Extremes of Anonymity, Fame Shade Slayings

In the immediate aftermath of the slaying of Ennis William Cosby, Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan, who lost his own son to tragedy, declared that solving the case would be the Police Department’s top priority.

At almost the same moment, Police Chief Willie L. Williams, who is fighting for his job and whose department is struggling for respect, declared that the Cosby case, though important, would be treated no differently from other killings. In particular, the chief cited the slaying of Corie Williams, a 17-year-old student shot to death as she rode a public bus.

In fact, say LAPD insiders and experienced detectives, the truth lies somewhere between the comments of the city’s mayor and its police chief: Ennis Cosby’s killing has not fundamentally refocused the priorities of Los Angeles’ 9,200-officer Police Department, nor is it being treated as just another murder.

That is the fate of William Elroy Smith, who was murdered Jan. 16, the same day as Cosby and Williams, but who died without the patina of celebrity, without the hoopla of rewards and hourly television updates. The Sheriff’s Department investigators in his case have no flood of tips, no composite sketch to distribute. They do their interviews between court appearances and acknowledge that they will probably have another murder to chase by next week.

“I see all the attention these other murders get, and I see my dad’s murder gets ignored,” said Jessica Smith, 16, the victim’s daughter. “It’s like my dad was a nobody. Like his death doesn’t matter, doesn’t mean anything at all.”

Ever since the shootings of Corie Williams and Ennis Cosby, the two deaths have been symbolically paired. Both were front-page news from the outset, the Cosby killing because it involved celebrity and mystery; the Williams murder because it occurred on a public bus, ended the life of a promising young girl and seemed to tap a deep reservoir of urban fear.

The police chief opened his Jan. 17 news conference on the Ennis Cosby case by mentioning the Williams murder. When Chief Williams called Bill Cosby, the entertainer’s first question was not about his own son but rather about the family of Corie Williams. Supporters of Corie Williams have publicly thanked Cosby for his concern and believe that the coincidence of the timing motivated police to find the girl’s assailants.

In both cases, the LAPD moved aggressively to find the killers. Despite Williams’ comments, the department did not treat them the same--it has devoted more time and attention to the Cosby case and has assigned it to its elite Robbery-Homicide Division.

But LAPD insiders and even some critics say the disparity between the handling of the two investigations is a natural consequence of differences in the cases, not the result of a police force that valued one life more highly than the other.

“Every life is immensely and identically valued,” said Deputy Chief Mark Kroeker, commanding officer of the LAPD’s South Bureau. “But the things that emerge, the volume of clues, the complexity of the cases--you just can’t make them all the same.”

In fact, the most poignant difference of all may be that, despite the disparities in LAPD time and attention, investigators have arrested five suspects in the Williams case. The Cosby case remains a perplexing mystery.

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The first detectives on the scene in the Cosby case were from the West Los Angeles Division; one, in fact, was among the investigators who initially responded to the killings of Ronald Lyle Goldman and Nicole Brown Simpson in 1994.

As with that case, the investigation did not stay with West Los Angeles for long. It was quickly transferred to the LAPD’s top homicide squad, the Robbery-Homicide Division. Detectives there are picked for their skills and experience and are supposed to represent the LAPD’s finest. Once in Robbery-Homicide, they enjoy lighter caseloads so that they can focus more attention on cases.

Some Robbery-Homicide detectives will investigate just three to four murders a year, though many are highly complex or difficult cases. By contrast, detectives in South Bureau Homicide, which is handling the Williams case, typically carry 12 to 15 cases at a time.

In the Cosby case, more than a dozen Robbery-Homicide detectives have spent the past 10 days chasing clues, interviewing possible witnesses, canvassing the area and following up on physical evidence. They have analyzed Ennis Cosby’s flat tire, checked his car for fingerprints and interviewed everyone from friends to a pair of Venice drifters.

In addition to those detectives, officers in the department’s West Los Angeles Division were called upon to handle other, peripheral tasks in the case.

Publicity in the Cosby case, as with many investigations, is a mixed bag. After composite sketches of the suspect and a possible witness were released Saturday, a Torrance resident called police to report sighting a man resembling the witness. It was the right man, but it turned out that he had not seen anything.

But if the public can be helpful, it also can be overwhelming. So far, detectives have been forced to wade through more than 400 tips related to the Cosby murder. Most are useless, but Cmdr. Tim McBride, the LAPD’s spokesman, said investigators still have plenty of good clues to investigate.

At the head of that probe is Det. Adalberto Luper, a 24-year veteran of the LAPD and no stranger to high-profile cases. He was the lead clue chaser in the investigation of O.J. Simpson, assigned the task of running down literally thousands of tips.

Luper later helped crack another high-profile killing, the 1996 murder of Academy Award-winning actor Haing S. Ngor, found dead outside his Beaudry Avenue home.

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Police records show that during the afternoon of the Williams shooting, as many as 47 law enforcement officers worked the scene of the crime. Ten detectives worked until midnight, then met to discuss the evidence and to decide how many investigators should stay with the probe.

“The last thing I told [lead Det. Rudy Lemos] before I left was, ‘Whatever you need.’ My only request was we don’t have people out here duplicating effort. I’d rather overstaff than understaff, but we don’t need people duplicating effort,” said Lt. John Dunkin, commanding officer of South Bureau Homicide. “You don’t want . . . so many detectives involved in it that your primary detectives turn out to be nothing but bookkeepers.”

Since that first day, six detectives have been assigned to it--three times the normal number but a complement that South Bureau supervisors felt was appropriate.

The day after the Williams killing, the team of six detectives was back on the case at 7:30 a.m. One pair visited Centennial High School, where Corie would have graduated this spring. Another went to a nearby high school where members of a local gang are students. They followed a few tips from anonymous callers, consulted LAPD narcotics experts, met with MTA police and combed the bus a second time for fingerprints.

As night fell, they were back in the field conducting interviews. Lemos--a 24-year veteran who has handled nearly 700 cases, including work on the Hillside Strangler task force--met with Dunkin about 7:40 p.m. for a status report. For the second night in a row, they worked until midnight.

The six convened again on Saturday, Jan. 18, about 2 p.m. They corralled a computer specialist who compiled a work-up on the suspects. Two detectives again visited Corie’s mother, and by day’s end had arrested one suspect, a 15-year-old boy.

Investigators were back on the job last Sunday, as well as Monday, a city holiday in honor of Martin Luther King Jr. Tuesday morning, they canvassed area high schools.

Thursday morning, roughly 70 LAPD officers descended on the homes of their suspects, arresting two. Another turned himself in later that day. Early Saturday, police arrested the suspected gunman, described as a 4-foot-6, 80-pound, 16-year-old boy.

Detectives acknowledge that the Cosby and Williams investigations have unfolded differently. But they stress that the differences do not reflect a Police Department that cares more about celebrities than average people.

“We don’t have a Nicole Simpson that gets murdered in South Bureau, and we don’t have a lot of famous people who frequent here, we just have people who live and work here and are trying to get by every day,” said Dunkin. “I would like to think it doesn’t make any difference. We’re going to work just as hard, given whatever we have to work with, no matter what.”

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That notion is a hard sell for the families of Steven Sherard Thomas and William Smith. Thomas was shot by a stranger in late 1993; more than three years later, his case remains unsolved. In recent days, his mother has watched in dismay as other victims attract the attention of the press and police.

“The detectives who investigated Steven’s murder were not ‘supported by dozens of other personnel,’ ” Beverly Thomas wrote Thursday in a letter to Chief Williams, reminding him of her son’s murder. “Chief Williams, you did not visit the family of Steven to offer your condolences at this senseless murder.”

Nor has any law enforcement leader or celebrity entertainer offered solace to the family of William Smith.

Smith was an unemployed motorcycle mechanic who was shot at a Lancaster trailer park Jan. 16, the same day as the Cosby and Williams slayings. There is no reward for his killer. There is no composite sketch; there are no good leads for sheriff’s detectives.

Smith, 40, lived with his wife and three children in a weathered tan mobile home at the edge of the trailer park.

Early on the morning of Jan. 16, less than 30 minutes before Ennis Cosby was murdered, Smith and his wife discovered that they needed diapers for their 1-year-old. They picked up the diapers at a nearby market and drove home along East Avenue I, a desolate, wind-swept stretch of road in the High Desert.

A driver suddenly cut Smith off. Smith became angry and honked his horn, flashed his lights, sped in front of the driver and cut in front of him. Smith drove another block and pulled into the mobile home park where he lived.

“He realized the driver was right behind him,” said Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Det. Mike Robinson, who is investigating the case. “He told his wife: ‘This guy followed us in here. Go inside, in case there’s trouble.’ ”

His wife heard gunshots and emerged from the trailer to find her husband mortally wounded. She never got a good look at the gunman or his car. None of the neighbors could provide any information to the detectives.

Detectives in the Cosby case have been deluged with tips. Robinson is still hoping for his first one.

But the Smith murder, most investigators agree, is not the exception. In a county that experienced 1,877 murders last year, it is tragically the rule.

“We usually do our work without any attention or fanfare,” said Sheriff’s Lt. R. David Dietrich. “Usually, if we catch the suspect or if we don’t catch the suspect, no one pays too much attention--except the victims’ families.”