'HE WAS MY HERO'

IT WAS ANOTHER L.A. MURDER, BUT WHEN THE VICTIM TURNED OUT TO BE THE SON OF A BELOVED TELEVISION FATHER, IT WAS AS IF AMERICA HAD SUFFERED A DEATH IN THE FAMILY

On Skirball Center Drive, just off the freeway ramp, the body sprawled next to the Mercedes convertible might have been just another victim of random murder and robbery in Los Angeles. Then a strange recognition took place, and America shuddered. The video image was banished from CNN only 20 minutes after it first aired--too horrible to gaze upon, too terrifyingly intimate to contemplate. The body on the roadside was Ennis William Cosby, 27, the only son of Bill Cosby.

In the inexplicable connect-disconnect of art and life, the name that probably came to mind for most viewers was Theo Huxtable, the...

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