Wednesday, July 9
Vail cabbie says Bryant was with entourage, police
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ESPN.com news services
CORDILLERA, Colo. -- Kobe Bryant left a Colorado hospital approximately 12 hours after the time frame in which he is accused of committing sexual assault against a 19-year-old woman, the Orange County Register reported Wednesday.
Bryant
Terry O'Brien, a 38-year-old Vail Taxi dispatcher and driver, told the Register that he picked up the Lakers star from the emergency room at Valley View Hospital in Glenwood Springs. According to the newspaper, Bryant was with three members of his entourage and flanked by Eagle County sheriff's officers.
Bryant pulled a towel over his head before diving into the back seat of the cab, O'Brien told the newspaper.
O'Brien was not at work early Wednesday and a telephone listing in his name was disconnected.
Police spokesperson Kim Andree refused to discuss the newspaper report or confirm whether sheriff's deputies accompanied Bryant to a hospital and then let him leave.
Fans launch "Free Kobe" Web site
A pair of sports fans have launched a Web site to take advantage of the Kobe Bryant legal situation, the Rocky Mountain News reported Wednesday.
Californian Jeff Reichman and Boston-area resident David Feingold have created a campaign and a retail store at
www.freekobe.com, where they are offering T-shirts, coffee cups and hats.
The two men launched the site Tuesday in response to reports that Bryant, a guard/small forward for the Los Angeles Lakers, was arrested in Eagle County on suspicion of sexual assault. Bryant has not yet been formally charged.
"There are not really any superstars to look up to anymore," Reichman, 24, said to the newspaper.
The site's creators, according to the newspaper, say they are seeking to "protect one of the few remaining role models in this tumultuous world of basketball fandom."
"It's not so much that we are huge fans of Kobe, but it's more that we are fans of the idea that there can be a hero, somebody to look up to in professional sports," Reichman said.
The T-shirts and hats sold on the site feature a "Free Kobe" logo and slogans such as, "Because we're running out of heroes."
-- ESPN.com news services
"We didn't handle this case any differently than any other case," she said. She said the department uses hospitals in Glenwood Springs and Vail for tests in sexual assault investigations.
O'Brien said he transported Bryant and three men to the Hotel Colorado in Glenwood Springs, then drove one of the men back to the Lodge and Spa at Cordillera, where the man "cleared out" Bryant's belongings. O'Brien said he was paid $372 by Bryant bodyguard Michael Ortiz for the 2½-hour job. The Register did not specify how O'Brien knew Ortiz's identity.
"The whole thing was pretty weird and pretty fishy," O'Brien told the Register. "Bryant was laying in the back seat with a towel over his head, trying not to be seen, while three men were taking care of all the details."
And now follows comments made in an article on Kate Hepburn in TIME magazine this week:
Stars who bemoaned the hardships of their profession...the loss of privacy--rankled her. "What does he expect?" she said...."You can't go around saying, I'm special. I make my living asking you to look at me, to pay to see me,' and then get upset at somebody to taking a picture. If you don't want to be a public figure, then don't pick a public profession and don't appear in public. Because in public you're fair game." She also didn't understand stars who sued newspapers over printing lies about them. "I never cared what anybody wrote about me," Hepburn said, "as long as it wasn't the truth."
What we need are more Kate Hepburns with a sense of humor.
