The Chauncey Bailey Project

Former Your Black Muslim Bakery matriarch to lose real-estate license

maryfricker — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 20:03:58 +0000

Esperanza Johnson, a former Your Black Muslim Bakery matriarch who left a trail of dubious real-estate deals from Antioch to Oakland, will have her real-estate broker's license revoked effective today after a judge found she's not "sufficiently honest" to keep it. (Johnson, at left, pictured in 2007 Oakland Tribune photo.)

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Another plea in kidnap case tied to Your Black Muslim Bakery leader Yusuf Bey IV

maryfricker — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 00:54:11 +0000

Yusuf Bey V, half brother of the jailed leader of the former Your Black Muslim Bakery, has pleaded guilty to helping kidnap two women in 2007 and agreed to testify against another defendant in the case, a prosecutor said Thursday. Bey V will testify against Richard Lewis but will not take the stand against his half brother, Yusuf Bey IV. The deal has Bey V receiving a 10-year sentence.

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Release of transcript may be near in Bailey case

maryfricker — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 02:18:58 +0000

A judge on Thursday ordered the release of transcripts of grand jury proceedings that culminated in three murder charges against former Your Black Muslim Bakery leader Yusuf Bey IV, who is accused of ordering the 2007 killings of journalist Chauncey Bailey and two other men. But Alameda County Superior Court Judge Morris Jacobson delayed the unsealing of the documents, which the Chauncey Bailey Project sought, until Bey IV's arraignment July 16.

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Oakland bakery members accused of kidnap, torture back in court

maryfricker — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 22:01:53 +0000

Four members of the defunct Your Black Muslim Bakery charged with kidnapping and torturing two women in 2007 appeared in an Oakland courtroom Wednesday, in an effort by defense lawyers to separate their cases into different trials.

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Prosecutors will not seek death penalty in slaying of journalist and two others

maryfricker — Fri, 29 May 2009 20:28:37 +0000

Prosecutors have decided not to seek the death penalty against former Your Black Muslim Bakery leader Yusuf Bey IV and another man for their alleged involvement in the 2007 killing of journalist Chauncey Bailey and two other men, a lawyer said Friday.

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Former bakery leader accused of saying ‘white people are devils’ after killing

maryfricker — Thu, 28 May 2009 15:23:40 +0000

The July 2007 slaying of Michael Wills, in which two members of Your Black Muslim Bakery have been charged, was tinged with racial overtones, yet those men aren't charged with a hate crime. Friends and relatives of Wills, who was white, are concerned that prosecutors haven't done all they can against defendants Yusuf Bey IV and Antoine Mackey. But experts say hate-crime cases are particularly difficult to prove and, in this case, would not bring added penalties beyond what the defendants already face.

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OPD deputy chief dropped two ranks

maryfricker — Tue, 19 May 2009 17:49:27 +0000

Jeff Loman, the former deputy police chief who was the subject of an investigation stemming from a sexual harassment complaint, has been demoted two ranks to lieutenant and will return to work today, sources said. Loman also faces possible discipline for his role in overseeing the department's investigation of the killing of journalist Chauncey Bailey in 2007, when he was the captain in charge of the criminal investigation division.

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Parallels abound in killing of journalists three decades apart

maryfricker — Mon, 18 May 2009 17:39:06 +0000

A man accused of killing a U.S. journalist because of his investigative work admits his role, giving testimony that implicates two more in the slaying. Sound familiar? Perhaps doubly so. It's the story not only of Oakland Post Editor Chauncey Bailey, shot to death on a downtown Oakland sidewalk in August 2007, but also of Don Bolles, an Arizona Republic reporter killed by a car bomb in Phoenix in June 1976.

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Temporary gag order issued in Oakland journalist slaying case

maryfricker — Wed, 13 May 2009 22:20:55 +0000

Attorneys for the leader of the now-defunct Your Black Muslim Bakery, who is accused of ordering the killings of journalist Chauncey Bailey and two others, won a court motion Wednesday temporarily preventing anyone from speaking about the case.

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Law catching up with Your Black Muslim Bakery

maryfricker — Sun, 10 May 2009 15:58:14 +0000

Until recently, Devaughndre Broussard was the only Your Black Muslim Bakery associate ever charged with murder, despite a decades-long trail of eight bodies authorities say they have linked to the organization or its founding Bey family. Now, Broussard and two others are charged not only with the August 2007 killing of Oakland Post editor Chauncey Bailey but in two other killings as well. But in the other bakery-related homicides, such hope remains only a faint possibility.

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