Free Republic

OAKLAND — A judge on Friday shot down Yusuf Bey IV's attempt to dismiss kidnapping and torture charges against him, quickly ruling that there remains "incredibly damaging" evidence. Bey IV's lawyer Anne Beles, argued that her client's rights were violated in April when another judge refused to allow a witness to testify at a preliminary hearing after which Bey IV was ordered to stand trial in the case. That decision was the second time a judge ruled there was enough evidence to proceed with the case against the 23-year-old former CEO of the defunct Your Black Muslim Bakery. An earlier...

OAKLAND — Former employees and supporters of the defunct Your Black Muslim Bakery have scheduled a rally for Aug. 2 — the one-year anniversary of journalist Chauncey Bailey's killing — to call for an investigation into the business's demise. "This is the anniversary of the closing of the bakery and the event is about getting to the truth, getting to justice and making sure that whoever is guilty of any crime be brought before the bar of justice, because right now the truth is not being told," said rally organizer Henry Clark. The date was chosen to commemorate "police attacking...

On a June night in 1986, police discovered a twice-shot, blood-smeared body spilling out of a red Ford van on Marshall Street in North Oakland.Police identified the victim as Peter August Kaufman and, according to a brief news report from the time, figured robbery might be the motive. Nearly 22 years later, the killing remains unsolved.Now, through interviews and documents — including a three-paragraph news account, a death certificate, coroner and police reports and court testimony — the Chauncey Bailey Project has uncovered a link between Kaufman's killing and Yusuf Ali Bey, the late founder of Your Black Muslim Bakery...

As the late Yusuf Bey built Your Black Muslim Bakery into an empire of wealth and influence, he also orchestrated a systematic welfare fraud scheme at his Oakland compound, three of his former wives have testified. By the wives' sworn account, Bey directed many of the 100 women whom he considered his wives to make fraudulent applications for government aid programs intended to assist poor families, then diverted the benefits to himself. Bey's alleged fraud scheme began in the 1970s and continued in some form until his death in 2003, according to the women, who gave depositions in a negligence...

Successor to the late Yusef Bey killed in an assassination-style shooting, police sayOAKLAND — A son of controversial Black Muslim leader Yusef Bey was shot and killed Tuesday night while pumping gas at a North Oakland station. Antar Bey, 24, was at the gas station at 55th Street and Martin Luther King Jr. Way just after 7:30 p.m. when he was shot as he waited to fill up his black BMW 745, police said. Police said Antar Bey, the appointed successor to the late Yusef Bey, had stepped away from the car and was talking on his cell phone when...