Exterior of Your Black Muslim Bakery Nov. 30, 2005. (Bob Larson/Contra Costa Times)

By Josh Richman

Bay Area News Group

OAKLAND — A former Your Black Muslim Bakery associate pleaded guilty to forgery Thursday, admitting he was the ringleader in a real-estate scam that cost investors more than $76,000.

Jamall Robinson, 27, will be on probation for five years and has paid the first $10,000 of his restitution to the investors, said David Lim, an Alameda County deputy district attorney.

“This was part of the real estate scheme that the bakery was engaged in, but to his credit … he came forward and took full responsibility,” Lim said. “I’d like to think he was a young man who was misled into thinking he could do these deals … and by taking responsibility he’s showing that he learned his lesson.”

If he hasn’t, a probation violation will send him to state prison for three years, Lim added.

Robinson’s attorney, Elena Condes, declined to comment Thursday.

Charges filed Sept. 28 against Robinson and three others alleged they falsified deeds to make it look like they owned five properties in Emeryville and Oakland and that they sold over the Internet in 2011. In exchange for Robinson’s guilty plea to one felony count of forgery Thursday, prosecutors dropped other forgery, grand theft, identity theft and false-document charges against him and dropped all charges against his brother, Jhamel Robinson, 24.

Marvin Woods pleaded no contest Monday to forgery and is scheduled to be sentenced Nov. 26. Cordell Hayes — charged with 15 felonies in the scheme — remains wanted by police in this case and in a similar one in Contra Costa County.

The now-defunct Your Black Muslim Bakery, based on San Pablo Avenue in North Oakland, long was thought to be a community organization empowering young black men, but in the mid-2000s it was exposed as part organized-crime family and part cult, with crimes from fraud to murder attributed to its many members.

Jamall Robinson was among bakery associates charged with aiding bakery CEO Yusuf Bey IV in the 2005 vandalism of two North Oakland liquor stores. Prosecutors in 2007 dropped those charges against Robinson.

Bey IV is serving three consecutive life prison terms for ordering the 2007 killings of Oakland Post Editor Chauncey Bailey and two other men, Odell Roberson and Michael Wills.

Josh Richman covers politics. Contact him at 510-208-6428. Follow him at Twitter.com/josh_richman. Read the Political Blotter at IBAbuzz.com/politics.