Ennis Cosby Slain in Robbery

Re “Bill Cosby’s Son Slain in Apparent Robbery,” Jan. 17:

Much has been said about Bill Cosby regarding all of the things that he has accomplished over the years in his profession and about the tragedy that has just struck his family. But, being a like victim with the loss of our daughter, the thing that brought him to my heart was his thoughtfulness that there were two other families who had a similar tragedy in the same time frame and we should not allow them to be forgotten in their grief. This is a man of compassion who has the heart, during his own hurt, to think of others.

In your prayers think of not only this giant of a man but of all others who face this same destruction in their family lives, rich or poor, famous or ordinary; this hurt is an everlasting destructive force.

HELEN M. CULLINS

Oceanside

* My heart goes out to Bill Cosby and his family. Ennis was his father’s “hero,” and the senior Cosby is a hero to all of us.

The news of Ennis’ death brought tears to my eyes, and the circumstances brought shivers. Several years ago, my wife was attacked by a passing motorist in the same vicinity where Ennis was murdered. Coming home after work, she exited off the 405 near Mulholland and pulled over to the shoulder when another car rammed her. She got out to exchange information with the other driver, when she was viciously attacked by him. As his girlfriend watched, the crazed man slammed my wife’s face into a fence and began beating and kicking her.

While there are complete lunatics out there, there are also those who care about other people. I once got a flat tire on the northbound 405 at around 1 a.m. I pulled over to the shoulder and attempted to change the tire in the dark. A few minutes later, a car pulled over behind my car. A man got out and approached me. He was a paramedic who’d just gotten off work. He shined his car lights toward my car and helped me change the tire. I was very moved that a stranger would go out of his way to help like that.

It is a dangerous world out there, and bad things can happen when we least expect it. Bill Cosby’s pain is our pain, and I hope he and his family can feel the communal hug that the world now gives him.

DANNY BIEDERMAN

Calabasas Hills

* So now it’s the Cosby family that has joined the ranks of a fraternity of which they never wanted to be members--grieving families of victims of gunfire.

My heart goes out to them. My daughter, Amy Margolis Silberman, was shot and killed by a gunshot from no one knows where by an unknown “celebrant” on New Year’s Eve 1994 in New Orleans. Because she was the first person to die in a practice that had injured thousands of people through the years and was a tourist besides, her death was headline news throughout the country on CNN, newspapers and radio and TV. The pain and anger are indescribable and since we’ll never know who her assailant was, there really is no complete closure. We have all resolved to go on with our lives and are functioning, but nothing is the same, nor will it ever be.

I keep wishing there were some way to teach those nonthinking fools who use guns that when they kill someone, they kill a large portion of the hearts and souls of the hundreds of people whose lives were touched by the victim. I just wanted the Cosby family to know that there are many out there who feel their pain personally and can honestly say, “I understand exactly what you’re going though.”

EUDICE MARGOLIS BERNSTEIN

Woodland Hills

* For every senseless death of a famous person, there are scores, if not hundreds of “nameless” people who get little to no news coverage. The vast majority of these undeserving victims are killed with handguns. Would it have made sense or would the outcome have been different if Ennis Cosby was armed as well? The pro-gun lobby might have you think that, but the reality is perhaps both victim and attacker would be dead.

The so-called “right to bear arms” must end. Britain and Japan both do well without handguns, so can we. How many more senseless acts must we endure?

PAUL SCHROEDER

Los Angeles

* Kudos to Howard Rosenberg for such an insightful column on media frenzy and the right to privacy that should be afforded to public figures (Jan. 17). What Rosenberg does not realize is that because Bill Cosby is such a beloved figure and so dear to our hearts, that this will only make the public hungrier for information about him. And the media will respond to this hunger. They will be right there with their inappropriate questions and probing cameras.

Was I the only one who was saw the horrible flashes that lit up the faces of Cosby and his wife as they were leaving their New York home in the dark of night? Take a note, members of the news media: leave Cosby alone. Let him mourn the death of his hero in private.

MELISSA PALAREA

Westwood

* First the media agree to help police ensure the safe return of a young kidnap victim. Now some news organizations are refusing to stake out Bill Cosby’s house and stick a microphone in his face. Are the media really evolving from the swamp?

TODD FRANKLIN