Kobe Bryant

CTL-E-5892 · Person · other · 1978–2020

VERIFIED evidence grade — build store (JSON graph)

Combined Graph record U-07139 · provenance: build store (JSON graph), record CTL-E-5892.

Kobe Bryant, born Kobe Bean Bryant on 23 August 1978 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, was an American shooting guard who spent his entire 20-year NBA career with the Los Angeles Lakers. The son of NBA player Joe Bryant, he spent part of his childhood in Italy, starred at Lower Merion High School, and went straight to the NBA, chosen by the Charlotte Hornets with the 13th pick of the 1996 draft and traded to the Lakers. With Shaquille O'Neal he won three consecutive championships (2000–02), and he added two more as the team's leader in 2009 and 2010, winning Finals MVP both years; he was league MVP in 2008, an 18-time All-Star, and scored 81 points in a single game in 2006. He retired in 2016 with 33,643 career points and was voted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in his first year of eligibility. Bryant died in a helicopter crash in Calabasas, California, on 26 January 2020, aged 41, alongside his daughter Gianna and seven others.

The record

• Also known as: Kobe Bean Bryant, Black Mamba

Notes

Staged 2026-10-16 under CTL-GOV-006 (Census Intake Wave 3 — 747 Program, Wave 9; 40-record packet). Gate A (2026-10-16): no Kobe Bryant entity in the live graph at 3,603 entities (exact / normalized / alias + token containment); ID CTL-E-5892 free. Provenance: Built in Census Intake Wave 2 and held because intake order closed that window at rank 1000; staged here in ledger order; re-verified against the live graph at 3,603 entities (Gate A re-run 2026-10-16: still absent). Supply: 747 Supply Ledger, Tier 3 — Famous Birthdays ABSENT census, readiness rank 1012 (Basketball Players list). The census supplied the NAME ONLY; no fact in this record is sourced to it (CTL-GOV-004). SCOPE GATE: PASS — Black American basketball figure. Vital status: DECEASED — 26 January 2020, Calabasas, California, aged 41 (AP; Britannica). Tribute treatment. ADJUDICATED LEGAL LINE (one neutral line, packet Facts section): the 2003 criminal charge was dismissed in September 2004 and the related civil case was settled in 2005 (HISTORY). EDGE BASIS: played_for → Los Angeles Lakers (CTL-E-1780) covers his entire 1996–2016 career (Britannica/AP). STATISTICS (sourced, dated): Five NBA championships (2000–02, 2009–10); 33,643 career points; 18 All-Star selections (Wikipedia/AP) — accessed 2026-10-16. RE-VERIFICATION (Wave 3, 2026-10-16): DECEASED status and headline facts unchanged — death on 26 January 2020 in Calabasas and posthumous Hall of Fame election on 4 April 2020 reconfirmed (CNN Fast Facts). The held record's verified facts and its adjudicated legal line are carried exactly in substance; no correction required. MEDIA: photo HELD (candidate: Wikimedia Commons and NBA/Getty press photography of Kobe Bryant is extensive, incl. Hall of Fame and jersey-retirement imagery; no file page was read at file-page level in this pass, so no image is cleared — CTL-PHOTO-001; a CTL-created graphic is the standing alternative); chart FILLED (charts/chart-ctl-e-5892-kobe-bryant.svg); video HELD (the Shorts Link Map catalog was checked by name and variants, incl. accent-normalized forms — no matching-entity CTL Short exists for this subject); audio HELD (no CTL-owned or rights-cleared matching-entity audio). MEDIA LAYER (staged 2026-10-16; full per-asset PHOTO-001 records + embed specs in the packet's staged JSON, Drive packet folder): map = N/A (Person records carry no map slot under the media-layer rule; maps attach to places and institutions.) | visual_assets = HELD: | chart = FILLED (CTL-created SVG (black / deep red / gold) built only from this record's sourced facts) | video = HELD (No matching-entity CTL Short in the Shorts Link Map catalog (checked by name and variants, incl. accent-normal) | audio = HELD (No CTL-owned or rights-cleared matching-entity audio at staging; the subject's own recordings/appearances are )

Relationships

• Los Angeles Lakers — played for
  Kobe Bryant spent his entire 20-year NBA career with the Los Angeles Lakers, 1996–2016, winning five championships (Britannica; AP obituary).

Referenced by

• Shaquille O'Neal — collaborated with → this record

Sources

• Encyclopaedia Britannica, "Kobe Bryant" — born 23 August 1978, Philadelphia; died 26 January 2020, Calabasas, California; helped lead the Lakers to five championships (2000–02, 2009–10); father Joe Bryant's NBA/Italy career; Lower Merion High School; Charlotte's 13th pick in 1996, traded to the Lakers; 81-point game — https://www.britannica.com/biography/Kobe-Bryant?ref=cdn.posts.market (build store)
• Associated Press obituary (26 January 2020), via Minden Press-Herald — died in a helicopter crash near Calabasas, California, aged 41; 18-time All-Star; five championships in a 20-year Lakers career; league MVP 2008; retired 2016 as the third-leading scorer in NBA history — https://press-herald.com/retired-nba-star-kobe-bryant-dies-in-helicopter-crash/ (primary source · build store)
• Wikipedia, "Kobe Bryant" — entire 20-year career with the Lakers (1996–2016); 33,643 career points; Olympic golds 2008 and 2012; Nos. 8 and 24 retired by the Lakers — http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kobe_Bryant (build store)
• AFP, via Latestly (28 May 2020) — Hall of Fame enshrinement postponed to 2021 because of the pandemic; Bryant died 26 January 2020 in the Calabasas crash with his daughter Gianna and seven others; 18-time All-Star, five-time champion — https://www.latestly.com/sports/kobe-bryant-induction-into-hall-of-fame-postponed-until-2021-report-1783376.html (primary source · build store)
• HISTORY (A&E) — on 1 September 2004 prosecutors dropped the criminal charge after the complainant declined to testify; the civil lawsuit was settled out of court in early March 2005 — https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/July-1/kobe-bryant-accuser-goes-to-police (build store)

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Record CTL-E-5892 · Combined Graph record U-07139 · CultureTechLens Knowledge Graph · 5 sources · 2 mapped relationships.
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Researched and maintained by the CultureTechLens research program · CultureTechLens Combined Graph, Release 2026-11-04. Corrections are public: the corrections log.

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