Accidental success bringing leader of felons to book (5)
I believe the answer is:
fluke
'accidental success' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)
'leader of felons to book' is the wordplay.
'leader of' says to take the initial letters.
'to book' becomes 'luke' (I can't justify this - if you can you should believe this answer much more).
The first letter of 'felons' is 'f'.
'f'+'luke'='FLUKE'
'bringing' is the link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for fluke that I've seen before include "Chance happening" , "part of whale" , "One lucky" , "Barb on anchor - chance success" , "Lucky break" .)