Decades before Black Lives Matter, Ellison was a very prominent defender of cop killers associating with Sharif Willis after the murder of a Minneapolis police officer. Willis was with the Vice Lords, a black Muslim gang and one of the largest in the country. He participated in demonstrations on behalf of the Vice Lords and attended a national gang confab. In 2000, he called for the release of Kathleen Soliah of the Symbionese Liberation Army and heaped praise on Mumia Abu-Jamal and Assata Shakur- two notorious cop killers.