INTERRUPTING VIOLENCE

A stirring account from the front lines of urban violence prevention.

Writing with Gryniewicz, Williams alternates between frank discussions of the challenges faced by anti-violence “interrupters” performing conflict mediation in Chicago’s resource-poor Black neighborhoods and a memoir about his own improbable transformation from a second-generation member of the Black Disciples. Alongside other aspects of restorative justice, the movement gained visibility following the acclaimed 2011 documentary The Interrupters, in which Williams appeared. In the foreword, director Alex Kotlowitz writes, “It’s formally known as community violence intervention, but that doesn’t begin to capture the scope of what Cobe and others do as they walk their communities with an open heart and a quiet fury stemming from their belief that things need not be this way.” Williams later adds, “Community violence intervention is a growing public safety movement that stops shootings and killings on the front end. It uses formerly incarcerated gang members as ‘credible messengers’ to interrupt violence.” The narrative presents a vivid family history, including intense vignettes like his own father’s murder following success as a drug dealer, alongside an ongoing account of the complex networking involved in the conflict resolution efforts of organizations like CeaseFire (since renamed Cure Violence), which provide “a model for this approach borrowed from the discipline of public health rather than criminology.” Indeed, during the pandemic, writes the author, “we moved from solely focusing on violence prevention to serving as community health workers.” Following the police murder of George Floyd and subsequent uprisings, “the community violence intervention model, which I had been promoting for over a decade, reached new prominence.” The complex narrative’s earnestness can drag at points, but Williams is deeply perceptive about brutal urban realities, and he dismantles assumptions rooted in implicit bias with academic rigor and effective storytelling.

A heartfelt, authentic guide for combatting community violence.