WASHINGTON (DC News Now) -- Decades after he fueled the crack epidemic in Washington, D.C., notorious former drug kingpin Rayful Edmond III died Tuesday in federal custody while at a residential reentry facility in Miami. After being locked up since April 1989, he was moved from federal prison to community confinement, with a release date of November 2025. Neighbors frustrated after teen shot near Dunbar High School, police search for suspects William H. "Billy" Murphy Jr., Edmond's trial lawyer, hasn't been in contact with his former client since the aftermath of the trial. "My reaction was, probably like everybody else's in the sense that he had been, a notorious figure in D.C. and, it was shocking to hear the news because he had been out for a while," Murphy said. "So I didn't I didn't suspect foul play. I just wondered what caused his sudden death." The Federal Bureau of Prisons confirmed Edmond's death but didn't say how he died. According to the Miami-Dade Medical Examiner's Office, they didn't have a record of Edmond, saying they typically don't have a record of people who die of natural causes. Edmond's criminal operation was linked to at least 30 murders, although none were directly attributed to him. He was arrested in 1989 at 24 years old, and sentenced to life in prison for his role as the leader of a highly lucrative drug trade. "Some estimates were it was as much as, $50 million a month. Some estimates even were that it was $50 million a week. So it was a tremendous amount of addictive cocaine," Murphy said. Residents can get help clearing sidewalks with DC Volunteer Snow Team The lawyer said he worked closely with Edmond during the trial. "What struck me about him was that he was brilliant, first of all. Second of all, he was charismatic. Third of all, he was a master at running a complex business operation that's one of the most difficult operations of any kind to run, and that's the illegal drug business and all the associated violence, that he had the respect of the entire organization, even though he was in his 20s. And, there was a lot of complexity to and he handled it like it was nothing," Murphy said. Edmond was caught in prison continuing to sell drugs. But he started cooperating with authorities, helping prosecutors jail dozens of drug dealers, break up distribution rings and even teaching prison guards how to prevent trafficking inside prison. Murphy wonders what could have been if Edmond weren't raised by two drug dealers for parents. "[I wonder if] instead, [they] were legitimate business people who were successful and who taught him, how to run a legitimate business. He was so talented that the sky would have been the limit," he said. Murphy said there's still a thriving drug scene in D.C. and it's up to the community to prevent crime before it starts. "We've gotta raise these kids. We've gotta assume responsibility for them. Unless we want them to continue to grow into the next Rayful Edmond instead of the next Thomas Edison or Henry Ford," he said. Get a free Lyft ride home in the DC area this holiday season through SoberRide Murphy said that should include residential schools and better career paths that kids can follow. "Instead of relegating all of them to expressing their genius through the arts, we ought to be making sure that they also expressing their genius through mathematics and science and, technology among other things, in medicine and law. And, you don't see that happening," Murphy said.