YSL Woody walked away from rap and renounced gang life in Atlanta while the YSL RICO case continues to make headlines and Young Thug remains at the center of a media storm.
YSL Woody, said he’s done with music and the streets. He’s now focused on faith, writing and telling his story through a new book and upcoming documentary.
“Walk away. You gotta tell yourself. ‘Okay, today, I’m done.’ That’s what I did,” Woody said in a recent interview with Fox5 Atlanta. “Nah, man, they want us believe it’s two ways out, dead or jail. No, it ain’t. Just turn your back, just walk away. You feel what I’m saying, because if you don’t do it now, later down the line might be too late.”
Woody’s transformation comes as the YSL trial continues to cause controversy.
Young Thug has been caught in a storm of leaked jail calls and resurfaced interrogation footage from a 2016 case involving Peewee Roscoe and a shooting targeting Lil Wayne’s tour bus.
The footage reignited speculation about whether Thug cooperated with police.
Since then, audio has surfaced of Thug criticizing several Atlanta rap figures, including Future, André 3000, GloRilla and Lil Durk. His attempt to clear the air on Big Bank’s podcast has only intensified the backlash.
Woody, meanwhile, has become one of the most controversial figures in the trial.
Once a key witness for the state, he admitted under oath that he lied in past police interviews and claimed he falsely implicated Young Thug to deflect pressure from investigators.
Despite his role as the prosecution’s star witness, Woody contradicted himself repeatedly, claimed disabilities, fired his lawyer mid-testimony and invoked the Fifth Amendment several times.
The trial, which was the longest in the history of Atlanta, ended with most members taking plea deals, including Gunna and Young Thug.
Woody is working on a documentary about his life and has a new book titled Books Up, Guns Down.
Woody hopes his book will deliver a much different message than the hip-hop culture he used to participate in.
“You ain’t got to be a violent person, to be a rapper, you know, drug dealer, to be a rapper, anything. You could be an educated graduate to be a rapper, you know, you can be whatever you want to be. You ain’t got to uphold that image,” Lil Woody said.