Posted on 10/06/2007 8:41:53 AM PDT by SmithL
The shotgun used in the slaying of Oakland Post Editor Chauncey Bailey was stolen two years ago in one of two high-profile attacks on liquor stores blamed on Your Black Muslim Bakery members, The Chronicle has learned.
When men in suits and bow ties vandalized the New York Market in West Oakland on the night of Nov. 23, 2005, authorities said, the group also took away a Mossberg shotgun a store owner had trained on them.
Using a store videotape, Oakland investigators soon identified Your Black Muslim Bakery members as responsible for the vandalisms and robbery.
But they decided not to seek a warrant to search the bakery's San Pablo Avenue headquarters for the gun.
The missing Mossberg, police now acknowledge, was used later by 19-year-old bakery handyman Devaughndre Broussard to execute Bailey on Aug. 2. It was recovered during a police raid of the bakery and nearby residences the next day when Broussard was seen tossing it out a window.
Oakland Assistant Police Chief Howard Jordan said Friday that police investigators did not have enough evidence to get a warrant to search the bakery after the liquor-store attacks two years ago.
"My understanding is that they didn't have enough probable cause to get a warrant," Jordan said, adding that the store owner who said his gun was stolen "didn't have enough information on the gun."
"It's a little more involved in getting a search warrant than an arrest warrant," he said. "Looking at the totality of circumstances, I don't think we felt at the time that a vandalism and a weak stolen-gun case was enough to go smashing in the door."
In hindsight, he said he would have authorized the search, "if I knew then that Chauncey Bailey was going to get killed by the same shotgun."
(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...
Clear and convincing evidence that an individual was actively involved in a conspiracy to steal something would seem to constitute probable cause to believe that the individual may possess the item in question.
LIberals who didn’t want to find this particular firearm that they new was stolen and new it might be used in a crime, want to eliminate all firearms that might be then used in a crime.
It’s not like they would have been conducting a house-to-house search in a random fashion. They knew who was there and they knew where they gathered.
WTF???
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