Wes moves to England after college on a full scholarship to Oxford University. He is the first African American graduate of Johns Hopkins to become a Rhodes Scholar. Years later, he returns to Baltimore to start a fellowship at the White House. He thinks about the other Wes Moore from the same streets with the same name. When he had returned from South Africa, his mother told him she was grateful he was away when all of that happened.

Wes follows the case obsessively. It was a jewelry store robbery gone wrong. The other Wes Moore and his brother Tony shot and killed the store’s security guard, who was an off-duty police officer named Bruce Prothero. Officer Prothero worked at the store as a security guard to make extra money for his family and was a father of five. Four men were charged with his murder, including Richard Antonio Moore and his half-brother Wes, and both were sentenced to life sentences.

Wes can’t help but think about how much in common he has with the other Wes Moore. He writes him a letter in prison. In the first letter he introduces himself and explains how he had heard about him.