Joshua Bey breaks ranks with family

Avenal Ave. house in East Oakland where prosecutors say a woman was tortured in 2007. (File photo/Oakland Tribune)

Avenal Ave. house in East Oakland where prosecutors say a woman was tortured in 2007. (File photo/Oakland Tribune)

By Cecily Burt, Chauncey Bailey Project

Joshua Bey, 19, pleaded guilty Tuesday for his role in the May 17 kidnapping of two women from an East Oakland bingo parlor, but in the eyes of his co-defendants — two of whom are blood relatives — his biggest crime may have been breaking ranks with the large, dysfunctional family known as Your Black Muslim Bakery.

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Special Report
Main story: Surprise guilty plea
Second story: Joshua Bey breaks ranks 

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Joshua Bey is one of more than 40 biological sons of Your Black Muslim Bakery founder Yusuf Bey. Joshua Bey was born Aug. 5, 1988, to Jane Doe 2, a young woman who was placed under the guardianship of the bakery patriarch when she was only a child.

Joshua Bey’s mother and her younger sister, Jane Doe 1, told police and social workers they were raped repeatedly by Yusuf Bey during the years they lived with him and his many Muslim wives. Those allegations, and the allegations of two other women, eventually sparked an investigation that resulted in multiple criminal charges of rape against the bakery patriarch.

 Both women bore multiple children by Yusuf Bey before they came of age and left the bakery compound in North Oakland, taking their children with them. But, it seems, the lure of family ties is hard to resist. Two of Joshua Bey’s co-defendants in the May 17 kidnap and torture case are his half-brothers: bakery CEO Yusuf Bey IV, 22, and Yusuf Bey V, 21. Bey V is also the son of Jane Doe 1, which makes him Joshua’s cousin. “You’re not a Bey anymore,” Bey V said in court. Bey IV said, “You can’t call me brother.”