OAKLAND — It was purported to be simply one other workday for Willie Bernstine IV, a father of two who confirmed up early final New 12 months’s Eve to his job at a West Oakland cleansing tools enterprise.
However two suspected North Richmond gang members allegedly had different concepts. As Bernstine approached his job at Auto-Chlor System close to Poplar and 14th streets, a person named Joseph Westbrook allegedly closed in, firing an AR pistol and a second handgun at Bernstine close to the entrance of the enterprise, in keeping with police.
Westbrook, a 26-year-old Santa Clara resident, has allegedly lengthy been a member of a North Richmond gang referred to as the Swerve Workforce, a gaggle that was notoriously the goal of a 2017 investigation involving three murders and 16 shootings across the East Bay. Westbrook is now in custody dealing with expenses of homicide with an enhancement for mendacity in wait, making him eligible for all times with out parole if convicted, in keeping with courtroom information.
Oakland police have stated that the motive for Bernstine’s Dec. 31, 2024 murder needed to do with outdated conflicts involving teams in North Richmond and central Richmond, although Bernstine — a father of two infants — wasn’t actively concerned in crime, authorities stated. The rivalry between gangs in each areas stretches again a long time.
Westbrook’s suspected driver, who has not but been arrested or charged, was additionally a suspected Swerve Workforce member whose title has come up in different murder instances, authorities stated. In courtroom filings, prosecutors say that he and Westbrook focused Bernstine and confirmed as much as his job as a result of they believed he can be there.
In October 2014, Westbrook — then simply a teen — was charged as an grownup with tried homicide and gang enhancements for allegedly working with one other Swerve Workforce member to shoot at 4 totally different individuals throughout a drive-by, courtroom information present. He ultimately pleaded no contest to assault with a firearm.
In that case, police testified that Westbrook was a Swerve Workforce member who’d fought alongside others within the gang at a youth boys’ ranch. After the taking pictures, an officer searched Westbrook’s automotive and located a New York Yankees cap, a standard image amongst North Richmond residents who take it to imply “Young Narfer,” referencing the “Narf” slang time period for the unincorporated group of North Richmond.
The Swerve Workforce developed as an offshoot of an older neighborhood gang referred to as the Venture Trojans. Its members initially known as themselves “Trojans in Training,” however modified the gang’s title after the 2011 homicide sufferer Ervin Colley Jr., who was shot and killed in North Richmond, prompting his associates to say they’d “swerve for Erv.”
In 2017, a gaggle of suspected Swerve Workforce members have been rounded up in a case involving 16 shootings, three homicides and several other burglaries and residential invasion robberies, together with the nonfatal taking pictures of an Orinda college board member throughout a handbag snatching.
Initially Printed: February 6, 2025 at 5:05 PM PST
