OAKLAND, CA — The former leader of an California community group will spend the rest of his life in prison for ordering the killings of three men, including a local journalist.

An Alameda County judge sentenced 25-year-old Yusuf Bey IV to life in prison without possibility of parole Friday.

Prosecutors say Bey ordered workers at his Your Black Muslim Bakery to kill the men in separate 2007 attacks. One victim was Chauncey Bailey, the Oakland Post editor working on a story about the bakery’s financial troubles.

The prosecution’s star witness was a bakery handy man who acknowledged carrying out the Bailey killing on Bey’s orders with help from Antoine Mackey.

Mackey also was convicted of murder and sentenced to life without parole.