With a potential multi-billion-dollar Oakland Coliseum project at stake, legal fight could shake Black-led development group
Ownership dispute ensnares flagship group
OAKLAND, Calif. — The city has tapped a group to help develop a $5 billion plan to transform the defunct Coliseum complex into a hub of live sports and entertainment, but two of the founding members are suing the others.
The legal complaint filed this month targets one of the African-American Sports and Entertainment Group’s six partner organizations. Two of the flagship entity’s eight members claim their equity stake in the project was unfairly diluted.
None of the parties involved in the complaint, which was filed in Alameda County court, agreed to be interviewed on the record, but documents and video evidence obtained from the group paint a starkly different picture than that presented in the complaint, casting doubt on its central claims.
The group eventually plans to buy Oakland’s half-ownership share of the Coliseum property for $115 million, and it tried unsuccessfully earlier this year to buy the other half-ownership share, which belongs to the likely departing A’s.
It failed to secure a long-awaited WNBA expansion franchise last month, one of its most visible goals. Instead, the league chose to collaborate with the Warriors to establish a women’s basketball team in San Francisco.
However, the entire legal saga may test AASEG’s commitment to a locally driven, community-based project that remains rooted among Oakland residents while excluding outside corporate interests.
It could also pose a new challenge for AASEG as it prepares to meet key deliverables in a deal with the city to convert the A’s ballpark, Oakland arena, and intervening parking space into new restaurants, nightlife, retail shops, hotels, and housing.
“We will fully participate in the legal process and will show the complaint to be without merit,” said cofounder Ray Bobbitt in a statement in response to the complaint. “In the meantime, the AASEG is hyperfocused on the tremendous task, responsibility and commitment we have to our community to redevelop and revitalize East Oakland and the Coliseum Site.”
The conflict is contained within AASEG’s flagship group, which is made up of eight Oakland natives who had little prior real-estate experience before becoming involved in one of the East Bay’s largest commercial redevelopments.
Loop Capital, a billion-dollar Black-owned investment firm, prominent sports agent Bill Duffy, and a business-consulting group led by former Oakland city manager Robert Bobb are among the other partners.
![FEBRUARY 2nd, OAKLAND, CALIFORNIA] Ray Bobbitt, left, greets Mayor Sheng Thao during a press conference at the Oakland-Alameda County Arena and Coliseum Complex on Thursday, Feb. 2, 2023, in Oakland, Calif. The African American Sports and Entertainment Group is negotiating with Oakland for the city’s 50% interest in the Coliseum complex
AASEG was founded by Bobbitt, a local businessman, and Levant Ogbulie, an education administrator, who began looking into how major professional sports could return to Oakland after the Warriors and Raiders left.
Brien Dixon and Karim Muhammad, two grieving Raiders fans who are now threatening to sue Bobbitt, Ogbulie, and the larger consortium, were among the other founding members they recruited.
Dixon and Muhammad claim their AASEG shares were wrongfully diluted when Bobbitt admitted four new members without their consent.
The eight members, which include Bobbitt and Ogbulie, own 12.5% of the flagship entity, which may own as little as 5% of the overall development once outside pre-capital investments arrive prior to construction.
Nonetheless, the complainants accuse Bobbitt of wrongfully designating himself as the project’s lead decision-maker and “deceptively” forming separate LLCs in Delaware that could be interchanged with the official AASEG branding as part of a larger power consolidation effort.
“Not only is this a patent violation of Bobbitt’s obligations to AASEG and the other three members, it usurps a business opportunity from AASEG and could also be considered as an act of fraud committed against the City of Oakland,” according to the lawsuit.
Documents examined by this news organization refute this claim: An email sent to Dixon and Muhammad in late 2021, for example, specifically outlines how those various LLCs would interact and streamline future investments, contradicting Bobbitt’s claim that the other companies were established secretly.
According to the complaint, Muhammad learned during a late 2021 company retreat that Bobbitt had promised equity in AASEG to four new members — Samantha Wise, John Jones III, Jonathan Jones, and LaNiece Jones — and that he eventually muscled them into the group by overruling the complainants.
All four members are Oakland residents, with Jones III, a community violence prevention advocate, being the most visible.
A video of a team meeting in December 2021, two months after their addition, paints a different picture. Dixon and Muhammad praise Bobbitt’s work on the project and reflect favorably on the earlier company retreat.
The eight members voted together with no apparent objections, and Bobbitt is listed on the agenda as AASEG’s “managing member,” a title he allegedly assigned himself months later in an operating agreement, according to the complaint.
Whatever the outcome of the legal complaint, it represents a schism within the flagship group, which has spent several years cultivating relationships with Oakland’s leaders, assisting AASEG in securing the Coliseum redevelopment despite stiff competition from other bidders.
AASEG is also in talks with the Roots and Soul, two new men’s and women’s soccer teams that want to build a temporary stadium in one of the Coliseum’s parking lots by 2025. Because not everyone was on board, those discussions alone created tension within AASEG’s flagship entity.
It’s yet another sign that AASEG — originally a group of grieving Raiders fans who decided to start a business together — must reckon with its small-town roots in order to complete one of the largest-scale commercial redevelopments in recent East Bay history.
