphis. The list also includes Jackson, the city where Hoover was born.

  The Folk Nation had a rival coalition, the People Nation. Its members included the Latin Kings, the Almighty Vice Lord Nation, the Mickey Cobras, the Almighty Saints and the Four Corner Hustlers. It also included the Almighty Black P. Stone Nation, run by Jeff Fort. Fort is a Mississippi native like Hoover and now shares his prison facility. In Memphis, the Gangster Disciples fought a separate city rivalry with a local crew called the Love Murdering Gangsters, formerly known as LMG Mafia.

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• 4. The Young Murder

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  On the evening of the 26th of February 1973, William "Pooky" Young, a 19-year-old alleged drug dealer, was abducted and shot dead in an alley. The alley sat near 68th Street and Union Avenue in Englewood, a neighborhood on Chicago's South Side. Hoover ordered the killing after Young's name came up as one of three people accused of stealing drugs and money from the gang six days earlier.

  Andrew Howard was arrested on the 16th of March 1973. Hoover went into hiding in Chicago. On the 21st of September 1973, he was driving a stolen truck when he was asked to stop for a traffic violation. He tried to run but was caught, and police then learned he was wanted for Young's murder.

  In October 1973, Howard and Hoover were both indicted for murder. In December, each was sentenced to 150 to 200 years in prison. Hoover was sent to Stateville Correctional Center in Crest Hill, Illinois, to serve his term. Investigators would later spend years watching what he did from inside the prison system.

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• 5. The Federal Case

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  On the 22nd of August 1995, Hoover was indicted after a 17-year undercover investigation. The Illinois Department of Corrections, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives worked on it jointly. The charges covered conspiracy, extortion, money laundering, drug-related offenses and running a continuing criminal enterprise. A lengthy federal investigation built on wiretaps led to his arrest.

  Prosecutors alleged that the gang had 30,000 "soldiers" in 35 states and made $100 million a year. Federal agents arrested Hoover at the Dixon Correctional Center. He was then moved to the Metropolitan Correctional Center in downtown Chicago to await trial.

  In 1997, Hoover was found guilty on all charges, 40 counts in addition to his earlier murder conviction. He received additional life terms in federal prison. He served that time at ADX Florence in Fremont County, Colorado.

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• 6. Growth and Development

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  In 1989, the Black Gangster Disciples began to see trouble at the top. Members felt Hoover's leadership of the Folk Nation alliance had weakened once he focused on the Gangster Disciples alone. The anger of a majority of members split the organization into the Gangster Disciples and a reborn Black Disciples. One sign of the split was a drug-dealing dispute in Englewood that escalated into a shooting. Several people were killed.

  By early 1993, Hoover claimed to have renounced his violent criminal past and became an urban political celebrity in Chicago. He proclaimed that the GD initials now meant "Growth & Development." In 1996, his teachings were published in a book titled The Blueprint of a New Concept: From Gangster Disciple to Growth & Development.

  In July 2022, Hoover went further and said he no longer affiliated with the Gangster Disciples. He said he wanted "no part" of the gang "whatsoever." He also claimed he was "no longer the Larry Hoover people sometimes talk about, or he who is written about in the papers, or the crime figure described by the government." Many believed this was a ruse to get his sentence reduced or appealed.

  Ronnie Bo, formerly a national spokesman for the Gangster Disciples, has also denounced his association with the gang in a song titled "Digital Social Hour."

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• 7. Campaign for Release

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  Winndye Jenkins-Hoover, Hoover's partner since 1968, created the Larry Hoover Project in 2014. Its aim was to win clemency for her husband and to have his criminal history reviewed. In 2021, Hoover hired Jennifer Bonjean, who had been Bill Cosby's attorney, and tried to appeal his sentence under the First Step Act. U.S. Judge Harry Leinenweber denied the request.

  Kanye West, a fellow Chicago native, has been a vocal advocate for Hoover's release for over a decade. On a demo of his song "Hurricane", meant for the since-scrapped project Yandhi, West suggested calling his ex-wife, Kim Kardashian, to help. Kardashian had succeeded in working on Trump to free a number of federal prisoners. On the 11th of October 2018, at a luncheon with Trump, West pleaded for clemency for Hoover.

  West's 2021 album Donda includes the track "Jesus Lord" and its remix, "Jesus Lord, Pt. 2". Both feature a recorded message from Hoover's son, Larry Jr., who talks about the "cracks" in America's criminal justice system. He also describes how his father's imprisonment affected the family.

  On the 9th of December 2021, West and Drake hosted the Free Larry Hoover Benefit Concert at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. Amazon Prime Video livestreamed it. Drake's performance and plea for clemency were accidentally edited out of the original stream, then restored in a revised version. The two rappers had been in a rivalry, and they paused it to raise awareness of Hoover's case and of sentencing reform. West later rapped "Free Larry, free Young Thug" on the track "River", from his collaborative album with Ty Dolla Sign, Vultures 2.

  Hoover is eligible to seek parole on his murder conviction, because the crime came before Illinois abolished discretionary parole in 1978. The Chicago Sun-Times noted that parole is not out of the question. Between 2010 and 2020, the Illinois Prisoner Review Board released roughly 50 elderly inmates serving time for murder under older state laws.

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• 8. A Voice in Hip-Hop

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  Hoover's voice reached listeners long before the benefit concert. He appears by phone from prison on several skits of the 1996 Geto Boys album The Resurrection. There he shares his views on the prison system and on the youth of the black community. Because of that link, J. Prince, founder of Rap-A-Lot Records, has backed Hoover since his imprisonment. As of 2022, Prince was calling for a pardon.

  Rick Ross put Hoover's name on the chorus of "B.M.F. (Blowin' Money Fast)", a single from his 2010 album Teflon Don. The line pairs Hoover with Big Meech, co-founder of the Black Mafia Family: "I think I'm Big Meech, Larry Hoover / Whippin' work, hallelujah."

  Killer Mike mentions Hoover in "Down by Law", a 2023 song and the opening track of his album Michael. That album won the Grammy Award for Best Rap Album in 2024.

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