Posted on 01/26/2008 9:36:56 PM PST by NormsRevenge
Politicians knew it. The community knew it. The police knew it.
If you really wanted to connect with voters in troubled northwest Oakland, ... , all roads led to the late Yusuf Bey and his Your Black Muslim Bakery on San Pablo Avenue.
Bey and his followers knew they had political clout. They used it to great advantage in obtaining money from the city, lenient sentences from judges, and a virtual hands-off approach from the Police Department - even though evidence now shows that the bakery's leadership was implicated in serious crimes.
Jerry Brown - former governor, now state attorney general - ... gave a stump speech at the bakery and spent an hour in Bey's private quarters. Elihu Harris, mayor before Brown, made the same pilgrimage to the bakery during his campaign.
Among others seeking audiences with Bey over the years were City Council members Nate Miley, Ignacio De La Fuente, Larry Reid and Dezie Woods-Jones, according to Saleem Bey and John Bey, so-called "spiritual sons" of the bakery founder. U.S. Rep. Barbara Lee, D-Oakland, Oakland Mayor Ron Dellums and state Sen. Don Perata, D-Oakland, each wrote testimonial letters for the bakery. Former Police Chief Joseph Samuels depended on Yusuf Bey to help improve police relations with the neighborhoods.
--snip--
For most of its existence from roughly 1968 to 2007, the bakery was a symbol of black enterprise and empowerment, setting a good - if sometimes intimidating - example in impoverished, crime-plagued North and West Oakland. The allegations of wrongdoing that have spilled out since Bey was charged with child rape in 2002 - vicious abuse of his numerous wives, systematic welfare fraud and unsolved killings - were mostly rumor before then, some politicians say, and they were rarely investigated by police.
(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...
Former Oakland Police Chief Samuels was ousted on a vote of no confidence years ago, like 8 or so years ago. Not about this matter, but general bad management.
If there is any evidence the current OPD Chief is involved, what is it?
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