OAKLAND, Calif., Aug. 2 — The editor of a prominent African-American newspaper here was killed on a downtown street Thursday morning in an attack the police described as “targeted.”

The victim, Chauncey Bailey, was shot multiple times at short range while walking in an open-air parking lot just three blocks from the Alameda County Courthouse and several city buildings.

Roland Holmgren, a spokesman for the Oakland Police Department, said the killing occurred about 7:25 a.m. and involved a single gunman, clad head to foot in black and wearing a mask. Mr. Holmgren said Mr. Bailey, 57, was shot in the head and upper torso with a rifle or shotgun and died at the scene.

“It definitely doesn’t appear to be random,” Mr. Holmgren said, adding that there were multiple witnesses. “This is downtown, a couple of blocks from City Hall, at 7:30 in the morning. There’s people going to work, kids on their way to camp, everybody starting their day and there you have something like this. It’s madness, a little bit, if you think about it.”

The police said they were looking into the possibility that the killing was related to Mr. Bailey’s work as a journalist, though no suspects have been named.

In June, Mr. Bailey was named editor of The Oakland Post, a weekly with a circulation of about 60,000 that covers issues involving African-Americans. He had previously worked for 12 years as a reporter at the daily Oakland Tribune, often covering issues of particular interest to Oakland’s African-Americans, a historically vibrant and politically active segment of this city of 400,000 across the bay from San Francisco.

Paul Cobb, the publisher of The Post, said on Thursday that he would be speaking to the police about several articles Mr. Bailey had been working on that Mr. Cobb felt might have a bearing on the investigation. He declined to elaborate.

The Associated Press reported that Mr. Bailey, who was divorced and had a teenage son, took out a restraining order four years ago against a woman he had dated.

Oakland has struggled with a soaring rate of murder and other crimes over the last 18 months, a problem Mayor Ron V. Dellums, who was recently elected, has made a priority. On Thursday, Mr. Dellums called Mr. Bailey’s killing “a huge loss for all of Oakland,” adding that “Chauncey will be missed.”

At The Post, staff members were both in mourning and on deadline, pulling apart their front page to add an article about the killing. Mr. Cobb called Mr. Bailey an outspoken and indefatigable reporter.

“He was the James Brown of the media,” Mr. Cobb said. “He was the hardest-working man in journalism.”