Beloved ‘Last Chance U’ coach John Beam shot and killed on Oakland campus
Former football coach John Beam was known for giving players who most coaches wouldn’t gamble on a chance after being featured in the Netflix series “Last Chance U” — which focuses on junior college athletes attempting to turn their lives around.
Now, Beam, 66, has been tragically shot and killed on the Laney College campus where he worked in Oakland, California.
The suspect is believed by police to have known and targeted Beam.
“That was the second shooting this week in Oakland on a college campus, by the way, and very unfortunate,” BlazeTV contributor Jason Brown, also known as Coach JB, tells BlazeTV host Jason Whitlock on “Fearless.”
“I did get calls by buddies of mine that are up there, that are in that conference, and what I was told is very disturbing and unfortunate … I haven’t seen the final report so it’ll all be allegedly at this point, but I heard it was a targeting situation where they walked into his office,” he explains.
“He had an office that butts up against the street, the neighborhood there in Oakland, and it’s very, very far from the facilities. It’s very, very far from anything, and it’s real easy to go do something and not be seen and then just escape,” he continues.
A suspect has been taken into custody and a gun has been recovered.
The suspect, as Brown understands, “walked in his office, did whatever happened, and then just went right into the hood behind it.”
Whitlock is shocked, asking Brown how “dangerous is it being a junior college coach in California?”
“As dangerous as it can be, because at the end of the day, you don’t have security walking around like a D1 coach. You don’t have resources,” Brown says. “You’re out there in the hood, at churches, trying to get food at food banks for your players, if you really care for your guys like I did.”
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