Beginning at age 11, Arn Chorn-Pond experienced firsthand the worst atrocities of Cambodia’s Khmer Rouge regime. Taken to a work camp, where his talent for playing the flute helped keep him alive, Chorn-Pond witnessed torture, starvation, mass murder, and cannibalism.

He was later rescued from a Thai refugee camp and brought to America by the Rev. Peter Pond, a New Hampshire clergyman, whose family adopted him. Chorn-Pond went on to graduate from Providence College, live in Lowell, and work against gang violence.