Banned From Atlanta: The Challenges of Young Thug’s Unique Probation

The rapper was released from jail last week after a surprise guilty plea. For 15 years, a set of strict requirements will govern his life and music. One of the defining Atlanta rappers of his generation is no longer welcome in Atlanta. Following a surprise guilty plea last Thursday in a gang conspiracy and racketeering case that had already lasted nearly three years, the musician Young Thug, born Jeffery Williams, was given 48 hours to vacate the Atlanta metro area, as defined by the U.S. Census Bureau, for the next decade. Once the chart-topping face of Atlanta’s ever-evolving music scene, Mr. Williams, 33, may now return only briefly, under strict circumstances: for the anti-gun and anti-gang presentations he is required to make to local youth four times annually, or for the weddings, funerals, graduations or medical emergencies of his immediate family members. Mr. Williams’s banishment from his hometown was just one of 12 special conditions that he agreed to as part of a plea deal that allowed him to be released from jail that very evening. But can an international hip-hop star pick up where he left off under a new set of strict provisions that could reshape his lyrics,...