words often do not retain their original meaning. No modern state practices declaring people outlaws therefore if the word outlaw retained its original meaning the only reason we would have to use it would be in history books as an antiquated term, but it is used quite often.
Thus outlaw has new meanings, the most common one is criminal, but some people seem to go with a meaning very like that of Tom Robbins, from Still Life with Woodpecker:
"The difference between a criminal and an outlaw is that while criminals frequently are victims, outlaws never are. Indeed, the first step toward becoming a true outlaw is the refusal to be victimized. All people who live subject to other people's laws are victims. People who break laws out of greed, frustration, or vengeance are victims. People who overturn laws in order to replace them with their own laws are victims. ( I am speaking here of revolutionaries.) We outlaws, however, live beyond the law. We don't merely live beyond the letter of the law-many businessmen, most politicians, and all cops do that-we live beyond the spirit of the law. In a sense, then, we live beyond society. Have we a common goal, that goal is to turn the tables on the 'nature' of society. When we succeed, we raise the exhilaration content of the universe. We even raise it a little bit when we fail."
I personally hate that usage, because I knew a guy who would go around with a self satisfied smirk declaring that he was an outlaw because he sold a bit of weed and believed in freedom whereas other people who were doing drugs were just criminals. I expect he probably got busted and ratted out all his friends, because I have a low opinion of outlaws I guess.