Even a federal prison cell couldn’t end Jeff Fort’s command over the El Rukns. But the phone calls that kept his Chicago street empire alive would help expose the conspiracy that brought it crashing down.

On Chicago’s South Side, Fort rose through the Blackstone Rangers and Black P. Stone Nation, attracting fierce loyalty, political attention, and supporters who believed he could help rebuild his community. A federally funded job-training program offered a path away from street violence. His story instead became entangled in stolen opportunities, drug trafficking, and murder.

By the 1980s, Fort’s El Rukns had a rigid hierarchy of generals, officers, and soldiers. From behind bars, he continued directing his followers through coded telephone conversations. Then came an extraordinary scheme: offering to carry out attacks inside the United States in exchange for $2.5 million from Muammar Gaddafi’s Libya.

The proposed attacks were never carried out. But recorded conversations, an undercover weapons operation, and testimony from inside the organization gave federal prosecutors the evidence they needed.

This documentary traces Jeff Fort’s rise, the formation of the El Rukns, and the investigation that exposed their international ambitions. It examines how a leader once embraced as a possible answer to Chicago’s gang crisis built an organization that brought further violence to the neighborhoods around it—and how his determination to maintain control helped investigators unravel his plans.

How did a South Side gang become involved in a terrorism conspiracy? Why did Fort believe he could direct it all from prison? And how did the loyalty he demanded begin to break?

Follow the rise and fall of the El Rukns—and the human cost behind one of Chicago’s most disturbing criminal histories.

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