At the time the newspaper series ran, Dayton Police and the Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office had identified Diamond Cut, aka D-CUT, as a gang, and Winn identified himself publicly as a D-CUT boss. He also has a D-CUT tattoo on his hand, which he often displays in online pictures and videos. Winn still maintains that Diamond Cut was not a gang but is a promotional team for his company Fam First Entertainment and a support system for him.
Winn, who lives in Atlanta, is in Dayton promoting his book, Don’t Stop...Keep Goin. He will have a book signing 6 to 9 p.m. Thursday at the Paul Laurence Dunbar House, 219 N. Paul Laurence Dunbar St.
He said his book is an effort to close the chapter in his life that dealt with the gang speculation. “I’m just moving on...(Diamond Cut) is a support system. It’s not a gang. It never was a gang.”
Winn is looking forward to moving into his new role as author and said his book highlights some significant incidents in his life, like the passing of his father Clarence Winn Sr., who died in a car accident in Alabama.
Winn’s life was also impacted by the death of best friend Markelle Roston, 33, who was shot and killed July 31, 2008, in what Dayton Police called an attempted robbery outside of Gold 4 Ya Mouth at the corner of North Main and Bond Streets.
“He was really one of the first people to believe in me,” Winn said of Roston. “He had stopped doing music to help me with my career.”
Winn said his book, which was published by his company, also talks about entrepreneurship, self-empowerment and other issues such as “being a young black male in a society that looks forward to seeing you fail.”
The message of his book that he hopes will stand out to readers is that they shouldn’t allow anything to hinder their goals and dreams.
Winn said he wanted to have his book signing at the Dunbar House because Dunbar was the nation’s first black poet laureate. Winn believes if Dunbar were alive today he would find his music “compelling.”
“Ohio Killa with the flow. Meet Death,” Winn says in his song David Ruffin off his latest music compilation 200k Power & Motivation. The song goes on to say, “My [expletive] keeps telling me to get a grip, but [expletive], I’m getting rich off felonies I commit.”
When asked what Dunbar would think of his lyrics, Winn said, “If he was to get a glimpse of my music, he would notice that everyone has a story, and it’s just the way you word your story.” He went on to say that he considers himself a well-rounded artist who makes music that everyone can relate to.
Today, the gang that the Montgomery County Sheriff’s office knows as Diamond Cut has been dissolved, according to Sheriff Phil Plummer.
“That was one of the first (gangs) that we targeted,” Plummer said of the Safe Streets Task Force. However, Dayton police says there are still some gang members in the Dayton area.
“We do monitor the interaction of these folks with law enforcement and the courts throughout the region,” said Dayton Police Maj. Pat Welsh.
Winn's music can be found online on most of the social media networking web sites, under the names Chaos The Community Serva, CCSERVA or Midwest Maniac. For more information on Chaos, visit www.midwestmaniac.com.
Contact this reporter at (937) 225-2414 or kwynn@DaytonDailyNews.com.
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