Cosby Investigation Suffers Setback

The search for Ennis Cosby’s killer suffered a serious setback Tuesday when Los Angeles homicide detectives concluded that two men detained as possible witnesses were drifters who had nothing to contribute to the investigation.

Authorities said they were convinced that one of the two men interviewed Monday evening was the “possible witness” seen by a security guard near the scene of the murder early Thursday on a darkened road above Bel-Air.

But that man, who one officer described as a “dead ringer” for the composite drawing of the witness, persuaded detectives that he had only been enjoying the view of Los Angeles’ lights from a vantage point high above the city. He had no useful information about the shooting that took place nearby as Cosby changed a flat tire, police said.

The man’s companion also had no knowledge of the killing of entertainment icon Bill Cosby’s son, police said.

The findings left police with just one known person who is believed to have seen the killer and without another witness they badly hoped could help them. The remaining witness is a 47-year-old woman who told police she had come to the scene to aid Cosby and provided a description of the apparent killer.

“For now,” one senior officer said Tuesday, “we’re just waiting for a break.”

As police in Los Angeles were left scrambling for a breakthrough, a Los Angeles area woman and her alleged accomplice were in custody in New York, facing charges that they tried to extort up to $40 million from Bill Cosby.

Although the alleged extortion plot extended until two days after the slaying, authorities said there is no apparent connection between Ennis Cosby’s shooting and the attempted blackmail of Bill Cosby.

The federal government charged that Autumn Jackson, 22, of Canyon Country and Jose Medina, 54, threatened to go to the tabloid media with Jackson’s allegation that she is Cosby’s illegitimate daughter unless he paid them millions of dollars.

The pair were being held without bail pending another hearing Friday.

Jackson and Medina made a brief appearance before a federal magistrate Tuesday on the extortion charge. Both were arrested by FBI agents in the Manhattan offices of Cosby’s lawyer Saturday and were ordered to remain in custody without bail by U.S. Magistrate Arthur J. Peck.

The government’s complaint contends that Jackson threatened to sell her story, which Medina would write, to a tabloid newspaper. The woman and her representatives allegedly asked for $40 million and then agreed to accept $24 million in a conversation with Cosby’s lawyer’s office that was recorded by the FBI.

Jackson, a thin woman with short, dark hair who wore dungarees and a long wrinkled beige sweater, and Medina, dressed in a dungaree jacket and matching blue jeans, had little to say during their 10-minute appearance in federal court in Manhattan.

Medina’s attorney, Neil B. Checkman, said his client sells medical equipment to people with disabilities. Medina suffered a head injury several years ago that makes it hard for him to understand complicated matters, Checkman said.

“He is terrified by this whole thing,” Checkman said. “The whole thing sounds a little too sophisticated for my client to be the guiding light behind it.”

Checkman said that his client met Jackson last summer at a Holiday Inn in Burbank where Medina was living while working on a movie script. At the time, he said, Jackson was working as a desk clerk at the hotel.

Jackson’s lawyer, Robert Baum, said that the woman--who met with a Globe reporter to negotiate the sale of her story only hours before Ennis Cosby’s murder--has been upset about the death. “She learned about it, and she is heartbroken about it,” Baum said.

The complaint does not specify when the woman first made the paternity claim. Representatives of Cosby have denied that he is Jackson’s father but acknowledged that the entertainer had previously met the woman and her mother.

The extortion scheme allegedly began in November or December. In early January, court papers allege, Jackson initiated escalating demands for money and threatened to go to the news media unless she was paid. Cosby’s lawyer called authorities, who monitored subsequent conversations.

The editor of the supermarket tabloid the Globe said in an interview that his newspaper was already in contact with Jackson at the time that Ennis Cosby was murdered.

Editor Tony Frost said the young woman asked for $25,000 for her story and a Globe reporter arranged to meet her at a “cheap” Los Angeles hotel. Arriving at the hotel, the tabloid reporter found not Jackson but a man in his 30s who said that he represented her and that the price tag on her story had jumped to $50,000. The meeting took place Wednesday evening, just hours before the younger Cosby was shot to death.

After the murder, the tabloid was asked by federal agents for assistance and agreed to comply.

The Globe is offering a $200,000 reward for information leading to the conviction of Cosby’s killer. Earlier, the National Enquirer posted a $100,000 reward. On Tuesday, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors added $12,500 to the pot.

Even as authorities press their case in the New York courtroom, the investigation continued Tuesday in Los Angeles. FBI agents visited a Canyon Country apartment where Jackson had lived and interviewed the young woman’s mother, Shawn Thompson, sources at the agency said. Agents described the woman as “cooperative” but would not elaborate on the about two-hour discussion.

If convicted, Jackson and Medina each face a maximum sentence of five years in prison and a $250,000 fine for conspiracy and a maximum sentence of two years in prison and a $250,000 fine for extortion.

Back in Los Angeles, the two scruffy-looking men picked up by police in Torrance on Monday afternoon were freed after LAPD detectives could discern no connection between them and Ennis Cosby.

The driver of the blue hatchback, much sought as a possible “second witness” to the murder, was in fact a drifter who had most recently been living in Venice.

The man’s vehicle, which also matched a composite sketch and description, was searched and returned to its owner, police said.

LAPD officials acknowledged their disappointment at the result of the interview, but expressed satisfaction that the lead regarding a possible witness had been checked out so quickly, avoiding a long, fruitless hunt.

The attention now shifts to the hunt for anyone resembling the composite sketch of the suspect, a long-faced white man who wore a knit cap on the night of the killings.

Times staff writers James Rainey, Beth Shuster, Josh Meyer and Matt Lait contributed to this story.

* ‘COSBY’ SHOW

The first episode of “Cosby” to air since the death of its star’s son drew an above-average audience. F1