The concept here is basically evil Batman. Although it could work as a comic-book, I mostly envision this as a novel, which I could then see adapted into a live action movie.

Marcus Randall was born to teenage Black single mother in the heart of “the Hood” (South Central L.A., Southside of Chicago, Baltimore, St. Louis, someplace like that). Yet he managed to avoid the neighborhood gangs and the various troubles of his surroundings and focused on his education, becoming a straight-A student, with an intellectual gift for math and science. He graduated high school with a perfect 4.0 grade point average, the class valedictorian, with a full academic scholarship to Stanford.  He was set on a path to get out of the Hood and make something of himself.

But on the night of his High School graduation, which was also his 18th birthday, he was out celebrating with some of his friend, when they got stopped by some racist White cops who planted drugs on them and arrested them. Instead of Stanford, Marcus found himself headed off to prison for a 10 year sentence.

Prison was rough for him at first, as Marcus was understandably bitter about his experience, and was not well-equipped to survive surrounded by the hardened criminal-types whom he had spent his life avoiding up til that point. He nevertheless continued his education behind bars, becoming a lawyer himself and helping get several prisoners released, which gained him loyalty among the other inmates. Unfortunately, halfway into his term, his poor mother died of a drug overdose.

8 years later, the cops who arrested him were exposed and arrested themselves. Marcus was released and received and $8 million settlement from the city for his false imprisonment. Marcus became determined to get revenge on the justice system that failed him.

With his intelligence he was able to triple his wealth within a year, he bought a mansion with a top-shelf gym and hired multiple trainers to get him in shape and train him in various martial arts and the use of weapons. With his new abilities and resources and the many underworld contacts he cultivated in prison, he then began to wage a one-man war on the corrupt cops, city prosecutors, judges, and city hall, in his city as the costumed terror, THE DEVIL’S KNIGHT.

The image at the top is by DAGGERPOINT.

This below image is a freeby that ARISTIDES ILIOPOULOS drew for me:

And here is the very first image of the character, which I commissioned from CELINA HERNANDEZ, both Daggerpoint and Aris based their images on hers:

Inspirations for this story include DC Comics Earth 2 OWLMAN character, Mark Millar’s NEMESIS miniseries, and the 2009 film LAW ABIDING CITIZEN. But I think with the added racial injustice component I can add something unique to may story, making Marcus a true “anti-hero,” and leave the readers/audience conflicted about whether to root for or against him. In the story, Marcus will maintain a “secret identity,” publicly acting as community activist whose working with the authorities, while secretly hunting them as The Devil’s Knight. And there will a love interest, in the form of a beautiful young female lawyer who was part of the team that got him released from prison, but then becomes part of the team trying to find out who the Devil’s Knight is and tries to capture him.