Your Black Muslim Bakery's New Owner May Soon Be Known

A hearing on Trustee Tevis Thompson's motion to sell the property at 5832 San Pablo Ave. is scheduled for 3 p.m. Thursday before U.S. Bankruptcy Court Judge Edward Jellen in Oakland.

But several buyers have expressed interest, and a live auction is to be held today in the office of Thompson's attorney, Eric Nyberg, to determine the high bidder. Thompson will then submit that high bidder's name Thursday for Jellen's approval; he'll seek the court's approval of the second-highest bidder as well, as a back-up offer.

The first offer for the property was made Sept. 10 — just four days after it went on the market — by Paulette Arbuckle, a longtime bakery neighborhood resident who has refused to discuss the matter with reporters. She has offered $899,000.

Arbuckle's real-estate broker is Esperanza Johnson, formerly known as Noor Jehan Bey — mother to four children by the bakery's late founder Yusuf Ali Bey. Johnson and her current husband, Antron Thurman, have racked up a series of questionable real-estate deals in Alameda and Contra Costa counties in which people have claimed the couple defrauded them; Johnson and Thurman have refused to comment on these other deals, and Johnson has refused to

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