Aug 17, 2007 3:17 am US/Pacific
Bailey Source Reveals Black Muslim Bakery Turmoil
by Joe Vazquez
OAKLAND (CBS 5) ―
Saleem Bey, the source who provided Chauncey Bailey a story just two weeks before the Oakland Post editor was murdered, appeared on his first television interview on CBS 5 Thursday night.
"The bakery is being illegally liquidated," Saleem Bey told CBS 5. "Out of desperation I went to Bailey to expose it to the public."
The story detailed the downfall of Your Black Muslim Bakery; a once-prospering Oakland institution - a symbol of Black self-empowerment that has collapsed into blood and bankruptcy.
Bey said he was shocked when he learned Bailey was killed before the story was even published.
"I believed that my life was in more danger than Chauncey Bailey's life," said Saleem, who believes he may still be in danger.
For nearly four decades, the bakery founder - Yusef Bey - built up the bakery into a multimillion dollar corporation. When he died in 2003, he left behind at least 46 sons and daughters . . . including 5 named after himself: Yusef Bey I through V. There are also dozens of other "spiritual children"; followers who adopted the last name of "Bey."
Saleem Bey, one of those spiritual sons, said there are more than 150 members of the family with the last name of Bey.
As he was dying from cancer in 2003, Yusef Bey hand-picked another spiritual son-- 51-year old Waajid Bey-- to become the Bakery's CEO.
But only five months later, Waajid suddenly disappeared.
Just as suddenly, 22-year-old Antar Bey became the new CEO in what Saleem describes as a takeover by a small, young violent faction of family members.
"There was a coup d'etat in Oakland at the bakery," said Saleem.
Waajiid Bey's body was later found buried in a shallow grave in the Oakland Hills. The murder remains unsolved.
Saleem Bey describes Waajiid's murder as the turning point. He says the new CEO - Antar Bey - stopped paying dozens of long-time employees, shutting a majority of the family out of the business. The old guard family members filed a lawsuit while the small, young faction began to let the finances go.
Court records show the young guard borrowed hundreds of thousands of dollars, often putting up the bakery's real estate as collateral. Loans were never repaid. Money was bleeding out.
"They were spending it on cars; they were spending it on jewelry," said Saleem. "They were squandering the money on bail."
Antar Bey led the bakery for a year-and-a-half until October 2005, when he was killed in what police call an attempted carjacking.
The next CEO - an Antar Bey protégé - introduced himself to the world in dramatic fashion. 19-year-old Yusef Bey IV and several followers ransacked two neighborhood liquor stores, according to police; smashing up liquor bottles because they said alcohol was poisoning the community.
Over the next year-and-a-half, the crime spree continued. Police across the Bay Area have charged Yusef Bey IV with theft, assault and kidnapping, along with real estate fraud and identity theft.
As bankruptcy approached, Saleem began to take court documents to law enforcement and the bankruptcy court; urging them to investigate his claim that the bakery was in illegal hands.
One of those documents is a memo Saleem says he recently found in a stack of lawsuit documents, which appears to be minutes from a board of directors meeting appointing Antar Bey as CEO of the bakery. But Saleem says it's fake; created by Antar's violent faction in an attempt to legitimize the Bakery's takeover. It's dated just three days after Waajid's disappearance.
"This is actually the smoking gun that proves the bakery was hijacked corporate-wise," said Saleem, referring to the memo. The signature line has initials instead of a signature, Saleem pointed out. He says the meeting never happened.
Saleem Bey's attorney, William Taylor of the Oakland law firm of Taylor, Goins & Stallworth, confirmed to CBS- that the memo came from lawsuit documents. Taylor described it as "discovery," which means Antar Bey's side of the lawsuit provided the documents to the family's old guard.
The document, among others provided by Saleem, apparently grabbed Bailey's attention, and he began to write a story that the Oakland Post allowed CBS 5 to view earlier this week.
CBS 5 has not been able to verify that the memo is fraudulent. A records request from the California Secretary of State's office provided other documents that also show Antar Bey as the official CEO of the bakery.
As for Bailey's article, it is short; about a dozen paragraphs. Post publisher Paul Cobb told CBS 5 the article needed more work, more attributions, and more proof.
Bailey was gunned down before he had a chance to finish it.
Following a bust of the bakery, police arrested 19-year old Devaughndre Broussard, Yusef the fourth and several others. Only Broussard is charged with the murder of Chauncey Bailey. Police initially said Broussard confessed that he killed Bailey because he was concerned about the negative publicity from the story Bailey was writing.
Broussard's lawyer now refutes the confession.
"The shame of Bailey's murder is that it was one billion percent unnecessary," said Saleem Bey.
(© MMVII, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
