Farrakhan Said to See Quake in Next 30 Days

A week after Nation of Islam officials were evicted from their Western regional headquarters in Inglewood, a top minister in the organization delivered a message he said is from Louis Farrakhanpredicting that an earthquake will strike California within 30 days and possibly wipe the Golden State off the face of the earth.

“The wrath of God will show itself in a major earthquake for this attempt to uproot upstanding citizens from their community,” Minister Tony Muhammad said Friday. “California has been the site of many wicked incidents [in the African American community], and this earthquake will destroy this part of the earth.”

*

Attempts to reach Farrakhan were unsuccessful, but a secretary at Nation of Islam headquarters in Chicago, who would not give her name, said Muhammad is authorized to speak for Farrakhan.

Though Farrakhan could not be contacted, some members of the Islamic community said the statement is preposterous.

“This is completely outside the circle of Islam to say that God contacted me . . . to say that something will happen in the future, unless there are scientific notions,” said Hassan Hathout, director of the Islamic Center of Southern California.

Hathout said the prediction won’t carry any weight with most other Muslims. “If they were ejected from property unjustly, I’m very sorry, but we Muslims do not believe that God goes to people and talks to them,” he said.

Wearing their trademark pressed suits and bowties, more than 40 members of the Fruit of Islam, the organization’s security guards, formed a circle around Muhammad in the courtyard at Inglewood Municipal Court on Friday.

Muhammad, who is the head of the organization’s Western region, said the earthquake will strike California because the African American community in the Los Angeles area is under fire.

*

He said other groups such as Inglewood’s All People’s Lockhaven Christian Lighthouse Church, which recently lost an attempt to halt eviction from its property by a lender that disagreed with its doctrine, also are being forced out.

Muhammad, who was joined by Brotherhood Crusade leader Danny Bakewell, expressed outrage at the sheriff’s deputies who handled the Aug. 8 eviction. Muhammad said deputies roughed up mosque members and removed them from the premises illegally.

He also alleged that more than 100 law enforcement officers, including members of the FBI and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, were called in to assist with the eviction.

“This was a malicious attempt to cause harm on law-abiding citizens who have a history of doing good work in the community,” he said.

Muhammad said he wants a public apology and has asked for a meeting with the Sheriff’s Department. He said he has gotten no response from authorities.

In an interview, sheriff’s spokesman Sgt. Ron Spear said that neither the FBI nor the ATF was involved in the eviction and that his department followed standard procedures.

The eviction has its seeds in a nine-month-old property dispute. The Nation of Islam moved into the two-story office building nearly two years ago under a lease-to-buy agreement.

According to landlord Centinela Office Investments, the organization was supposed to purchase the property by July 1995, but it was unable to because it was facing a zoning problem with the city. The deadline was extended until October and again until March, when eviction proceedings were started.

Nation of Islam attorney Laura Santos said the group was having difficulty purchasing the building--valued at $750,000--because it was not zoned to hold a school and the parking lot could not accommodate the large number of cars parked during services.