06: The Zodiac Killer | Red Thread
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On the night of July 4th, 1969, couples were celebrating Independence Day across the country. The same was true in Blue Rock Springs in Vallejo, California, where lovebirds drove to secluded spots to watch the fireworks crackle over the night sky in relative peace while they shared a moment together. One such moment was being shared by Michael Magoo and Darlene Ferren, who were parked in their car in an isolated and empty spot at the park.

some teenagers having just left as they had found their spot. They sat in the leather seats and began to talk to one another, their conversation broken by a car entering the park along the road behind them. The two watched as it rolled forward until it stopped behind their car. They looked back, Michael with confusion and Darlene with fear. The headlights were bright and the engine was rumbling idly. The darkness made it impossible to see inside. It lingered for an eternity until the engine kicked in and the car sputtered forward.

Relief came immediately as they watched the car leave the park through the winding road. It was probably just someone who was lost, they rationalized between themselves. It was only moments later that the car returned and the fear crept back in louder now. The person wasn't lost. The car rumbled behind them once more as a door opened and footsteps pushed forward to their own car.

A bright light pierced their windows, blinding them both, before glass shattered alongside the sound of deafening gunshots. The figure, a silhouette beyond the flashlight, fired into the car indiscriminately. As quickly as it started, it was over, and the figure walked to his car and drove calmly away from the scene. The figure would go on to be known by the public as the Zodiac Killer, a figure so enigmatic he still remains a mystery to this day, 50 years later.

But this is just one of many stories from the Zodiac's case that we aim to explore in this week's episode of The Red Thread, the show where we cover cold cases, cryptids, conspiracies, and cults. I do like alliteration. I'm Jackson and I'm joined by Isaiah and Charlie and this is what we do. This is what we do.

This episode is brought to you by our lovely sponsors at MeUndies, Adam and Eve and AG1. You'll hear more about them later on in the show. And another very quick note before we start, boys. I just want to shout out that we have show notes in the description. I shouted this out last week, but I want to shout it out again. You can head below and see everything we talk about in written detail with pictures and other notes and additional details and stuff like that. Stuff that we might miss during the actual recording.

And the link is in the description to go check it out. And also thanks to everyone for watching and listening to the show over on Spotify. We'd really appreciate it if you click follow so you get the latest episodes delivered directly to you. And feel free to leave a rating as well because that really helps us out as well. All right, that's enough notes before the show. How are you guys going? Going great, Jackson. Thanks for having me.

It's your show as well. I'm not having you. I'm not having you. You're part of the show. I don't know why he keeps saying that. You know what, Jackson? Thank you for inviting me on as a guest for this episode. It really does mean a lot. We're just guests in your world. Yeah. It's Jackson's podcast. We're just living in it.

It wouldn't be the same without you guys. I'd just be here talking about fanfiction to myself about serial killers and stuff like that, which would be an entirely different mood and vibe. These people would watch it, probably. You know, I'm sure they'll tune in. Your therapist would, at least. This time around, your intro wasn't really fanfic. It was just describing one of the murders.

Yeah, after last week with the whole Jeffrey Epstein. I'm a little disappointed it wasn't in the first person, just to be honest, like, I kind of wanted you to be like, you're on the ground, you look down in a puddle, you're the Zodiac Killer.

That's how you've evaded arrest these last 50 years. Yeah, it's you. You're the Zodiac Killer. Yeah, I don't know, I really didn't want to do that again, honestly. I didn't want to get too much into it like that. But yeah, it was more just a description of one of the actual events, because, I don't know, I find it interesting. Anyway. It is admittedly in better taste to not put you in the shoes of, like, murdered teenagers, so that's fair. Yeah.

Yeah, but then we lose the personality of it. It's a balancing act. That's true. All right, from the top, you're sitting in a car. Suddenly, you hear someone tap outside. You have to understand, Jackson, you can get more creative. Instead of putting you in the perspective of the killer or the victims, you could have done like a bystander, like a bird or something in a tree that you don't know what you're seeing, but you know it's not good.

You are the local woodpecker on his way home to sit on some eggs. You just had a delicious breakfast of worms. You look over, a gunshot. You can't understand it because you are simply a bird. You know you must flee. You look over to see a human holding a really loud bird. Nothing makes sense.

I don't know, I'll get more creative with it next week. No, no, it was perfect, you're beautiful. Continue. I appreciate it. So, the Zodiac. I'm sure you guys are both very aware of the Zodiac Killer. I don't think there's a single person out there that isn't at least somewhat aware of the Zodiac Killer. It's a very popular name. How much detail do you guys know?

I definitely knew a lot more when I was in college because I watched a bunch of documentaries and movies on it and looked into it, but it's been a while, so I'm a little foggy on a lot of the specifics. Do you remember anything specific? Like in terms of who I thought it was?

That or just like really specific elements of the case that jumped out at you that like you were interested in? Oh, yeah, of course, obviously, the biggest one being like all the notes that got sent. But like in terms of who I thought it was at the time, I believe the one I was leaning mostly towards was Kane.

Oh, okay. Interesting. Okay. Yeah, there's a lot of suspects that we'll get into down the line. There is a lot of suspects and a lot of different points to one or the other, so I'm interested in seeing where we differ on that. Isaiah, what do you think? I think that the Zodiac Killer's one of the serial killers that I'm most familiar with. Like, I don't know if I could list off every name and date of the victims, but I

I know all the broad strokes of the killings. I know the number of victims. I know what was included in the letters he sent. I always thought that the killer was Lee Allen.

But it's been a while since I've looked at it. Like, I know last year information came out that made a bunch of people say it was Gary Post that I haven't looked at that much. So I could be swayed, but I was kind of in the Lee Allen camp for a long time, I remember. But yeah, I think I'm pretty familiar with the case. Yeah. Before we get into it, can we shout out the hit 2007 movie starring Jake Gyllinghall and I think Robert Downey Jr.? It's just called Zodiac by David Fincher.

I think that was what started my interest in Zodiac. It's pretty... It takes some liberations. Like, it's definitely, like, a dramatization and plays a bit loose and fast with the facts of the case. But it's still pretty accurate to what I read over the last research period for creating this document. Yeah.

fantastic film yeah the like if we're arguing it as like sort of a docu docu series or whatever it went a bit hard in the lee allen camp like a lot of the scenes between the journalist and lee allen were fabricated but as far as a film great work one of one of uh i mean fincher pretty much exclusively puts out bangers but it's a great film overall it's one of his good works

Yeah, fantastic movie. I love re-watching it. It's a great watch. Definitely recommend it to anyone out there who hasn't watched it. If you haven't watched it, highly recommend go watch it. All right, so I figured the best way of tackling the Zodiac Killer, because there's just so many different details, is just to do a timeline. Basically what we did for Jeffrey Epstein. We'll just go over the murders as they happened. There's five specific cases or five specific murders that...

100% confirmed to be the Zodiac, which we're going to be focusing on in this episode. Otherwise, it would probably run for about 10 hours. So we needed to cut down on a bit of the fat and make sure that we just stuck to what was the most conclusive information available to us. And then we'll also go over the clues...

And the letters that he would send in as well, because those are very important to the Zodiac case itself. And it's basically what gives it its entirely unique perspective or spin on the whole crime thing. Like, he would send letters in to journalists and stuff like that. And that's why he was so well known. So...

The first such case or first murder was in December 20th, 1968. And it was the murder of Betty Lou Johnson and David Faraday. They were 17 and 16 and they chose the secluded Lake Herman road in Benicia, California, which is North of San Francisco and South of Vallejo. And they would go out. It was about 10, 15. They would go out in their cars to what was basically like a lover's lane and

and hang out there. And around 11pm local resident Stella Borges left her house to pick up her son from a show and she was driving with her mother-in-law and daughter and she passed Lake Herman Road a few minutes later spotting Faraday's car and the front right door was open and two figures laid on the ground covered in blood. She made the choice not to stop and offer help or anything like that and instead drove to the nearest Benicia police station which I kind of get given that she had her own

her own child in the car, I guess that would be, and she was basically a woman on her own with her mother-in-law. So if she sees like a scene, you know, a crime scene, I get why she would just drive straight to the Benicia police station and not stop to help or anything like that.

But it is rather unfortunate because they were still, the two victims in this case, were still alive at the time, which if they had have received help quicker, then perhaps they both would have survived. That is true. That is one of those

I was just going to say, that's one of those things where, like, what kind of help would she have offered for gunshot wounds? Like, I guess the best she could really do would be, like, CPR if they start to flatline. But it's really understandable why she wouldn't stop, because the killer could still be there. Like, you know, and then she's not safe, her daughter's not safe. Like, it's all just...

I think she made the smartest choice in this situation. It's just really... It's the choice I would have made myself if I was in that situation. Well, yeah, you're also a fucking coward, though, so... What would you have done? What would you have done? Oh, I would have absolutely stopped. I would have stopped. I would have gave them a sinsu bean. Like, it would have been smooth sailing if I was on the case. Pop culture reference! Let's go! There it is! You would have hunted down the Zodiac Killer yourself and challenged him to...

Beth is like, bro. Put down the gun. It's time for some pugilistic combat. Which way did he go? Point it out to me. Charlie gets out of the car. There's like a girl bleeding on the floor. Where is he? Speak. There's no time. Drops her, runs into the woods. Yeah, he's never seen again either. You wouldn't have to help them out. You'd be off to the hunt yourself.

Also, like, in 1968, it wasn't as common knowledge as it is now, unless she was like a nurse or something about like, oh, well, if someone has a bleeding wound, put pressure, you know, apply pressure, stuff like that. All that would have done in 68 is keep her from getting help because it's not like she could have called the police from there. So, yeah, I think she did the right thing driving away. And once again, as mentioned, the killer could still be there.

Absolutely. Like, I'm not saying all of this to blame her or anything. I'm just saying it is unfortunate because they were still alive. I can't believe you blamed this woman for the death of these two. Coward. No, for example, like, if she had, I don't know, dragged the bodies over and put them in her car and, like, drove them to the Benicia police station with her, then, like, 25 minutes would have been saved. That's what I would have done. I would have stolen the bodies, yeah. I would have been like, hmm.

I'm just saying it's just unfortunate that help didn't arrive sooner, I guess, because there was, he didn't stick around to finish the job, basically. So it's entirely possible that they could have survived if help got to them quicker. So upon reaching the scene, the police observed an absence of signs indicating any kind of struggle or robbery. No discernible motive was identified in the following investigation and all car doors except the open right front door were securely locked.

Shell casings were discovered on the floorboard and a bullet had pierced through the back window, leaving a hole in the car roof. And the police concluded that the assailant had utilized a 22 caliber semi automatic pistol loaded with Winchester Western super X. That's important. Super X copper coated long rifle ammunition and pulled up alongside the park car and shot into it repeatedly. So it was basically just, he rocked up to the side of the car and just shot indiscriminately into the car. Um,

spamming spamming shots into their hitting them repeatedly and very Betty Lou was located a few meters away from the vehicle suggesting that she did not die immediately and attempted to the best of her ability anyway to flee so she was located away from the car so maybe he wasn't the best shot and he had to kind of finish her off after she had left the car well it's also a 22 so it's gonna take a ton of effort to kill someone with it anyway

Yeah, good point. I don't know anything about firearms, so I'm glad you're here. .22 is like a squirrel caliber, like you use it for hunting squirrels. It's like the size of an air rifle, like a pellet gun. Right. It's a very small bullet, doesn't do a lot of damage. I mean, they're used in murders a lot because they're cheap and easy or whatever, but you've got to typically unload into someone to kill them with it.

Gotcha. So is that probably why they survived for so long? Yeah, that's definitely why. If he had like a 9mm or something and he shot them like 5 times, they're dead. But with the .22, it's very reasonable they could have lived for hours afterwards. Yeah, okay. So does this speak to some level of unawareness on his part? Like, if he was intending to kill them, would he have chosen a better weapon at the time?

I've always had the theory that the Zodiac Killer was very full of himself, obviously, because of the letters. I think he liked thinking... Yeah, very egotistical. I think he liked thinking about killing people more than actually killing them because he was really bad at it. Most of the murders he only got away with were like the suspect died because of how incompetent the police were or because it was the 1960s. Because his final kill count

was five people and he attempted to murder seven or eight i believe confirmed so that's like that's just over a 50 success rate um yeah that that we know of to be fair he did he does claim himself that he's got a high kill count he claims to be 37 but but i also don't know about that because he loved gloating about the ones we know he did so much

Yeah, I feel like he would have attached proof. Yeah. We'll get into that later on. But yeah, so she suffered five bullet wounds on the right side of her back. The shots had traversed her heart, lungs, liver, and right kidney, resulting in an instant death in that situation. So she had fled the car and she had been shot in those vital organs and died pretty much immediately for her. Whereas David was discovered beside the car and was barely alive, but actually alive upon police arrival.

He was shot near his left ear with the bullet entering his brain, which, wow, the bullet entered his brain and he was still alive for a bit of time. That's how small 22 is.

There's actually, that happens more often than you think. There's a pretty famous case of that. You can actually watch it on YouTube. There is a guy who, I think it was during a burglary, got shot in the head. And if I remember correctly, he didn't know he got shot in the head. So he ended up going to the, like the police came and they started interviewing him and they realized that he was a little out of it. And then the police investigator during the investigation said,

And he said, like, did you hit your head? And he's like, no, not that I know of. And then he realized that he got shot in the head and he just had a bullet lodged in his brain the entire time. And he was totally lucid. Having a conversation just seemed a little off. Like when you it's not instant death or anything when you get shot in the head, like all the time.

I gotta be, well, yeah, I gotta imagine where in the, like, brain, like, there might be less sensitive areas of the brain. I think if you hit the brain stem or whatever, I think that's, like, an immediate death from what I understand. Yeah. There's also another one where, like, a wife shot her husband while he was sleeping in the head, and then he just woke up with a headache and never realized he got shot until he, like, went to the doctor for something totally unrelated, and they're like, there's a fucking bullet here. Like, it happens from time to time.

Jesus Christ. Imagine like, imagine being told by the doctor you were almost assassinated. Yeah. That one was a wacky case.

I'd be questioning my whole life at that point. That'd be insane. Yeah, there's a lot of factors, like what part of the brain, what calibers used, how much energy it carries. There's also stories, like there was one guy who he shot, I don't know if we can say that, he tried to, what was it from the Epstein one? Hang up. On a live. Yeah, hang up. He tried to hang up with a pistol, and he put it in his mouth, fired,

And then it like obviously did a lot of damage, but he lived. Police show up. And anyway, he ends up surviving this scenario. And it turns out doing that cured his schizophrenia. Oh, I remember that one. Yeah. So like the brain's really weird. Wacky stuff can happen.

Yeah, brains are fucking crazy. Crazy shit. So that was at the end of 1968, I believe. Yeah, December 20th, 1968. And it would take another six months until he struck again with the attack on Darlene Ferrin and Mike Magoo. I don't know how to pronounce it. Magoo? Magoo, I think. Yeah, Magoo.

You can continue calling him Magoo if you want. I don't know, it feels a bit offensive now. Mr. Magoo. Yeah, I definitely don't think it's Magoo, I'll be honest with you. I think you're just a big Leslie Nielsen fan and just got Mr. Magoo in your head from it. Yeah, probably. I'll take this one if you'd like. Yeah, yeah, go for it. So...

Around midnight on Independence Day of 1969, 22-year-old Darlene Farron and 19-year-old Mike Maggio were en route to Mr. Ed's Diner after Darlene picked up Mike from his house. Before heading to the diner, Darlene asked to have a private chat with Mike, turning around on Springs Road and heading to Blue Rock Springs Park in Benicia, a popular local spot for teenagers at the time,

similar to the Lover's Lane where the previous two murdered victims were found. When they arrived at the spot, they put the car in park and settled in for their conversation. There were other teenagers at the park at this time, setting off firecrackers. In the park, they turned off the car light but left the radio playing. The other teens left about five minutes before the attack occurred.

Alone again, a car entered the parking lot, pulling alongside Darlene's car, a brown Corvair or a Ford Mustang.

Mike asked Darlene if she knew the driver, and her response was to the effect of, oh, never mind. Mike was unsure- Not a great response, by the way. If I asked someone, like, hey, do you know that guy? And they go, oh, never mind. I'd be like, what the fuck? She's like, yes or no. Well, I'm immediately weirded out, yeah. Yeah. Hey, do you know this random guy who followed us to this, like, makeout location at night? Oh, don't worry about him. No. Okay.

Mike was unsure if she knew or didn't know the driver, but didn't press further. The car quickly left, heading south along Columbus Parkway towards Vallejo and Springs Road. Approximately five minutes later, it returned and parked at the rear of Darlene's car. A man emerged from the vehicle, carrying with him a high-powered flashlight along with a 9mm semi-automatic handgun. Believing the stranger was a policeman, Mike began searching for his ID.

Suddenly, the stranger raised his gun and fired five shots through the car window, targeting Mike first. Some bullets tore through Mike's body and hit Darlene as well. Mike recalled hearing a muffling sound, suggesting the possibility of a silencer on the gun. However, local resident George Bryan, about 800 feet away, heard the gunshots.

It is possible that due to the low proximity of the... or to the close proximity of the gunshots, Mike suffered temporary hearing loss and therefore thought the gun had a silencer. However, it is also possible that George Bryan had heard fireworks or fired crackers given the holiday. Wait, so Isaiah, like...

Have you ever had a gunshot go off by your ears unprotected? Yeah. So what happens is you don't hear the gunshot that much. All of a sudden your ears are ringing and everything's quieter.

Like obviously you hear the gunshot, you hear the pop, but that muffling he's talking about was likely because he had never been around a gun getting fired near his face. So yeah, you immediately lose hearing, you know a pop happened, but mostly everything's dampened for a while after that.

Right, so I don't think the Zodiac Killer ever used a silencer in any other cases, so I'm leaning towards the likelihood that it is that, that he just wasn't used to gunshots going off near his ears, and that's why he thought it was a silencer. Which most people are, to be fair. Yeah, of course. It was a new experience for him, as it would have been a lot of people. Now, one thing I will add is silencers aren't, like, movie quiet.

The only time you get close to that is when you're using subsonic ammo. If you use regular caliber or regular velocity ammunition, like 9mm ammunition, through a suppressor, it will dampen the range that the shot is heard, but the bullet will still hit supersonic speeds and make the loud crack. So it will still sound like a gunshot up close. The silencer just tapers how far out or the visible flash of the gun going off.

So, it's also true that he could have a suppressor, but it still sounds like a really loud gunshot close to it. But I am with you. Would you still get the effects of that hearing loss if a weapon with a silencer on it went off near you? You definitely would. Like, for some calibers, like, for example, AR-15s that shoot 5.56s,

Uh, the bullets going so fast that even with the suppressor on, you're not supposed to shoot it without hearing protection still, even with the silencer. Now, nine millimeters, not that fast, or it's not that power like that. It doesn't have that much powder as a five, five, six. So it's not to the same intensity, but I imagine if the muzzle is in your face, when it's fired, you're still going to get a hearing.

deafening. Now, I'm still with you in that I think a silencer wasn't used in any of the other crimes. He probably was just getting the muffling from the gun, but it is worth noting that both could be true.

With a sudden adrenaline rush, Mike pushed himself into the backseat of the car away from the immediate danger. In the process, a bullet entered his knee. Darlene was then shot on each arm and her back as she attempted to turn away.

the attacker began walking back to his car but returned upon hearing mike's moans of pain shooting two additional bullets at each victim totaling nine shots fired he then left the park towards vallejo both mike and george bryant heard the killer drive away at high speed but when the attacker later made a call he claimed to have stayed under the speed limit after

I like how that's on the record. He's like, don't worry, I didn't break the speed limit. That's where he draws the line. I may have attempted murder back there, but you bet your sweet bippy I was obeying the road rules. You're not allowed to find me. He's on the phone with the police, and it's like, I killed two people. Did you speed away? No! Why would I do that? Stop it.

After receiving reports of gunfire, officers Richard Hoffman and Ed Rust were the first to arrive on the scene that night. Hoffman quickly attended to Mike, who was on his back on the ground next to the car, while Darlene remained motionless behind the steering wheel. Attempts to get information from Darlene were met with only mumbled responses. Rushed to Kaiser Hospital, Darlene tragically passed away due to her injuries and was pronounced dead at 1238 a.m.

Miraculously, however, Mike survived the attack and provided a description of the assailant to Ed Russ. He depicted the man as heavy-set, around 5 foot 8 inches tall, weighing at least 195 to 200 pounds, but not, quote, blubbery fat, with a large face and short, curly-like, light brown blonde hair.

Approximately 40 minutes later, a call was made from a payphone at the gas station of Spring Roads and Tolyum to the operator and Vallejo police headquarters. I'm so happy I didn't have to pronounce that one thing. I would've fucking butchered that. I'm sure I did, but I'll take one for the team. You typed it, so it's the least I could do.

The caller possessing a mature male voice spoke evenly and consistently. Despite the operator's attempts to inquire about the caller's identity and location, he spoke as if reading from a script.

The quote went as follows. I want to report a double murder. If you go one mile east of Columbus Parkway to the public park, you will find the kids in a brown car. They were shot with a nine millimeter Luger. I also killed those kids last year. Goodbye. End quote. There's something about like the the casual delivery of that. I also killed those kids last year. Like, man.

I think this was clearly a man that wanted to, or a person that wanted to be like, um, he, he wanted the reputation. Um, again, Mike survived and these were nine millimeter rounds. Does that change anything? Uh, it makes it much more likely that he would have died. Nine millimeter is a much, much larger bullet compared to 22.

And he got shot like multiple times. Yeah, it is wild that he lived. Nine millimeter is like the quote unquote standard handgun size. Police, a lot of police in the US use .40 caliber, but nine millimeter is a very popular handgun round for police. Like in the military, that's what their sidearms are. So yeah, it's really, really absurd that he lived being shot that many times. Incredibly lucky. I mean, he went back.

The Zodiac Killer went back and double tapped, basically, after hearing him cry. So he got lucky twice, really, when you think about it. Because that second time he came back, I'm assuming he went there to really finish the job and make sure that he placed the bullet correctly or whatever. And still he survived.

It's crazy. It is insane that he lived. I also will mention, this is the last point of gun nerdism I'll bring up for this, that because he said the phrase 9mm Luger, most depictions of him have him with a literal World War II Luger. I'm pretty sure he was just specifying the caliber. 9mm Luger is the full name for 9x19 Parabellum, which is like the common 9mm round, but

but because he said the word Luger, a bunch of people think he uses like World War II weaponry, um, which I don't think is true. Just to, well, wait, is that, is that, is it impossible that he would? I mean, he could, he could have been using a World War II pistol, um,

just for aesthetic points, I guess. But there's much more, there's more reliable, more easily accessible, less expensive firearms out there in 9mm. But every drawing, every artwork you see of the Zodiac Killer, he looks like an SS officer because they're like, oh, Luger, here you go. Full Nazi regalia. Yeah, pretty much.

Yeah, some weird kids OC. Yeah, oh man. Oh man, that's scary. Before we continue, let's take a quick brief break to thank the sponsors of this episode of The Red Thread.

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today thank you all so much for watching the ad and thank you so much to ag1 for sponsoring the show it really does mean the most hope you all check them out link is in the description and we are back to the show okay now we're back back in uh charlie did you want to take this next section because it deals with the the code and stuff like that yeah so in

On August 1st of 1969, this is when the first Zodiac letter started to come through or came through. So the Zodiac sent nearly identical letters to the Vallejo Times Herald, San Francisco Chronicle and San Francisco Examiner. In these letters, he confesses to the murders of David Faraday and Betty Lou Jensen. He also claims responsibility for the death of Darlene Farron around the 4th of July that same year. The validity of these letters is undeniable due to it containing unsettling and specific details about the murders that were only known to the police.

The letter also had the zodiac symbol displayed at the bottom, which was a circle with a cross through it that would divide the circle into four quadrants. It is thought that the zodiac symbol represents a gun sight, though it's impossible to know for certain. So this is from the letter.

Dear Editor, This is the murderer of the two teenagers last Christmas at Lake Herman and the girl last 4th of July. To prove I killed them, I shall state some facts which only I, plus the police, know. Christmas. One brand of ammo, Super X. Two. Ten shots were fired. Three. The boy was on his back with his feet to the car. Four. The girl was on her right side, feet to the west. Fourth of July. Six.

Five, girl was wearing patterned pants. Six, the boy was also shot in the knee. And seven, brand name of ammo was Western. Here is a cipher or that is part of one. The other two parts of the cipher are being mailed to the editors of the Vallejo Times plus San Francisco Examiner. I want you to print this cipher on the front page of Frye.

on the front page by fry afternoon august 1st 69 if you do not print this cipher i will go on a kill rampage fry night that will last the whole weekend i will cruise around and pick off all stray people or couples that are alone then move on to kill some more until i have killed over a dozen people

So he's making these big threats about if you don't publish this, you're going to be responsible for the rampage that ensues to try and pressure them to get his cipher out there. And the attention on him, obviously. Again, he wanted that reputation. And it's undeniable because he offered all of this information that only the police would know. It's obviously undeniable. Also, another thing to note is you read that verbatim, but I want to really...

I really want to point out just the raw amount of spelling mistakes in the letters themselves. Like, he spells Christmas with two S's. There's just a lot of, like, just random errors throughout it. Like, he spells cypher with, like, C-Y-I-P-H-E-R. Just... And this is constant throughout all of these letters as well. Do you think there might have been a reason for that? That's what I think. See, the mistakes are... I don't think he's, like, an uneducated person, but from...

from everything that I've come to understand about him. Well, some of them aren't even, like, mistakes that could be unintentional. Like, for example, he spells Friday, like, the abbreviation stuff, F-R-I, he says F-R-Y. There's gotta be some reason for that, because, like, the guy knows, you know, the three letters that abbreviate Friday.

So maybe I've heard some theories that maybe he misspelled stuff to make the cipher more difficult in sections to prevent double letters or from easily recognizable short letter combinations from popping up. So maybe that was part of it. It's also possible that he was trying to mislead the investigators into thinking he was an uneducated person or something like that.

yeah, it's just some way of like throwing off, throwing them off their game. Like it definitely, I don't know. It definitely seems intentional to me, but well, it a hundred percent is these aren't, these really aren't mistakes. You could accidentally make the,

So I believe there's definitely a reason behind it. I just don't know how many illiterate people there were in the 60s and how common it was. I don't even really know what illiteracy looks like in adults. Well, it doesn't look like this. If you're illiterate, you're not writing a note that looks like this. It wouldn't get this far. Plus, there's no way you're making ciphers, mailing them to the...

Exactly. True.

Yeah, he was a smart enough guy. I also don't agree with him being like some kind of super genius guy. I feel like when it comes to making a cipher, you can really make shit that's almost impossible to crack if you just get ridiculously abstract with it. And I don't think it takes like a super genius to do that. Exactly. But it does take someone that's at least somewhat educated. Yeah.

Well, you can definitely make a cipher that's completely uncrackable. You can absolutely just do that. But I think he wanted the possibility of them solving it as well. Yeah. Yeah. Because I could sit here and make up a language and then speak in it and be like, ha ha, you'll never crack it. Because duh, because I'm the only one who made up how the language works. But it does take some level of...

Sure, it was the 1960s, but for the level of police evasion he did for making decipherable ciphers, I'll say is more complicated than impossible ones. So, yeah, there was some level of intelligence on display. He wasn't just some dumb average killer. I agree.

So each of the letters contained one portion of a cipher known as the Z408 cipher, named after the number of characters it contains. The Zodiac demanded that each newspaper publish a cipher on the front page. All three newspapers published their respective parts of the cipher. The first of the Zodiac ciphers was solved by North Salinas schoolteachers Donald Hardin and his wife Betty.

The cipher itself was a simple substitution cipher. In a substitution cipher, each letter of the plain text, original message, is replaced by a different letter of the alphabet. The replacement is consistent throughout the cipher, meaning that the same plain text letter is always replaced by the same cipher text letter. Some elements made the Z408 cipher more unique, however, like the fact that the Zodiac Killer created a unique set of symbols drawn from distorted alphabetic letters, numbers, mathematical symbols,

and seemingly arbitrary shapes and signs and symbols that seem to have been inspired by ancient scripts or even astrological symbols. And their solution was sent to the San Francisco Chronicle, and the deciphered message revealed the words, I like killing people because it is so much fun. It is more fun than killing wild game in the forest because man is the most dangerous...

It's misspelled animal of all to kill something gives me the most thrilling experience. It is even better than getting your rocks off with a girl. The best part of it is that when I die, I will be reborn in paradise again, misspelled and all that and all that I have killed and all the I have killed become my slaves. I will not give you my name because you will try to slow it down or stop my collecting of slaves for my afterlife.

Yeah. I mean, like you said, there's spelling mistakes constantly throughout. He spells paradise. And the spelling mistakes are consistent across letters as well. Like, for example, in this one, paradise, he spells it constantly paradise, like I-C-E on the end. Yeah. That's constant. And as well as Christmas with two S's, Friday as in F-R-Y, stuff like that. There's these consistent spelling mistakes, which are just so off.

odd to me you'd think he would get friday right at least once you know so i i don't know i think it is deliberate was hold on let me get a bit conspiratorial here for a second wasn't the original spelling of friday i'm talking like back when the the word was first invented wasn't the original spelling like f-r-y-d-a-y

You're asking the wrong people. You'd have to speak to, like, Socrates or something. So there was this thing Kaczynski would do where, and I know people say that Kaczynski and the Zodiac Killer are the same person. I'm not saying that. But another killer who liked to taunt investigators. There's this thing Kaczynski would do where if he knew a word was spelled wrong,

quote-unquote a correct way in the 1400s or whatever and we've changed the spelling of it he would intentionally say the same or spell the thing in the old way it was done because like the way he views it we've dumbed down language so he's correcting it by doing everything the correct way it's almost like an attack on the establishment or what he perceives it's being a smart aleck right like oh I know how this word's spelled even though you all spell it the simpleton way right so

So the only issue with this is that I don't think the word slow has ever been slow. Yeah. That puts a bit of a damper in where I was going with that. Uh, so I don't think there were like medieval peasants walking around, like shouting out, slow down, going rampant or anything like that. You know what? Fair point. So yeah, continue. I'm going to, I'm going to press doubt on that one. But I still, I still think like the, I still think that the, um, the, uh,

the misspellings are deliberate. I don't know. It just really feels deliberate to me. Like there's some kind of hidden message in it itself. Almost. I don't think, I don't necessarily think there's a hidden message in it. I think it's all just to portray this character.

character because i also don't believe that he thinks that by killing people he's gathering slaves for the afterlife to me it seems like he was going for more of a showmanship angle because he's egotistical about all of this i never really believed that that was something that he that was his motive behind it that he's killing them to gather slaves for his afterlife when he dies to me that just seems like something that he would have drummed up in his head as like a real villain

like a super villain out of like a comic book or something. Yeah. Or some kind of movie. Trying to create an idea. Yeah. Cause like, that's kind of the question about the ciphers itself because this, this was the deciphered part, right? The whole thing about, I need to kill people to have slaves for the afterlife. So, and also that mention you had about like the symbols were made up of like astrological symbols, ancient symbols, stuff like that. So, um,

The one theory is that he was some kind of a cultist practitioner who was putting praxis to it. So to him, these symbols, maybe they really meant something. Maybe they actually led into his true belief.

And maybe he is thinking about souls for the afterlife. The other idea is, as you just said, Charlie, he's doing it to put on a show. And if that's the case, then maybe the ciphers don't matter that much because most of them do stuff like this of kind of showing off being a showman.

So in that way, it's almost like the ciphers themselves are a taunt to the police. Like, he does his whole message to get attention, then he's like, haha, wouldn't it be funny if I leave some code saying that I think I'm the devil or whatever. Yeah, to me, it definitely feels more like just raw serial killer trolling as opposed to an ideological message. To me, that's just how I feel, but I'm not...

I don't know for sure. At the end of the decoded message, there was also 18 letters remaining that did not form a coherent message, and the letters were E-B-E-O-R-I-E-T-E-M-E-T-H-H-P-T-I. So, E-B-O-R-T-E-M-E-T-H-P-T-I. Before the meth pit. Got it. Yeah, pretty much.

Saying that out loud sounds like I'm casting like an incantation or something. It is still unknown what these- It's actually his name. It would have been the easiest solve ever. They just go to the fucking phone book and they find his name in there like that. Yeah. E.B. Orta Method EP. Oh my god. He was just up the road.

Only one man in existence with that name. Of course, it's the retired cop, Officer Meth Pit. We missed him.

It's still unknown what these remaining letters mean, and there's much speculation about them, though nothing has been satisfactorily explained or decoded from them. It's likely that they might be meaningless and intended to confuse or mislead investigators. In response to the deciphered message, Vallejo Police Chief Jack E. Stiltz expressed doubt, indicating that the police were not fully convinced that the letter had indeed been written by the murderer. And to further establish the identity, Chief Stiltz requested a second letter containing additional factual details.

And that's when the response letter comes in, if you want to take it, Jackson. Yeah, just briefly on that, I feel like there was enough information in the first one to prove that he was the actual Zodiac killer. I feel like what Police Chief Jackie Stiltz was doing there was kind of goading him into giving them more information. Yeah. I just don't see any reality where that wasn't enough information to convince the police that they're dealing with the actual killer here. There was just so much...

information there. But yeah, August 4th, 1969, that is roughly a week later. No, just a couple days later. In 1969, the response letter is received by the San Francisco Examiner in response to Stilt's request. It reads as follows.

Okay, alright, alright, hold on, hold on. That immediately gives away...

that he's just trolling them with the whole like I am the soul killer because they cracked it and the answer was I'm trying to kill people to get souls and in his letter he's like don't worry I'm sure when you crack it you'll figure out who I am yeah that gives it away he's clearly trolling yeah or he's EBT meth pit you're right we can't throw out the other possibility

Why did no one see that? On the 4th of July, I did... Oh, this is him, by the way, not Jackson speaking. I'm going back to the letter. On the 4th of July, I did not open the car door. The window was rolled down already. The boy was originally sitting in the front seat when I began firing. When I fired the first shot at his head, he leaped backwards at the same time, thus spoiling my aim. He ended up on the back seat, then the floor in back, thrashing out very violently with his legs. That's how I shot him in the knee.

I did not leave the scene... See, he spelled scene C-E-N-E. Like, come on. Scene of the killing with squealing tires and racing engine as described in the Vallejo paper. I drove away quite slowly so as not to draw attention to my car. The man who told the police that my car was brown...

Last Christmas, in that episode...

Alright, that one wasn't even close. Silhouette? Are you serious? Now I'm just mad. To be fair, if there was any word that I would think that someone may get wrong, it would be silhouette. It would be silhouette. Yeah.

Yeah, that's sometimes a hard word to spell. Continue, sorry. I'm just getting mad at him now. The killing kids, I can let by, right? But silo wets is unforgivable. Yeah, it is kind of frustrating because it kind of feels like someone pretending to have dyslexia or something. Yeah. Or like a learning disability. Maybe he couldn't spell.

I mean, maybe he does have dyslexia. Well, even if you have dyslexia, I don't think it would present itself like this and this commonly for each word. What dyslexia can end up doing is you do still have spelling difficulties later on because you just have a fundamental issue with like understanding the language itself.

I've definitely seen dyslexic people that have a lot of difficulty spelling words. Bullshit. This is him again. Bullshit. That area is surrounded by high hills and trees. What I did was tape a small pencil flashlight to the barrel of my gun. If you notice, in the center of the beam of light, if you aim it at a wall or ceiling, you will see a black or dark... He spelled dark D-A-R-C-K. Dark spot in the center of the circle of light about three to six inches across. I'm serious.

So, I'm still mad about everything that was spelled that way. But...

That does raise, because at first I was trying to find a reason to the misspelling, but now, yeah, maybe he didn't. Isn't there a kind of, I'm forgetting the name for it, but isn't there a kind of head trauma that leads to spelling difficulties?

I'm sure there is. Yeah, probably a lot of different ones. Yeah, but not necessarily a decrease in intelligence or something like that. Oh, yeah, I've heard of a few mental conditions where you retain intelligence, but you lose a lot of functionality in speech, obviously, and things like writing and stuff like that. Yeah, yeah. Maybe that leads to something. Anyway, I could take this next section if you want about the next killing. Yep.

All right. So this is on the 27th of September. So this is just a month later, right off of that string of letters with the police. So just over a month later, the stabbings of Brian Hartnell and Cecilia Shepard.

A month later, a couple by the names of Cecilia Shepard, 22, and Brian Harnell, 20, were unwinding on a blanket near the shoreline at Lake Berryessa near Napa, California. In the secluded surroundings, the two were reminiscing about their college days. During their conversation, Cecilia heard a rustle and noticed a man seemingly watching them from the bushes. Cecilia told Brian about the stranger she saw, who nonchalantly suggested that the man might be searching for a restroom.

The stranger would later be described as heavy set, dark haired, and standing between 5'8" to 6' tall. He wore glasses, a dark jacket, and disheveled clothing. He allegedly disappeared behind a tree briefly and then emerged once more donned in dark pants and a windbreaker. A black executioner style hood concealing his shoulders and torso hid his identity.

To ensure his eyes remained unseen, he also wore clip-on sunglasses. On the chest of his hood there was a white circle with a cross symbol prominently displayed, the same symbol recurring in his ciphers. Completing his ensemble, a sizable sheathed knife hung from the right side of his belt.

Approaching Cecilia and Brian, the man shared that he had escaped from a Montana or Colorado prison, accounts vary, and urgently needed money and a car to escape to Mexico. Responding to his plea, Brian handed over the keys to his Volkswagen and whatever spare change he had, mostly coins. Concerned for their safety, Brian offered assistance to prevent any potential harm, to which the man replied, no, time is running short.

Brian later noted that the man's voice was unremarkable, lacking any discernible accent but carrying a slight drawl. The situation took a turn when the man ordered Cecilia to hogtie Brian. As she complied, tossing her wallet aside, which the man ignored, he eventually hogtied her as well before drawing a gun. The Zodiac spoke, I'm going to have to stab you people. In a desperate plea, Brian requested to be stabbed first, unable to bear witnessing Cecilia's potential fate.

the attacker complied. The knife with a double-edged blade appeared either handmade or meticulously crafted, featuring a wooden handle, two brass rivets, and white tape in place of the guard.

Brian was stabbed six times in the back before the attacker turned to Cecilia and stabbed her ten times. They both survived and played dead in hopes the man would leave, and it worked. The attacker then went to Brian's car and, using black marker, wrote on his car, Vallejo 12-20-68, 7-4-69, September 27th, 69, 6-30, by knife.

So those were the murders, the previous murders as well, I'm pretty sure. Yes, yeah, those were the two days. 4th of July and December 20th. So he's saying that this is now his third killing by knife.

Yeah.

Just fucking insane. It's just insane how many like people actually survived this case because they're so isolated in every single case and he never like never finished the job per se. That's what I meant when I said I don't think he liked killing as much as he did talking about killing.

Like he, it seems that the murders are very like, like sure. The whole, I'm, I'm an escape convict. I'm trying to get out of here was to lower their guard. Cause that's, that's the thing that like killers do a lot in these cases is they'll try, they'll be like, I just want your wallet or I just want, you know, something to take you off guard. And then from there they'll do the killing. So that's all that was. But to just like to, to finally be at the moment that you theoretically planned months for, and then you stab someone six times,

and then you stab the other person a few times, and then you leave, and then you just gloat about it for the next month to come in the papers or whatever. It feels like he liked the attention and the notoriety it got him more than the actual...

aspect of killing. And also this is another thing to note. The Zodiac killer is unique because most serial killers have a preferred method or they'll do something to the victim or, you know, something like that. But the Zodiac killer doesn't really have any of that. Sometimes he kills them with a knife, sometimes a gun, sometimes he ties them up. Other times he just shoots them and drives away. It's like the, the killing is just a means to an end for him. Yeah. Well,

100%. I also think that it's very clear that this is still all premeditated. Like, he clearly goes to great lengths to still do the things that he's doing because, like, he showed up with a fucking executioner's hood. Like, with a sewn-on zodiac symbol on the fucking breast of it. Like, that takes premeditation to a whole new level. Yeah, yeah. I don't mean any of that to say I don't think it wasn't premeditated or spree or anything like that.

It's just unique in how much he doesn't relish in it, at least in the moment, you know? In the actual killings. He definitely relishes. Oh, yeah, yeah. Super relishes in it after it's over. The symbol that he creates. Yeah, of course. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. 100. I agree with you. I don't think the I think the killings were like you said, a means to an end. Yeah. Yeah. So this was October 11th of 1969. The murder of Paul Stein, 29. He was a cab driver for the Yellow Cab Company in San Francisco, and he started his night shift around 845 p.m.

After his initial fare, Leroy Sweet, the assistant traffic manager for the cab company, directed Paul to pick up a passenger at 509th Avenue on the western side of San Francisco. This would be the last known contact with Paul. Less than 15 minutes later, he was discovered lifeless, covered in blood in the passenger seat of the Ford Galaxy taxi cab he was driving. At 1046 p.m., the taxi meter read $6.25. $6.25.

allowing the police to estimate that Paul Steins likely picked up his second fare around the Mason and Geary intersection or Union Square. The intended destination was Washington and Maple Street near Presidio. However, for reasons still unknown, the cab drove about a block away from its intended destination to Washington and Cherry Street at 9.55 p.m. Paul's wallet and keys were missing and have never been recovered.

A significant portion of his shirt was torn off, later mailed with a letter to the San Francisco Chronicle. Additionally, bloody fingerprints were recovered from the car. Just across from the cab, three teenagers witnessed the event unfold through their house's window. They observed the attacker meticulously removing a portion of Paul's shirt and wiping down various areas of the vehicle, including the interior, driver's side compartment, exterior right front passenger door, and the driver's side door handle.

Teenagers called the police at 9.58pm, but a miscommunication regarding the attacker's description led to patrolling officers being told to be on the lookout for a black male. This confusion allowed the actual Zodiac Killer to escape. The teenagers were approximately 50-60 feet away from the taxi and described the suspect as 5'8 or 5'9, heavy build, reddish blonde hair, glasses, dark brown trousers, a dark or navy blue jacket, a parka jacket, and dark shoes.

On that same night, police officers Donald Folk and Eric Zelmas, unaware of the corrected description, were patrolling and spotted a white male with a crew cut. He wore a navy blue jacket and rust or brown trousers along with tan engineering style footwear walking east on Jackson Street. Mistakenly looking for a black adult male, the officers did not find the man suspicious.

Upon receiving the correct description, the officers reviewed a composite sketch and began to consider the possibility that they had encountered the killer that night.

The man they observed bore a resemblance to the description provided by the witnesses, though notably he didn't appear to be carrying anything. The officers dispute that they communicated with the individual, with some accounts suggesting that they stopped the individual to ask if he had seen anything suspicious, to which he replied that he had seen a man walking the other direction, waving a firearm. This situation is such a deviation from all the other situations that he did. Like, think about it. He was in the middle of a residential area, and it almost feels like...

I know we're talking about how meticulous and methodical he was. This feels like just a random killing almost, like you just domed the taxi driver in the back of the head. It doesn't feel like all of these other killings. Yeah, this is definitely the most...

like different one usually he does it like in complete isolation like and is only so far had only targeted couples this is the first individual that he's targeted and he does it in an area where he didn't like survey the surroundings to make sure he was even alone there are plenty of people to witness it he didn't drive away he walked away like it's all very different so it seems more like this kind of was a spur of the moment thing that he did

I'm sure it probably wasn't, but it definitely does feel like a spur of the moment thing. Also, just the difference of victims, right? Like, this is just a random cab driver, whereas all the others are couples. I feel like that's such a deviation. It's interesting. And then this is a very famous image, the police sketch of the man. This is the one that I think most people have probably seen floating around to represent what the Zodiac Killer looked like.

Yeah. Yeah. I don't have a lot to say about it other than it looks it looks like it looks like a really normal like NPC level dude. Like it's not someone that would be really like alarming to see. It just looks like a normal guy fits the description of what the officers described and they're still looking for the wrong like working under the wrong description of who the suspect was. So I think it's a really good chance they did see this man.

And again, like, think about how confident... Do you think that this situation happened because he was feeling like an unprecedented level of confidence and he was trying to escalate his... Put himself into more tricky circumstances to get out of because he was feeling so confident? Um...

not necessarily if i had to spitball why he would have done this i think it was probably maybe out of frustration like because now he's had two victims survive and maybe like he's trying to get better at it potentially would be something i'd consider because he's now like he almost had a third victim survive as well like she passed away two days later like he he's

not like, like Isaiah said, he's not very good at killing people. So maybe this was one of those things where he wanted to guarantee that he could kill somebody. Like, yeah, he was feeling resentful. Yeah. And,

that's actually an interesting theory because the two people that did survive were both men so maybe he's like I gotta get the men count back up or something I've gotta kill a man basically yeah like what does it take to actually finish a man off or something potentially well not the right way of phrasing it but you know potentially I think that's

Because, again, it's just such a big deviation from every other murder. And it was such a deviation to the point where I'm like, maybe this isn't the Zodiac Killer, but we would later on go on to find out that he himself confirmed that he was the...

the killer of this this man well as confirmed as it can be there's still i mentioned this before the show but there's still a theory that there's multiple zodiac killers like it wasn't all one guy so i don't necessarily believe that but it's also important to note that there's no way of knowing beyond 100 a shadow of a doubt that it really is the zodiac we can say that about everything to do with this i know the identity of the zodiac killer because there's just

We will never know, honestly. I don't think we will ever know. October 13th, 1969, letter to the San Francisco Chronicle following the murder.

A letter was sent to the San Francisco Examiner... Actually, I think it's the Chronicle. From the Zodiac Killer shortly after the murder of Paul Stein, where he taunted police for their failures on the night of the killing. The letter's validity is considered undeniable due to the fact that it included a portion of the bloodstained shirt from Paul Stein that was removed from the scene of the crime. So, it's definitely...

The letter is definitely from the person who killed Paul Stein. That's undeniable. But what Charlie's saying is... It's possible it could not be the Zodiac. It could be a copycat killer. It could just be another random killer as well that's just taking the mantle. I think that that does... Like, I've seen that theory as well. I don't personally subscribe to it because I think that the handwriting is pretty similar. Like, they had handwriting specialists on hand to confirm...

the similarities between letters. So I think it would be extremely hard to like replicate, replicate. Oh, maybe not because they were published letters as well. So maybe they were, they were in the paper. Someone could get really good at replicating it. You could absolutely emulate it if you spend enough time.

I don't know. It's something I think experts might still be able to tell. Like there's such, I don't know much about the art of handwriting or whatever, but I think there's a lot of subtleties that your conscious mind doesn't pick up on that handwriting experts may pick up on. So I'm not sure. Regardless, it's commonly said by, you know, police investigators that this was the Zodiac killer. So I'm counting it as a Zodiac killer kill. And I believe that it was.

So, he goes on to say in the letter, this is the Zodiac speaking. I am the murderer of the taxi driver over by Washington Street and Maple Street last night. To prove this, here is a bloodstained piece of his shirt. I am the same man who did in the people in the North Bay area. The SF police could have caught me last night if they had searched the park properly instead of holding road races with their motorcycles, seeing who could make the most noise. The car...

The car drivers should have just parked their cars and sat there quietly waiting for me to come out of the cover. School children... And this is where it gets concerning. School children make nice targets. I think I shall wipe out a school bus some morning. Just shoot out the front tire and then pick off the kiddies as they come bouncing out. So he's trying to spread as much terror as possible. Yeah. Also, I do think it's him because he misspelled motorcycle.

I was actually going to say there's like a lot less misspellings in this one, which... There's less. You're right. You're right. But the characteristic misspelling of motorcycles is a dead giveaway. So shortly after saying that, you know, he's going to shoot a bunch of kids, which is, you know, something that San Francisco is absolutely threatened about. On October the 22nd, it says during a live broadcast of...

a talk show on KGO TV in San Francisco, a person pretending to be the Zodiac Killer called into the talk show to talk to the host. The show was hosted by Jim Dunbar and prominent attorney Melvin Belli. The caller spoke in a soft, monotone voice. He sounded distressed and occasionally incoherent. He complained of severe headaches and requested help, claiming that he was afraid he would kill again.

Belli acted as a mediator and tried to gain the trust of the caller, offering to arrange a meeting between the two. He asked the caller to reveal his identity so that he could receive assistance. Nothing fruitful was gained through this, however, and law enforcement was unable to trace the call due to the caller not staying on the line long enough for a successful trace. There were doubts as to whether the caller was actually the Zodiac Killer, and later,

The police and FBI concluded that it was likely a hoax after analyzing the call.

Yeah, I'm not 100% sure. Like, I was trying to research into it, and there's no real direct confirmation either way that it was or wasn't the Zodiac Killer, apart from the Zodiac Killer later himself writing that it wasn't. But, I don't know, I feel like the Zodiac Killer himself is a liar, and I also feel like, with how confident he was getting, it's not impossible to believe that he might have called in to, like, talk shows and stuff. Like, that's not out of the realm of possibility for me, personally. So...

I used to think this talk show, or like, sorry, when I was first researching all this, I thought the talk show was a total fake until the letter he later sends where he says that he can't stop himself and it almost sounds like he has some kind of, I know they say that the DSM no longer recognizes multiple personality disorder as a thing, but it's some kind of schizophrenia that may lead to similar conditions. So I don't know, I don't entirely write that off.

Yeah. I don't think it's out of personality or anything like I was saying. This person clearly loved the attention and clearly got some kind of gratification out of the attention. And there's, like, going on a... And also, like, throughout the story, there's this kind of escalation in what he does and how he acts. And the next escalation from talking to a journalist or the newspapers is to go on a talk show, surely. So, yeah.

Yeah, I don't consider it out of the realm of possibility, but I guess the police and FBI concluded that it was likely a hoax.

I tried to look into what they meant by analyzing the call, like how they determined that it was a hoax, but I couldn't find anything conclusive or concrete as to how they ruled it out. So not sure what they did to rule it out. So I don't know. November 8th, 1969, the San Francisco Chronicle received a card from the Zodiac Killer, the front depicting a picture of a hanging pen with liquid dropping off it. It read, "'Sorry, I haven't written, but I just washed my pen.'"

Um, so this was like a, he was, he was trolling again. Like he's sending like greeting cards now with like funny, funny, like pictures on them and stuff like that. And obviously, obviously the letter about like, sorry, I haven't written in a while is because he has, he hadn't written in a month or so in two months. Yeah. Um, so. Hey guys, it's me again. Yeah. Sorry, it's been a while.

This is the Zodiac speaking. I thought you would need a good laugh before you hear the bad news. You won't get the news for a while yet. P.S. Could you print this new cipher on your front? Front spelled F-R-U-N-T. Front page. I get awfully lonely when I'm ignored. So lonely I could do my thing. Thing is capitalized and there's like 100 exclamation points after it.

And then it's got his symbol and he spells, he says December, July, August, September, October equals seven. So he's saying that he's killed seven people at this point.

Which we only have five confirmed victims. So unless he's counting the two people that survived as that seven, or he's insinuating that he's killed two other people that the police don't know about. I'm not 100% sure. I don't think anyone is. I'd probably say he's counting the people who survived. Yeah. That's kind of what I think as well. Yeah. It is possible that... Well...

I don't know. I was going to say it is possible that he was also killing other people though, that the police don't know about. But again, like we were saying, I can't remember if we said it on this episode or before the recording started. I don't think he would be capable of killing someone and not bragging about it. So I feel like we would know.

Um, another note here, he spelled December D E S. That's another thing that's like, that doesn't even sound right. Okay. So at this point, maybe the misspellings are part of his way of letting the police know it's actually him. Hmm. Good point. Yeah. If he, if he remains consistent in his misspellings, like it gives a bit of validity. Yeah. Interesting. Yeah. Potentially. Yeah. Because someone thinking to pretend to be him and send the police letters wouldn't think to misspell stuff.

Unless they saw the misspellings beforehand. Yeah. Yeah, true. That's something to think about. Attached with this letter was what was called the 340, the 340 cipher, which was only decoded in December 2020. So it took 50 years for this decryption to take place. And unlike the earlier 408 character cipher that the Zodiac sent, the 340 cipher was far more complex, obviously. It's believed to involve things such as transposition, which is rearranging the letters in the cipher,

homophonic substitution which uses it's using multiple symbols to represent the same letter or a combination of both so he upped the difficulty level on the cipher itself he realized that he needed to make it a bit more difficult the difficulty curve may have been a bit extreme though there the zodiac killer because it took 50 years for this son of a bitch to be solved so maybe ease it back a little bit

This made it harder to find a consistent pattern and way to crack it. And there was also the fact of the Zodiac Killer himself potentially making mistakes, whether intentionally or unintentionally, that could add complexity to solving the code. So we don't know if he, like, because he is, he's coming across as a bit of a troll to me. So maybe he was trying to make it as impossible, like unfair as possible.

That could be a part of it. Maybe he made the mistakes in the cipher on purpose just to frustrate them. That's potentially a thing. But whatever. It was solved in 2020 through private citizens using advanced code-breaking software and algorithms that the code was finally cracked and the following message was found. So we needed AI to solve this fucking... We needed AI to solve this cipher.

It reads, I hope you are having lots of fun in trying to catch me. That wasn't me on the TV show. Which brings up a point about me. I am not afraid of the gas chamber.

Just a quick note, the guy on the TV show was talking about how scared he was of the gas chamber and he wanted to stop killing and stuff like that and begging for help, basically. So he says, I'm not afraid of the gas chamber because it will send me to paradise all the sooner because I now have enough slaves to work for me where everyone else has nothing when they reach paradise. So they are afraid of death. I am not afraid because I know that my new life is. Life will be an easy one in paradise death. Yeah, I'm still on the troll theory. Yeah.

that that whole section's just to mess with them. It's disappointing that that took 50- like, that was the outcome of 50 years of work. That was 50 years, yeah. Yeah. It's just this guy talking about paradise again. "Wait, that wasn't me on TV, I'm gonna go to paradise with all my slaves, ha." Yeah, what a fucking lame- Thanks, dude. What a lame fucking end to that 50 year journey. That's why, like, there's a bunch of people like, "Oh, if we can solve all the ciphers, we'll know who it was." I would- I don't believe him.

No, he would have never put his actual name or anything in there, to be fair. I know, well, we'll get to it soon, but I still think no matter what, there was no chance he was ever going to give any real identifying information. No, it was all a game plan. On November 9th of 1969, this is the death machine or bus bomb letter, which is already a great start, sent to the San Francisco Chronicle.

In his seven-page letter to the San Francisco Chronicle, the Zodiac boasted of having murdered seven people and expressed growing frustration with law enforcement. He disclosed that the police had indeed encountered him on the night of Paul Stein's murder, referring to the officer as a, quote, blue pig. He revealed that he was present in the nearby park when questioned by the police about a man with a gun. He deliberately misled the officers by directing them away from his actual location.

The officers contested this, however, and it is unsure whether or not it is entirely accurate or not. Regardless, it's widely believed and corroborated that the officers did at least notice or come into the proximity of the Zodiac Killer as he fled the scene.

The letter, which arrived the following day after the previous letter, also contained the bad news that the Zodiac Killer had mentioned. The letter reads as follows: "This is the Zodiac speaking up. To the end of October 1st I have killed seven people. I have grown rather angry with the police for their telling lies about me, so I shall change the way the collecting of slaves.

Yes, so I shall change the way the collecting of slaves. I shall no longer announce to anyone. When I commit my murders, they shall look like routine robberies, killings of anger, and a few fake accidents, etc. The police shall never catch me, because I have been too clever for them. Ugh. One, I lo- I hate that. Was that a sigh? Yeah. I hate that he wasn't caught immediately. Like, he's so braggadocious. I hate it.

So my falling off point with him is the misspelling. Yours is that he's too bragging. Again, none of us are hurt by the killings. That's not the issue. No, it's the attitude.

It's the attitude. You know what it is? It's his bad sportsmanship. That's what makes him insufferable. Yeah. One, I look like the description passed out only when I do my thing. The rest of the time, I look entirely different. There's that misspelling, so I think this is him. I shall not tell you what my...

does size consist of when i kill disguise i think oh oh that is that is that is d-e-s-c-i-s-e that is crazy i thought he was trying to say just decision or something yeah decisive decisive i hate this guy even more now

Alright, at 2, as of yet, I have left no fingerprints behind me, contrary to what the police say. Groups of parking about 10 minutes apart, then the motorcycles went about 150 feet away, going from south to northwest.

And I disappeared into the Park A block and I

a half away never to be seen again yeah a block and a half away to never be seen again i i run on sentences too that's it yeah we gotta catch this guy hey pig doesn't it rile you up to have your nose rubbed in your boo-boos he spelled nose n-o-z-e what the fuck it's on purpose like he's doing this just to keep taunting the officers

you can't keep getting away with this I didn't remember this part was this uh was it published at any point that the officers may have seen someone that looked like the description of the zodiac was that ever publicly published um uh I remember I remember whenever I researched about this years ago reading that detail that the police talked to him possibly and then he ran away

Yeah, but Charlie's saying was it published with the Zodiac Killer? I don't think so. Or someone know about that information in the public at the time? I don't think so. I don't think they would have published that information themselves. Because until this letter came out, that was just a normal interaction with the police. Yeah, I guess that makes sense. Then this letter comes out and they're like, oh, that might have been the guy. Yeah, potentially. Anyway, the guy who's like, yeah, someone's over there waving a gun, whatever.

So, if you cops are going back to read that letter. Oh yeah, you did read the boo-boos part. Continue. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Going back to reading the letter. If you cops think I'm going to take on a bus the way I stated I was, you deserve to have holes in your heads. Take on a bus.

Take one bag of ammonium nitrate fertilizer and one gallon of stove oil and dump a few bags of gravel on top and then set the shit off and we'll positively ventilate anything that should be in the way of the blast.

The death machine is already made. I would have sent you pictures, but you would be nasty enough to trace them back to the developer and then to me, so I shall describe my masterpiece to you. The nice part of it is all the parts can be bought on the open market with no questions asked.

One batch bat one bat pow clock. Oh, one battery powered clock will run for approximately one year. One photoelectric switch, two copper leaf springs, two six volt car batteries, one battery powered

one flashlight bulb and reflector, one mirror, two 18-inch cardboard tubes, black with shoe polish inside and out. Does anyone know why you would need a mirror for a bomb? Just in case you want to, like, see yourself when you put it down or something? Look how cool you look with your Zodiac outfit on? So the explosive he described was the fertilizer bomb, but this is a battery-powered clock, photoelectric switch. This sounds like...

more of an electrocution thing because there's no actual actual accelerant unless i'm missing something in that description of you have a clock a switch two copper springs car batteries flashlight bulb one isn't isn't the ammonium nitrate fertilizer and stuff like that is this the same thing he's describing the back of nitrate and that this stuff like the uh battery powered clock and stuff i think that's the machinery and then this is the chemical uh the

The ammonium nitrate fertilizer is the chemical component. Yeah, so that's your accelerant. That's your actual blast. I guess this is a trigger mechanism. I guess he's going to describe the rest of it in a second. But this is some kind of electrical mechanism. So after describing that, he says, the system checks out from one end to the other in my test. What you do not know is whether the death machine is at the site or whether it is being stored in my basement for future use.

I think you do not have the manpower to stop this one by continually searching the roadsides looking for this thing, and it won't do to reroute and reschedule the buses because the bomb can be adapted to new conditions. Have fun! By the way, it could be rather messy if you try to bluff me. P.S. Be sure to print the part I marked out on page 3 or I shall do my thing.

To prove that I am the Zodiac, ask the Vallejo cop about my electric gun site, which I used to start my collecting of slaves. Yeah, I looked up about the electric gun site and I could not find any information, but I'm assuming the Vallejo cops or police department, like that was something significant to them, but I couldn't find any information on it, so I don't know.

Yeah, so to start the collecting of slaves would have been the first murder. Yeah. Isn't that the murder when he said he used the flashlight? Yeah. He said that he used the black in the middle of the bulb burn. Yeah. So is that what he means by electric gun sight, maybe? Yeah, maybe, but he had published letters previously with that information in it as well. Yeah, that wouldn't be proven of anything. Is he just resurfacing information that's already been established? I don't know. I assume that it was new information, but I couldn't find anything on it, so I'm not 100% sure. Yeah.

December 20th of 1969, this is the letter to Melvin Belly. So, on the first anniversary of the Lake Herman Road murders, a letter arrived to Melvin Belly from the Zodiac Killer. To verify his identity, the Zodiac included a piece of Paul Stein's shirt. Dear Melvin, this is the Zodiac speaking. I wish you a happy Christmas. The one thing I ask of you is this. Please help me. I cannot reach out for help because of this thing in me...

because of this thing in me won't let me. I am finding it extremely difficult to hold it in check. I am afraid I will lose control again and take my ninth and possibly tenth victim. Please help me, I am drowning. At the moment, the children are safe from the bomb because it is so massive to dig in and the trigger mech requires much work to get it adjusted just right, but if I hold back too long from no nine, I will lose complete all control of myself and set the bomb up. Please help me, I cannot remain in control for much longer.

So I don't know how you boys feel about that, but to me that just sounds like a bunch of bullshit. It doesn't seem like this is genuine being genuine or anything at all. It's just once again trying to cause a bit of a panic. I don't think this is a situation where he's suffering from this demon inside of him. I think it's all just part of his game.

Yeah, the reason I mentioned this letter earlier is because if you did, if someone did say that the person who called into the talk show was the Zodiac Killer, then this letter makes sense as to why he would be in a position where he would call and say he needs help and then send a letter that says that wasn't me on the show. Because there's like, he has some level of schizophrenia that's causing, you know, both sides of his mind to kind of compete against each other or conflict.

you know, some kind of mental disorder that causes that. So maybe this letter could be a manifestation of it. But I think the more than likely solution is what you said, that this is all just like, oh, the police want to think I'm some troubled person who has this condition. And so just a troll, similar to the slaves thing.

Yeah. It's also worth noting that this is like, I think one of the first times he's reaching out to people outside of the police department and outside of the, you know, the media, like the newspapers. This is like Melvin Belly is a attorney and he, I feel like the Zodiac Killer would have only known about him because he appeared on that talk show as a co-host.

um, during that segment or whatever. So I feel like now he's reaching out to people, even just loosely connected to the case. Um, so he's trying to get, uh, into as many people's lives and, and start trolling them as much as possible as well. Um, yeah, I, I agree with you guys though. I don't think that this is genuine by any means. I don't think, I think it's the troll. Yeah, I agree. So this next one is the one that I find to be, uh,

Very interesting. You take it then, because that last one was so short. Yeah, so this was on April 20th of 1970, so this is the My Name is Cipher. A letter was sent to the San Francisco Chronicle with the Z-13 Cipher claiming to contain the Zodiac's name. It wasn't until years later that French engineer Fecal Zerroi claimed to have cracked the cipher, with it apparently saying, My name is Kerr. This is close to Lawrence Kerr's

K, who is a suspect in the Zodiac murders. It is important to note the accuracy of this is disputed. In the letter, he claims to have killed 10 people, even more if his bus bomb worked, but it had been a dud. In the letter, he depicts a new bomb setup. This is the Zodiac speaking. By the way, have you cracked the last cipher I sent you? My name is cipher.

I am mildly serious as I am mildly Saris as to how much money you have on my head. Now, I hope you do not think that I am the one who wiped out that blue meanie with a bomb at the cop station. Even though I talked about killing school children with one, it just wouldn't do to move in on someone else's territory. There's more glory in killing a cop than a Sid because a cop can shoot back. I have killed 10 people to date.

It would have been a lot more except that my bus bomb was a dud. I was swamped out by the rain we had a while back. The new bomb is set up like this. P.S. I hope you have fun trying to figure out who I killed. And then he drops like schematics in here to like a design he came up with.

Yeah, another bomb, like, diagram slash schematics, like you said. Just a quick note, you said Lawrence K. That was my own typo, it would appear. It's Lawrence Kane. Yeah. That's the suspect, instead of Lawrence K. So, it would have had to be he got two letters wrong in the My Name Is.

Yeah. My name is K-A-Y-R, which is K-A-Y-R. That's what the cipher apparently comes out as. And the closest suspect that matches that kind of name is Lawrence Kane, K-A-N-E.

But again, it's like, I don't believe in that. I don't believe in it because, like, again, I don't think he actually would have included his name or details anywhere in the ciphers. I think if he found out the police had a suspect that wasn't him, he's the type of guy to just be like, that's me. Like, you know, to make them chase some other random guy. It's super possible, but as we get to the Kane profile, I think there's a lot that lends credibility to it actually just being him. At least from what I remember. Like, I thought...

Like, to me, a lot of what Kane was... I'll just wait. I'll just wait. He's getting excited. We can all go over what we think, but to me, Kane was always the one that stood out as the most probable. But maybe I'll change my mind as we keep going.

You really hate Kane. I don't know. It just, everything seemed to make sense. April 28th, 1970, the dragon letter to San Francisco Chronicle. Just over a week later, another letter was received. The letter was in a Jolly Roger brand card depicting a character riding a dragon. And the card says, sorry to hear your ass is a dragon. I don't know what this is even dragging. Like your ass. Yeah. Oh, right. Fucking boomer. Yeah.

A similar card can actually be seen in a news interview with Brian Hartell, the survivor of the Lake Berry Esser attack. So there was a news interview with Brian Hartell and in it, like they showed all the, you know, cards that he received while he was recovering in the hospital. And there is actually like a very eerily similar drawing on the card. I'm not sure if these cards were just popular at the time or what. And I'm not sure what this even really insinuates. I doubt he stabbed himself and then his girlfriend. Yeah.

So I'm not sure if this is unintentional or what, but it's just, I don't know. I thought it was an interesting note. And the note, the actual letter says, if you don't want me to have this blast, you must do two things. One, tell everyone about the bus bomb with all the details. Two, I would like to see some nice Zodiac buttons wandering about town. Everyone else has these buttons like P.

peace sign black power melvin eats blubber etc well it would cheer me up considerably if i saw a lot of people wearing my button please no nasty ones like melvin's what a loser thank you zodiac please don't be mean to me guys i'm trying my best out here what also just a real quick note what is melville melville eats blubber i found the pin i imagine it's a political thing like an election yeah it's probably something political

Yeah, so he wanted people to wear Zodiac buttons around town as a sign of exerting power and control over people, obviously, and getting the recognition that he desperately wanted. And this is what kind of upsets me about this case, because we kind of gave it to him. You know what I mean? Like, there's movies about him now. We're doing a fucking podcast about him. He kind of got what he wanted, which kind of fucking sucks when you think about it. I guess. He's still dead, though.

he's still lost in the end yeah true unrelated to the Zodiac case but look at I googled Melville eats blubber apparently it's about Herman Melville the guy who wrote Moby Dick and it was apparently a counterculture thing against the book Moby Dick I guess I don't know why they had beef with him over that

Well, maybe it was just, oh, you mean the people... I assume that he only knew about it just because it was... Yeah, yeah, that's why I'm sure he only knew about it. I'm like, why did they make that, though? Fuck Moby Dick, I guess. Sorry, I'm just unconnected, but continue. Who knows? I didn't expect Moby Dick to be loosely connected with the Zodiac.

Two months later, the Zodiac sent another letter to the San Francisco Chronicle, upset that people in the San Francisco Bay Area were not complying with his polite request to wear nice Zodiac buttons. He notes that due to the time of the year, he's promised to punish them by targeting a school bus was not possible because of school holidays.

But he would punish them eventually in another way. He also claims to have shot a man sitting in a parked car with a .38 firearm. .38mm firearm. But I couldn't find any confirmation on that. .38mm is like an anti-aircraft artillery shell. It could have been that. He rolled up on someone with a howitzer aimed at their window. That's actually some Wile E. Coyote shit. Yeah.

I don't know anything about guns you're gonna have to fact check me on that so so you see how it says 0.38 right so that is in relation to one like like it's it's 0.38 away from being one so in America guns are married calibers are by inches so that means it was 0.38 of an inch

Gotcha. Like the actual size of the bullet. Whereas in millimeters, which is what like European rounds are, 38 millimeters, like, like a AC-130 shell. Like, yeah.

Yeah, the Zodiac Killer had air support. I'll punish him in another way, I just got my chopper gunner killstreak. Yeah, wait, what is his killstreak, Eddie? Was that like 8 here? If he's at 10, he's definitely got his pay blow, right? He's sending a predator missile, yeah. Hey, if he had hardline, then he did have his AC-130, so maybe that's what he was on about. The world's first COD player, IRL.

He includes the fourth and final Z-32 symbol cipher. So this is the very last cipher and a map of San Francisco and vicinity, like the area around it, I think. Claiming to lead to where a bomb is set and giving the police till next fall to dig it up. No bomb was ever found. The Z-32 was unable to be broken at the time as it had 29 different characters for the 32 symbol cipher. Again, Zerau, the French, I think it was French code breaker from before.

engineer from before, claim to have cracked the cipher, which apparently reads Labor Day, find 45.069 north, 58.719 west. So those are obviously directions. Following these coordinates on the Earth's magnetic field, it lands close to a school not far from South Lake Tahoe.

which would align with the Zodiac's threats to target a school bus. And of course it's in the area. So that seems like too much of a coincidence to, you know, not be true. It accidentally gives a, you know, a date and a location nearby. Yeah. Yeah. But I wonder why it didn't, it didn't go off. Why, why he didn't like go through with this plan. Maybe he just couldn't get the bomb to work or maybe he got distracted or maybe. I think there was probably just never a bomb in the first place. He was just making these threats to scare people.

He seemed to have some knowledge of bomb making though. Yeah, some like rudimentary knowledge of it that I feel like it doesn't mean that he's making it. You'd still have to make it, which is a very difficult component.

I'll also say guys like this who like to see a panic, not to pour more gas on the Unabomber is the Zodiac killer fire. But Ted Kaczynski did make several bombs. And then in one of his letters, he threatened to blow up an airplane leaving the Los Angeles airport and it never happened. And then later he was like, oh, I never had any intention to. I just wanted to rile people up. So fully possible that this was all just again. So to put on a show for him.

Or maybe he did plant the bomb or whatever and buried it and it just never went off and it's still out there somewhere because he sucks at making bombs. I think it would have been found by now. I'm confident they probably would have dug at those coordinates and everything nearby.

maybe he got the coordinates wrong like he put those coordinates down but it was completely wrong and he was in the wrong area he misspelled the coordinates yeah i think we need to i obviously i i hate to say it but he's probably a smart a smart guy um but we should treat him like a stupid idiot just to take some of the power back i think i agree well look at this dumb guy doesn't know how numbers work idiot idiot

Doesn't know direct- Can't make a bomb. Nerd! Nerd! Oh, oh, you like ciphers? You like puzzles, idiot? Stupid. Yeah, it's fucking- Lame. Fucking Boy Scout shit. This is the Zodiac speaking. I have become very upset with the people of San Fran Bay Area. They have not complied with my wishes for them to wear some nice Zodiac buttons. Sad face. I promise to punish them if they did not comply by annihilating a full school bus.

He almost spelt bussy there. B-U-S-S. Thank you. But now school is out for the summer, so I punished them in another way. I shot a man sitting in a parked car with a .38. .38 caliber. Ah, look at you. Zodiac 12. San Francisco PD 0. Wait, so now he's up to 12?

Yeah, I think he's just making this shit up. It's not right. It's not accurate. I think what happened, I think what happened, you remember how earlier I said I feel like the killings are a means to an end? I think he got five kills and then he got what he wanted. Everyone was talking about who he might be, deciphering codes, having talk shows about him, right? So I think all he needs to do now is just sit at home and write letters every now and then where he's like, oh, I've killed three more. I've killed five more. I've killed six more. And people believe it. And just send those off. Yeah.

And it's enough. Yeah. Oh, he doesn't even need to do the work anymore. Yeah, exactly. He could just say he's killed more people and he gets the results he wants. Yeah. I mean, yeah, potentially. That's interesting. I've never considered that. Um, the map coupled with this code will tell you where the bomb is set. You have until next fall to dig it up. And then nothing ever happened with that. Okay.

Well, that was weird anyway. That concludes the ballpark of the Zodiac story. Is it still out there in San Francisco somewhere? Maybe. We'll find out one day, I guess.

So, on July 24th of 1970, Kathleen Johns is considered a potential victim of the Zodiac Killer, although this has not been definitively proven. On March 22nd of 1970, while driving on Highway 132 near Patterson, California, Johns experienced car trouble when a stranger signaled for her to pull over due to a wobbling wheel.

He offered assistance, but after she resumed driving, the wheel completely detached. The stranger then persuaded Johns to accept a ride with him. However, she soon sensed something was amiss when he started to drive to isolated areas. He then allegedly went on to threaten her verbally for two hours. Johns managed to escape and sought help at a local police station where she identified the Zodiac from a wanted poster as her abductor.

Her car was later discovered burned. Johns described the man as around 30 years old, 5 foot 9 inches tall, weighing 160 pounds, with short dark hair, heavy rimmed glasses, and dark clothing. While she claimed her life was threatened during the ordeal, the police report lacks specific details, leading to disputes over its accuracy.

However, the San Francisco Chronicle received a letter on July the 24th of 1970 where the Zodiac claims responsibility for this interaction. Quote, this is the Zodiac speaking. I am rather unhappy because you people will not wear nice Zodiac buttons. What a loser.

He won't shut up about the fucking buttons. So I now have a little list, starting with the woman and her baby that I gave a rather interesting ride for a couple hours. No, he did not spell hours like that. H-O-W-E-R-S. Hours. For a couple hours one evening, a few months back, that ended in my burning her car where I found them.

Okay. I don't know. I don't know about that one. I don't think he would have known about it.

Okay, hold on. I have no idea, but it just doesn't make any sense for him. It doesn't make any sense for him to suddenly go from like wearing the garb, driving up to people and shooting them to then be like, oh, I'm going to sabotage a woman's car and then I'm going to drive her around for a couple hours, supposedly not get a chance to kill her. And then she gets away. Like, I don't know.

But again, with the Paul Stein murder, there was such a deviation from what he would normally do in that situation as well. It's like he was very random with how he did stuff. What if this letter could be a copycat, right? Because enough letters have come out at this point that someone can just claim to be the Zodiac and then follow the way he writes his letters because they've been published in the paper. Or...

What if this may be pushing it a little bit, but if the Zodiac is just like farming, I was about to say farming engagement. I'm truly, I'm truly YouTube brain. Yeah. I'm too far gone. I need to be put down. If he, if he is just farming publicity, then maybe he heard about this case in the paper that was linked to him. So he writes a letter like, yep, that was me. I'm still out there still hunting.

Yeah, except she, I mean, she also positively ID'd him to the wanted poster. That came before the letter, though. So it was already circulating in the papers as a Zodiac attempted killing, and then the killer takes credit for it. Or someone takes credit claiming to be the Zodiac killer. Yeah. Also, again, weird that he didn't try to kill her. Like, she was vulnerable, obviously. Yeah.

I mean, he's in situations where he pulls guns on people, has them tie each other up, stabs them. Like, you know, he goes a lot more intense. Because how does she say she got away? Threaten her verbally? Managed to escape and got to a police station. Yeah, I believe she, like, hopped out of the car or something like that. I feel like he would just... I feel like he'd just shoot her before she got away. I'm not saying he'd be successful at shooting her, as we've seen, but...

I don't know. But again, the guy changes up his M.O. every time. Constantly, yeah. Yeah, so I don't know. It's weird. That's a weird one. This is July 26, 1970. Little list letter. So it was two days after the Kathleen Johns letter, the Zodiac sent another one to the San Francisco Chronicle talking about the ways he would torture his slaves in paradise. At the end of the letter, he provides a clue relating to Mount Diablo code, which is in reference to the button.

Letter above where he claims to have planted a bomb. This is the Zodiac speaking. Being that you will not wear some nice buttons, how about wearing some nasty Zodiac buttons? Or any type of Zodiac buttons that you can think up. If you do not wear any type of buttons, I shall, on top of everything else, torture all 13 of my slaves that I have waiting for me in paradise. Some I shall tie over anthills and watch them scream and twitch and squirm. Others shall have pine splinters driven under their nails and then burned.

Others shall be placed in cages and fed salt beef until they are gorged, then I shall listen to their pleas for water and I shall laugh at them. Others hang by their thumbs and burn in the sun, then I rub them down with deep heat to warm them up. Others I shall skin them alive and let them run around screaming, and all billiard players I shall have them play in a darkened dungeon cell with crooked cues and twisted shoes. Yes, I shall have great fun inflicting the most delicious of pain to my slaves.

SFPD 0 Zodiac 13. Okay. Do you want me to stop there? I hate this guy. I just, no, no, no. Continue in a second. I just hate this guy so much. Just writing letters to the police like, oh, you all don't like my buttons? Well, guess what? Those people I killed, they don't get any water. And I watch and I laugh. Well, he's trying to go for like whimsy unhinged approach. He's like Dr. Seussing this. Yeah.

I don't think he's killing anyone at this point I think he's just like gloating and having fun I think uh I think he goes fucking wild on the Dr. Seuss shit in this next paragraph it becomes pretty fucking weird

Okay. Continue. As someday it may happen that a victim must be found, I've got a little list. I've got a little list of society offenders who might well be underground, who would never be missed, who would never be missed. This is the pest. Wow. This is the pestilential nuisances who write for autographs, all people who have flabby hands and irritating laughs, all children who are up in dates and implore you with I'm plat, all

All people who are shaking hands shake hands like that. And all third persons who, with unspoiling, take those who insist they'd none of them be missed, they'd none of them be missed. There's the banjo serenader and the others of his race and the piano organist, I got him on the list. All people who eat peppermint and fomf it in your face, they would never be missed, they would never be missed. And the idiot who praises with enthusiastic tone of centuries but this in every country but his own.

And the lady from the provinces who dressed like a guy who doesn't cry and singularly abnormally the girl who never kissed. I don't think she would be missed. I'm sure she won't be missed. And that nice impriest that is rather rife, the judicial homerist, I've got him on the list. All funny fellows, comic men and clowns of private life. They'd none of them be missed. They'd none of them be missed.

An uncompromising kind of whatchamacallit thingamabob and likewise well nevermind and tut tut tut tut and what's his name and you know who but the task of filling up the blanks I'd rather leave up to you. But it really doesn't matter whom you place upon the list for none of them be missed. None of them be missed. P.S. The Mount Diablo code concerns radians and number inches along radians. That's a lot of the rhyme there. Yeah.

That's just like fucking full-blown lunacy Finnegan's Wake type shit. Is it fake lunacy though? Like he's playing into it? I 100% think so, yeah. I think he's too good at being insane. You know?

Like, it's not like every letter is like this. It's like he switches in and out of this whenever he wants. It's like, it's not uncontrollable. Obviously he's a fucking lunatic. He's killing people. Yeah, evil, evil person. But that doesn't mean he's like, yeah, but if people use the word insane. Yeah. People use the word insane as too much of like an excuse almost of like thought processes or ideas behind actions. He's certainly evil, of course, but that doesn't mean he's crazy per se.

Yeah, definitely. I think he's fully aware of everything he's doing and I think it's all just part of his show that he's trying to put on. Do you think he killed anyone after the first five? Nope, I do not think so. I'm unsure. I don't know. I can't point one way or the other. I'm not sure about the woman we just talked about with the abduction. Yeah, that one's weird. Either way on that.

Um, he goes for, he goes from this fucking Dr. Seuss lunacy that whatever that is, uh, and then immediately goes back into like talking about the Mount Diablo code and stuff like that. Like this is all obviously just a giant game to him.

October 5th, 1970, the Pace postcard to the San Francisco Chronicle arrives and he claims to now have 13 victims. There are 13 hole punches in the letter, also referencing the 13 victims. It's worth noting that the score tally on the previous letter also stated that he had 13 victims. It says, Dear editor, you'll hate me, but I've got to tell you, the pace isn't any slower. In fact, it's just one big 13th. Some of them thought it was horrible.

Zodiac. P.S. There are reports city police pig cops are closing in on me. F.K. I'm crack proof. What is the price tag now? And this is an interesting one because it's made entirely out of like newspaper clipping. So there's no handwriting or anything like that. I'm not sure how they were able to confirm that it was directly him or not, but.

it's yeah i don't know it seems like at this point there's not a ton of like sure when he sends in the clippings of that the cab driver's shirt i get it but other than that like i don't know what the vetting process is this yeah the guy you know yeah this is considered to be from him though like yeah wide wildly so they must have they must have an idea and then october 27th

This is a Halloween card. The Zodiac Killer then mailed a Halloween card depicting a skeleton and a pumpkin to the San Francisco crime reporter at the Chronicle, Paul Avery, who

Who's played by Robert Downey Jr. in the Zodiac movie. Likely due to the fact that Paul Avery was frequently writing articles about the Zodiac Killer at the time. And on the bottom right of the card, there are also three symbols. One unknown, one Z, like the letter Z, and the Zodiac symbol. On the card also, he writes out the word paradise again and writes around it with by fire, by gun, by knife, by rope.

and then slaves through the middle. So he's saying that he's going to collect these slaves through these means, through these four means, although I don't think he's ever lit anyone on fire, at least as far as I know, and then deliver them to his paradise, basically. What's the Halloween card say? From your secret pal, I feel it in my bones, you ache to know my name, and so I'll clue you in. But then why spoil...

the game me why spoil the game yeah yeah huh which which is a fuck did he custom make that card why would there be a card that's a weird card that was a weird card before he had all the paradise and slave stuff oh is it meant to be like uh is it meant to be like uh i i know they do it for like valentine's day where you send anonymous like a secret santa thing yeah but for halloween yeah yeah so weird fucking skeleton

He clearly was having a lot of fun with like finding these cards and stuff. Yeah. I can't imagine this guy at like a CVS, like going through the aisles like "Ah, I love this one." "Oh, I found the perfect one." Like Macy's Day. That's where they need to be looking for this guy, the Hallmark section.

The symbols down the bottom of this card, there's a Z, which I assume means Zodiac, and then the Zodiac symbol itself, which we've come to know by this point. And then the third symbol is like this little V with dots around it.

I have no idea what that is. It looks almost Nordic, the way it's like strong lines, but then there's not a lot of dots in Nordic, I don't think. I doubt this is like a real symbol from something. I'm sure he's just made this up. Well, actually, wait, I was just thinking about it. When was the bomb thing? That was like end of 1970 or middle of 1970, I think. Let me scroll up. The threat of the bomb, the first one? Yeah, I think this was still... It was November 9th of 1969.

Okay, and they were saying that the bomb was around the Mount Diablo area. I'm pretty sure that he said that. What if this is a clue towards where the bomb is set in the Mount Diablo area? Maybe it's like the silhouette of the mountain ranges or something. You need to be looking at the mountains from a certain angle to find those dots lining up with it to find the bomb. That is an interesting point.

Look at you, the detective. Is there a Mount Diablo in California? There is. Yeah, the Mount Diablo range, I'm pretty sure. Yep, yep. Wow, look at you, man. Hmm, could be something. Yeah, that just came to me because they look like mountain peaks to me, the little... At this point, it's been two years since the initial threat, but like you said, maybe the bomb's still out there. Yeah, yeah.

I think he said that it was going to explode this coming fall or something like that. In April 28th of 1970, he does the one talking about the whole Labor Day, like giving the location and all that. So 11 months later is when this letter shows up. Yeah, but I remember, I mean, there's been so much information. Yeah, after summer break, he said it'd blow up in the fall.

Yeah, in the fall. So is, I don't know. It should have gone off by now because this is now into the spring, but maybe it didn't. Maybe the bomb's still there. Okay. Okay. I was just going to say it's October fall. I guess not.

Um, alright, so March 13th, 1971. Oh, wait, wait, wait, sorry, I was looking at the wrong date. You're right, October is in the fall. So I was looking at the March 13th down there, down here, and getting confused. Uh, no, you're right, this did get sent Halloween. So yeah, that does kind of place it in late fall timeline. So yeah, maybe. If he's still, like, going along with the bomb thing, then this could potentially be a clue to the bomb to some degree. Yeah, yeah. Okay, I see, that does make sense with the timeline. Huh.

We may have cracked something. We might be able to find the bomb now. Imagine you just got this right on the money. They go there, check it, and it's the bomb. And it has DNA evidence of who the Zodiac was. Everything gets confirmed. Picture of the Zodiac killer on it. He left his driver's license.

You know who we need to collaborate with now? The fucking GeoGuessrWizard guy. He needs to find this mountain range. Show him that drawing and he'll be like, well clearly this is 8th Avenue on. I know exactly where this is in Mount Diablo range. I've looked at it multiple times actually. It's right here.

This just in, a freak accident, a YouTuber in New Zealand blew up last week. New Zealand? Or yeah, you're in Australia, Australia, sorry. What the fuck? I'm sorry, all you un-sea people, I get confused. They got the wrong guy. They got the wrong guy. Some poor guy in New Zealand got hit.

All right. So continuing on March 13, 1971. So that is a few months later, five months later. In this letter, he sent it to the Los Angeles Times, which we've never heard of from before. So he's branching out. Zodiac killer now claims to have 17 victims. In this letter, he calls the police the Blue Meanies. I mean, come on, man. Which is a term connected to Yellow Submarine, a fictional army of beings who allegorically represent all the bad people in the world. And he says...

This is the Zodiac speaking. Like I have always said, I am crack-proof. If the blue meanies are ever going to catch me, they had best get off their fat asses and do something. Because the longer they fiddle and fart around, the more slaves I will collect for my afterlife. I do have to give them credit for summoning across my riverside activity, but they are only finding the easy ones. There are a hell of a lot more down there. The reason I'm writing to the Times is this. They don't bury me on the back pages like some of the others. SFPD 0...

zodiac 17 plus so now he doesn't even know how many he's killed maybe may like not to play not to give him more credit than he deserves and i still mostly believe that he only killed five people but he did say in that last letter he's no longer going to announce specific killing so maybe you know i mean how many like homeless people die and it goes unreported all the time or you know

Like there's accidents, so to speak, that don't get connected. Maybe he was killing more people during this time. Who knows? Yeah. And he, yeah, like you said, he did say he was going to stop reporting it. Um, it's possible, I guess. I don't know.

I feel like he would be able to help himself. I still think he just killed five. I still think he just killed five, because I also don't think he could help himself. But it is possible. That mention about down at Riverside, the police stumbling across my Riverside activity, maybe there was a local bodies found or whatever, that the murderer never got caught. Because a lot of murders in big cities, especially back then, go unsolved. Could be. I could take this next part. So...

On March the 22nd of 1971, so this is just about a week after, a little over a week after the last letter, while not making any direct connections and also while not being definitively attributed to the Zodiac by law enforcement, this letter seems to make claims as to the disappearance of Donna Lass, a 25-year-old woman who went missing six and a half months in the Lake Tahoe area prior to the postcard arriving.

The postcard itself being sent to Paul Avery. The postcard, again, has cutouts from newspapers with the message created that read, quote, peek through the pines past Lake Tahoe areas. It was mailed six and a half months after the disappearance of a woman named Donna Lass. Yeah. So that's what I read. I don't know how it directly connects to Donna Lass, but that's what people seem to believe. It's him.

Maybe that case was very prolific at the time. Yeah, he's gloating about another victim, maybe. The notes, the postcard seems to have sought victim 12 and then peeked through the pines past Lake Tahoe. So maybe that was just a very public thing at Lake Tahoe at that time. The disappearance of Donna Lass and he's just saying it was me.

um but again it could be it could be something completely unrelated and he had he's just it was during the time and went to paul avery so that's what people lead to believe why people leave to believe it may be connected yeah um interesting okay and i'll take this next one too because it's short on the 29th of january of 1974 so this is like three years after

um the last letter supposed the last definitive letter that was sent to the los angeles times and it's been it's been a while yeah it's been a minute yeah so this is the exorcist letter that was sent to the san francisco chronicle nearly three years after the lake tahoe postcard the zodiac sent a letter and now claimed to have 37 victims in total the included poem appears to be an original creation and does not appear to be from any work of fiction

Here's the poem. I saw and think The Exorcist was the best satirical comedy that I have ever seen. Signed, Yours truly, he plunged himself into the billowy wave and an echo arose from the suicide's grave. Tit willow, tit willow, tit willow. P.S. If I do not see this note in your paper, I will do something nasty, which you know I'm capable of doing.

Me, 37, SFPD, 0. Three years pass and he's added about 20 onto the count. Also, he's not using the Zodiac symbol anymore. Oh. He did misspell truly, though, in satirical and comedy, so maybe this is him. I don't know. It's likely. Maybe.

I don't know. Yeah, and then that's basically it. There was a few more letters after that that he didn't sign as the Zodiac. He would call himself the Red Phantom and stuff like that. Those ones are disputed. They're not known for sure if it was actually the Zodiac killer sending them, but they are

They talked about it a fair bit. And one of the lead investigators at the San Francisco Homicide Police Squad, whatever you want to call them, police department, Dave Tosche, does stand by that some of the letters after that are actually from him. And they were confirmed by forensics, like handwriting analysis. But it's not known for sure, I don't think. That was the last situation where...

The Zodiac Killer inserted himself into the conversation. That 29th January 1974 exorcist letter. Beyond that, it's all just up in the air. Like, no one knows for sure. Nothing happened after that point, really. So, I guess now we can talk about the potential suspects and theories and stuff like that. Starting with... Let's just go over... Let's just knock out a few quick ones. Darlene...

which was the, um, victim from the second killings where, uh,

Independence Day killings. She had two husbands. Well, she had an ex-husband and a current husband at the time who were both potential suspects, but they were both quickly ruled out because they both had alibis. And then the next big one was Arthur Lee Allen, which is probably the one most people are familiar with, I have to imagine. He's the prime suspect in many people's eyes. He's the one I always thought it was.

Yeah, he's the one that I always thought it was as well. So he was born 18th December 1933 and is often considered a prime suspect in the Zodiac case due to several compelling connections. At the time of Sherry Jo Bates' murder on October 30th 1966, though the Zodiac's involvement remains unproven but suspected, Alan, an elementary school teacher in California, took sick leave on November 1st, claiming to have been in the area where the murder occurred.

So that was another murder that's not directly attributed to the Zodiac, but like looking back, he was in the area at the time. So there's, that may have been his first murder.

Additionally, shortly after the murder, a desk was found at the RCC campus bearing a scratched poem that some believe may reference Sherry's killing, potentially linking it to the Zodiac. These circumstances, among others, have led to speculation about Alan's involvement in the Zodiac case. Alan... This is one that I found very fucking interesting and I think it's pretty wild. Alan received a watch for Christmas from his mother in 1967. The watch...

had the label Zodiac on it which I think was the brand of the watch with the same circle with a cross symbol that Zodiac the brand I guess would use so I mean yeah that's pretty weird I also don't know how people didn't make the connection I was just about to say oh there's a brand called Zodiac that has that symbol

Well, I don't know how the brand themselves wouldn't say something about it. Like, hey, he's infringing on our copyright. Use something else, Buster. Actually, if you look at Zodiac watches, like, right, not, okay, hold on, hold on. I'm sure they're great watches and I'm not meaning to imply them in anything that's happened, of course. But if you look up Zodiac watches right now, that's still their logo. That's like their... I cannot believe they didn't rebrand that. That's actually crazy. Yeah, I kind of want one now.

Maybe it was the CEO of Zodiac at the time. He was just going completely wild. Yeah, the Australian guy saying that for the CEO listening, not the two good American boys who know better. Anyway. Maybe it was a marketing move. Like the marketing department came to him like, you got to go out there and start killing. It's going to be great for sales.

I never, yeah, yeah. I had thought about this before, but yeah, like on every Zodiac watch is just that symbol, the cross and the circle. Yeah. Yeah. And he had one. He was definitely, uh, police like saw him having one. So it's not contested. You'll see it from his mother in Christmas. I mean, with all already with like the connections, it's pretty wild. Um,

And so a friend of Alan's, Don Chaney, claimed that Alan would make disturbing claims to his friend.

Such as...

Don claimed that these statements were made to him under the premise of Alan writing a novel. So he was saying that Alan was saying all this stuff. I don't think I believe Don because why on God's earth, when the killings were happening, did he not think this was good to take the police? And then afterwards he's like, oh yeah, all that killing stuff. Yeah. He told me he did that for a book. Right.

Like, what? Well, I did read that he did go to the police as soon as the murder started happening, but they didn't take him seriously. No. Wait, wait, wait, wait. Hold on, hold on, hold on. Don went to the police and said he says that he's taunting them with the Zodiac letters or whatever.

And the police were like, yeah, yeah, get in line. Yeah. Well, basically I think he went to them and said like, I've got a friend that's concerning and I want to talk about it. And they kind of just brushed him aside or took his statement and didn't worry about it.

they thought he was like just making shit up I think so he estimated the conversation took place on January 1st 1969 which was shortly after the first killings Don would eventually take these claims to the police allowing them to obtain a search warrant for Alan as a suspect of the Zodiac Killer they didn't search his home in Vallejo but instead a trailer that Alan used nearby in Santa Rosa and

and they found nothing of note. Alan is said to have had a conversation with his friend where he claimed to have a fascination with the concept of hunting people, and according to him, they would be more challenging to hunt than animals due to humans having intelligence. This is obviously a reference to The Most Dangerous Game, which was a story by Richard Connell about a man who would hunt people because man is the most dangerous game of all. So that comes up quite a bit, like that book and stuff, him liking that book. Yeah.

And in 1968, Alan was fired from his job as an elementary school teacher after being caught molesting a student. He was also dishonorably discharged from the Navy 10 years prior. He moved back in with his parents but did not have a good relationship with them. He fell into a spiral of depression which hit the worst around his birthday, December 18th and Christmas. The Lake Herman Road murders occurred on December 20th. So this fell within this kind of time frame.

Allen also owned the same type of ammunition used to kill the victims in this attack, as proven by a search warrant executed by Vallejo Police Department later on in 1991. Yeah, keep in mind, this guy was like a suspect for like 20 plus years. Yeah, yeah, a long time. And they just couldn't, they couldn't find concrete like forensic evidence. They couldn't find conclusive forensic evidence tying him to the murders.

Which is a shame because there's just so many fucking compelling and, I don't know, just over-the-top evidence here that feels way out, like,

Like, impossible to just be a coincidence. Like this. The Blue Springs attack occurred a mere four minutes from Alan's residence. Notably, Alan had a friend attempting to sell a brown Corvair, which was a vehicle he occasionally drove. One of the survivors, Mike, recalled the vehicle involved in the attack as brown, possibly a Corvair. Furthermore, between 1966 and 1977, Darlene Ferron worked at the International House of Pancakes

on Tennessee Street in Vallejo, which was one-tenth of a mile from Alan's home. Like, come on. How... What are the odds of that? During this time, Alan reportedly expressed admiration for a waitress from the restaurant to his friend Don Chaney. Additionally, in mid-1992, Mike identified Alan from a lineup at the Vallejo Police Department...

basically stating that's him, he's the man that shot me in a lineup of the pictures. Mike was, I believe, the victim that survived from the Independence Day shooting. Yeah. A man named Lee was also said to have been an associate of Darlene's as described by her sister and as corroborated by a police report. Arthur Allen's middle name was Lee, L-E-I-G-H, and he would often go by the name spelling it Lee, L-E-E.

Another thing to mention, isn't Darlene the one who, whenever the guy pulled up, the man said, do you know that guy? And she said, oh, never mind. Yeah, she said something like if she didn't, she would be like, no, of course not. Or something like that. But she acted unnaturally. Yeah. Hmm.

Yeah, maybe it was Lee. Maybe she didn't know him. Maybe she knew him, yeah. That's what I'm leaning towards. Alan was well-versed in the Berryessa area, often engaging in activities such as trapping, scuba diving, and camping there. That's where the stabbings took place. On the day of the Berryessa attack, Alan informed Vallejo Police Sergeant Lynch during a 1969 interview that he intended to visit Berryessa, but ultimately went to the coast instead, providing a cryptic alibi involving meeting a couple from Treasure Island, which...

with which he had spent time with though he couldn't substantiate this claim and the couple were never located for validation so his alibi was like i met this couple at the beach and hung out with them and like there was no no further like examination of that or like confirmation where were you on this day i was with other people can we meet them no no they go to their names they go to a different school they go to a different school yeah

Well, what's ominous about that was if he was the killer, he was with another couple at the time, when you think about it. So maybe he was playing a game with the police as well. Ha ha ha ha ha ha, Mr. Lee, very funny. That wasn't a joke from me. No, I know. I'm just getting more annoyed by him as this goes on. In a 1971 police interview, Alan confessed to possessing bloody knives on the day of the attack.

Weird confession. Attributing it to slaughtering a chicken. Size 10.5 shoe prints found at the crime scene matched Alan's shoe size. And during a 1991 search warrant, police discovered a foot-long knife with a sheath and rivets in Alec's possession. Though they were not compared to the victim's wounds for some reason. Like, they didn't compare them to the wounds. Well, to be fair, those wounds would have been over 20 years old at this point. And I doubt there was good forensics back then taken. Yeah, you don't think they had taken...

Photos or something? I'm sure they took photos. You still wouldn't be able to match definitively. Yeah, yeah. Fair, fair. A photo from the 70s, like, with the level of detail they were looking for back then, wouldn't have been enough to match, like, the jagged pattern on the knife with the stabs or anything. Yeah, right. But in 1971, that 1971 police interview, he did confess to possessing bloody knives on the day of the attack. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's still weird. Don't get me wrong. It's still very weird. Like, I don't know.

So the

the cabby, the cab driver, Alan had admitted that he was the Zodiac killer and would prove it by going to San Francisco and killing a cabby. After the murders, the Zodiac had mailed letters with bomb diagrams and ingredients saying that the bomb was stored in his basement where Alan lived, had a basement, which I, as I understand is, uh, irregular in California. It's not a common thing. If in the city of San Francisco, probably not.

Yeah. So him having a basement and also the Zodiac having said that he had a basement is kind of concerning. And police found handwritten diagrams of bombs with the same ingredients listed by the Zodiac. So they found him...

What the fuck? Wait, wait, wait, wait. They found handwritten diagrams for bombs in Arthur Lee Allen's basement? Yeah, that's what I've written here, so that must have been in the research that I found. What happened? Did you not remember that? There's so much research here. Hold on, hold on. There's no way. There's no way they found bomb instructions in his basement.

I'm going to lose my mind. I'm going to start throwing stuff. There was also mail order catalogs for guns, bombs, and booby traps. Alan was also a fan of the movie, The Most Dangerous Game. So he had that film there as well.

In August 1971, police detectives interviewed Allen at his place of employment in Pinole, oh, this is a really important information in my opinion, Pinole, California. The last verified Zodiac letter had been mailed in March 1971, just a few months prior. However, after this interview by police, it would be another two and a half years before the Zodiac would send in another letter. So, like, by reading it like that, it sounds like the Zodiac got spooked because they finally interviewed Allen.

this prime suspect. And so he stopped sending in letters for two and a half years. Furthermore, Allen was arrested by the Sonoma County Sheriff's Department on a charge of child molestation in 1974. The Zodiac had ridden several times in 1974, breaking his two and a half year silence. Once again, however, once he was arrested for that

for that child molestation charge, no proven Zodiac letter was ever received again after his incarceration and arrest. Like, that's so suspicious, right? Yeah, as soon as Alan gets arrested, the letters stop, yeah. Yeah, both times, twice. Like, once, sure. But both times, like, he got spooked and then the letter stopped and then he got arrested again and the letter stopped again? Like...

Come on. And that's on top of all this other evidence? Circumstantial, sure, maybe. Like, there's no forensic evidence. Hold on. This is from ZodiacKiller.com, just to further the point you made. This is a direct quote, okay? In 1991, the search warrant executed by the VPD revealed Alan had, in his basement, handwritten diagrams for bombs composed of ammonium nitrate fertilizer and gravel.

Well, there's no stove oil there, so it can't... No, no, no. He forgot the stove oil, so it can't be the same guy. That's what the police department said. He's clear of all charges. Well, he's innocent in my eyes now, except for being a child molester. Yeah, that part, yeah.

Every crime case I read, every single true crime case, the killer only gets away because the police are blind. They're like just bumbling. Oh my gosh. Okay.

Well, the main reason he was ruled out in the police's eyes was that his handwriting did not match that of the Zodiac letters. I'm going to strangle him. Whoever came to that conclusion, I'm going to get them. I can't do this anymore. That counted as forensic evidence back then, though. And also, another note is that apparently Lee was ambidextrous, so it's entirely possible that he could have written the letters with

with one hand and then all these other like in real life stuff he had bomb diagrams of the exact materials the killer was using in his basement in san francisco and they said nope the handwriting's different i was i was sold on this guy when he had the fucking watch for zodiac symbols on it i mean to be fair though to be fair like uh if you you wrote this as well this guy does not match in

any of the depictions of the Zodiac that any of the victims had given. He runs counter to all of them in a big way. Like, he's taller, he's heavier, and he looks much older. Like, much older. How tall was he?

Jackson doesn't have it written here but even just looking at his mugshot he is a lot bigger than 5'8 I know that the shoe size does match the shoe size Alan's driver's license states his height as 6' tall well I would put him in the 5'8 to 6' tall from the first victims I guess and if he slouches a bit yeah

Yep. So, Arthur Lee Allen died on August 26th, 1992, aged 58 of natural causes. The police conducted another search two days after his death. They have been secretive about what was found in the search, but were apparently looking for a videotape labeled Zed, was he? What was on the tape has never been revealed, although police have said there was no confession. I don't know why the fuck they wouldn't reveal this shit.

White Hullies found a tape titled Z. No, they were apparently looking for a videotape or label for it. We don't know if they found it or not. And it's been 30 years since that happened. I don't understand why they would be so tight-lipped about it. They probably just never found it, I'm sure.

Well, then why not just say it? Like, it's such a cold case at this point. Yeah, I know. Because you know how bad it looks for the police if the guy they talked to like five times turned out to be the killer and they just never... True. It would kind of be like a PR disaster for them. Yeah. Yeah.

Another big suspect is Richard Gakowski. Gakowski was a journalist and editor who lived in the San Francisco Bay Area in the 1960s and 70s, near where the events of the Zodiac Killer occurred. Gakowski was intentionally arrested for refusing to sign a traffic citation in 1965. He wanted to write a story on the conditions of the county jail from the perspective of an inmate.

That is where the mugshot of him originates from. However, when he became a suspect of the Zodiac murders 20 years on, records of his fingerprints were long gone. Yeah, because that just happens, apparently. That just happens. A police informant who went by the name Goldcatcher brought Gajkowski to the police's attention, having worked with him previously at the Bay Area newspaper.

According to Goldcatcher, Yakowski seemed to know too much about the Bay Area murders. He was also an editor for the Food Times newspaper in Santa Cruz, which received a letter from someone claiming to be the Zodiac Killer.

Yakowski was a trained medic in the army, which would link to the military-style boot impressions that were found at the crime scene in Lake Berryessa, and he could be trained in the quick removal of clothing, which is present at the murder of Paul Stein, where his top was removed and a piece torn off. Which I don't think is like a super difficult talent, by the way. Being able to cut clothing is kind of easy. I don't think you need to go. Yeah, but he did it really efficiently, you see.

It was that military undressing, that profession now. They're good at that. You learned that in boot camp, probably. Nancy Slover, the operator who took the call from the Zodiac in July 1969, has later said that Kikowski's voice is the closest she has ever heard to the Zodiac's voice that night. Richard Kikowski died of lung cancer in 2004, age 68. Yeah, and there's not much there apart from just the phone operator, really.

Like, all the other stuff seems really fucking weird and stupid. Yeah. I don't put a whole lot of stock in him being one of them. Or him being the Zodiac Killer. I guess his physical appearance is kind of more like what the Zodiac kind of look like, I think, compared to Arthur Lee Allen anyway. But, yeah, there's not much evidence there to support him. Uh...

Moving along here, I want to talk about the one that I, for a while, thought it was, but after hearing more from the prime suspect, yeah, I'm starting to lean towards maybe there being more evidence there. But I thought Kane made the most sense for a while. So Lawrence Kane suffered a brain injury to his left frontal lobe in 1962 after a serious car crash, and doctors diagnosed him with an inability to control his urges for self-gratification and

and was arrested several times for being a peeping Tom. He was left with paralysis on the left side of his face, and former detective Harvey Hines was convinced Lawrence Kane was involved in the Zodiac murders after he learned that Kane worked in the same building as 25-year-old nurse Donna Lass, who was abducted in Tahoe, and Hines noted a comparison between the Bay Area letters and Kane's handwriting. The sister of Darlene Farron, one of the victims, Pam Huckabee,

has stated that she believes Kane was following and trailing her sister in the run-up to the night she was murdered. Five days after the attack, Kane actually traded in his car for a different vehicle, and Kane was also living nearby to where Paul Stein was murdered. And additionally, Kathleen Johns, which was one of the potential Zodiac victims, the one that got away from the car, identified Kane as her abductor. And then, of course, the famous My Name is Cypher, a lot believed to be decrypted, saying Kane, because it looks so close.

Now, the reason why that was so compelling to me is he fits the height. He is 5'8 and some change, like almost 5'9. His physical appearance matches what everybody said about him, like from all of the stories, from the accounts, like even the police that may have encountered him leaving the night of the murder of Paul, all of it.

matches exactly what this guy looks like, plus his proximity to that cab driver, plus being identified by somebody, even if it's not like a potential victim, even if she wasn't a victim of the Zodiac. Like, it's still all very...

hard to believe it's a coincidence. Plus, having a reputation of being a peeping Tom would explain why I'd always go for teenagers at the make-out points. All of it just kind of fits that M.O. Not being able to control urges and all of that. To me, it all just... It was at a criminal record, yeah. Yeah, to me, it all just painted this...

him as someone that would very likely do this, having that frontal lobe injury and like leaving him with some kind of traumatic brain injury like that would explain like maybe his spelling being all over the place and all fucking disheveled and cattywampus. And maybe he really did have like this split personality type thing where he just had this monster inside of him that he couldn't control. It's just one of those things where everything about this guy is

sounds like what the Zodiac Killer would be to me but there's just not enough real evidence there that makes him like more convincing than Arthur Lee Allen unfortunately well not unfortunately but like Arthur Lee Allen has a lot more evidence backing it it's just Lawrence Kane's

situation makes more sense for the murders to you yeah yeah to me yeah to me yeah so something something that i just noted while reading this he was left with paralysis on the left side of his face uh i i remembered during this episode that um someone described him as having a drawl like his voice had a drawl like oh yeah could it possibly potentially be like a slur almost you know how some people after

uh, losing, you know, having paralysis on one side of their face that could impact speech maybe. Yeah, that's a really good point. That would, they probably would have an impact on the way that he speaks. That's also something that never got brought up again is that drawl.

Well, he never really talked to anyone. Wasn't that mentioned with the stabbing? With the stabbings. It's the stabbings ones, which were the only case where there was a victim left who he talked to him. Yeah, but then if it was actually him that called into the station, they would recognize a draw. Yeah, which means that it might not have been the person that called into the station. Yeah.

Yeah, interesting. But again, the previous police operator said that Richard Gajkowski's voice was the closest that she had heard. Did she ever hear Lawrence Kane's voice, though? Yeah, I would assume so. She would have been shown all of them, right? I don't have confirmation on that, but I don't see why she wouldn't have been shown all of them. Maybe he just wasn't available. I have no idea. You're probably right, though. He probably would have been shown that.

Isaiah, do you want to take Rick Marshall real quick just to give, because I know he's like a really popular theory as well. Yeah, yeah, yeah, just to knock it out. So Rick Marshall, an engineer, resided in key areas during the majority of the attacks. Notably, he lived in a basement residence just a few miles from where taxi driver Paul Steins was murdered. A detail the Zodiac would later reference when describing the location of the bomb he claimed to be constructing.

Marshall's favorite movie was The Red Phantom, and he possessed knowledge of electricity as well as being an enthusiast of ham radio, suggesting he could have technical awareness to create a bomb. And if you'll remember, that last letter that got sent to the police in 1974 that's debated if it was a Zodiac killer or not, signed it as The Red Phantom. Yeah.

However, Ken Narlow, a lead investigator, concluded that Marshall was not a viable suspect. Additionally, the fingerprints held on file of the killer, including the bloody fingerprints left on the taxi cab, did not match those of Rick Marshall. Marshall was interviewed by Crimes of the Century in 1983, saying, quote, I must have a double floating around. I hope the poor guy doesn't look like me. But the fact is, the characteristics you just mentioned fit me almost to a T.

I really am startled at the mass and accuracy of the detail. And obviously, if they had been that forthcoming about that at the time, I would have understood why they were investigating me. My innocence notwithstanding, the details do fit.

I feel like this is the Zodiac Killer because he's like, wow, you're right. That does sound like me. Maybe I did do it. He's almost convincing himself. I did kill those people. Damn. I'm a fucking fiend. What's going on here, guys? Yeah, he's like weirdly polite about it.

it take me away i deserve it like he's crying at the police's feet i must have done it one more suspect i wanted to mention that i wanted to take some more time to read about before we mentioned him in the episode is someone named gary post so a lot of you probably remember last year there were a bunch of like news articles and headlines with titles like the zodiac killer's been identified or like finally after 50 years the killer revealed uh those are

insane exaggerations, the killer was not definitively identified. Instead, a group of people called the Codebreakers, who are a bunch of retired police or detectives who worked on the case before their retirement, they determined that they believe Gary Post to be the killer, which is still pretty, you know, something to be taken into account. That's pretty serious accusations. But that doesn't mean they've 100% identified the killer.

But anyway, yeah, Gary Post was a former airman. He has a long, long history of violence. There are people who lived with him after he moved from California and lived for a while in upstate New York who said that he was incredibly violent. He'd kill animals just for fun. He's believed to be responsible in some other killings in other parts of the country. He's his own can of worms to get into. He's also dead now. He died in 2018. But...

The reasons that the codebreakers consider him to be the killer is partial DNA that was found on one of the Zodiac letters.

matches two Garys, again only partially. The way partial DNA works is if you don't have a whole sequence it can narrow down the results of who you're looking for, but I can't find information as to exactly how partial that DNA was, so it could be a match for like half the population or you know 10% the population or some big number.

The other reason is his need for violence. A lot of people attribute that. Basically, after all the information, I get why people consider him to maybe be the Zodiac Killer. Also, apparently, the name Gary works for a lot of the ciphers within the actual...

The actual Zodiac ciphers. So that's pretty good evidence, right? That the killer's name might be Gary. But also that's been debated by other people who say it only works if you kind of make it work and it doesn't, you know, exactly apply. But anyway, basically there's a lot of debate as to...

If Gary Post is it or not, if you saw the headline saying the killer's been identified, that's who they're talking about. I just wanted to mention him because now, because of all those headlines, a lot of people think Gary Post is the killer. And while I get that, and there's people far more qualified than ourselves who have said that, I still think Lee Allen's the best guy for it. I'd still place my cards there. But yeah, Gary Post is definitely someone worth mentioning.

Yeah, that's all of the biggest, I think that's all of the biggest suspects in the case. There were like 2,500 other people that the police were investigating, but these ones are always the biggest names that are brought up when talking about it. Personally, I'm on the Lee Allen train. There's just so many different elements there that just add up to him being the Zodiac Killer to me.

Other than that, I think the only other possibility for me, because I don't really buy the other three, maybe a little bit Lawrence Kane, but not so much as Alan. The only other thing is that it's just someone that completely went by unnoticed by the police and hasn't been brought up at all. I think that's entirely possible as well. Yeah. Yeah, that is definitely possible.

I don't know. I think the Zodiac Killer, like we talked about, I think he gets too much credit for being an Einstein-level genius. But he did know how much he could get away with. I think he killed a few people, probably the first five, attempted to kill seven. And then from there, he just starts gloating, taunting, and he gets the attention that he wants. Mm-hmm.

I do think Lee Allen's the most likely possibility, which explains why the Zodiac Killer completely shut up after Lee Allen went to jail. But despite all of that, it is wildly frustrating that he never got, if that is the case, it's wildly frustrating that he never got payment for it in this life. He was never prosecuted or anything. I will say the one detail that kind of shuns me away a bit

is if Lee Allen was a sexual pervert, like, you know, he got fired for like touching kids. Why wasn't any of that seen in the killings? Yeah. You would think he would act out sexually as well. Yeah. Yeah. He tied up women completely defenseless, stabbed them. And then from everything we know, did nothing to them before or after they were dead. So, um,

I don't know. Maybe it was just children that he was fascinated in. Um, so maybe he just wanted the attention of the killings and then that's where his sick fantasies came out at. Maybe that's why he talked about school buses. Uh,

I don't know, but that is the one thing that kind of makes me squint a bit at it, but I still do think Lee Allen's the most likely. I know that Gary Post, a lot of people have faith in him, but that's using... One of the biggest problems about this case is I think there is a world where we've correctly identified the Zodiac Killer if we took better care of evidence, because all of the evidence that is on file...

has been torn to pieces. There are investigators from around the country who were requesting pieces of the evidence so they could research the case themselves for fun, I guess. It was, there's cases of after police retire from the department, they would take little pieces of evidence as like souvenirs. Everything was so horribly kept together that by the time there were advancements in forensics that maybe we could get an old sample and tell, everything was way too muddled to make heads or tails of it.

So I understand out of the forensics we do have, like people bank on Gary Post being the killer. And I get that. But I don't think the evidence we do have of that is enough to take me off of the Lee Allen train. And I also think it's really frustrating that the police incompetence then let him get away with it. And police incompetence up until today lets him continue to get away with it. Yeah.

Yeah, it's a frustrating case, especially with the misspellings. I hate that guy. Yeah, he's dead. I mean, they're all dead. I think all the prime suspects are at this point. Yeah, he's almost certainly dead. Yeah.

Oh yeah, I definitely think that the Zodiac Killer is dead, which means we'll never conclusively know who the Zodiac Killer is, which is the most disappointing aspect of this whole puzzle to me, is that we'll never get a concrete answer. I don't think we will. I don't think we'll ever see it. What's wild is a lot of these cases, these high-profile cases, again, like the Unabomber or Dahmer or stuff like that, it's like they go on for so long and it's normally some

a gigantic mistake that's made that leads to them getting caught or it's something that never could have been accounted for like the guy's brother ratting him out to the police right and

It's frustrating how these people can get away with it so easily. Or at least they could before modern tech. Yeah, I was going to say, I think this is the last case of that because with the way mass surveillance works currently, there's no way... I don't think there would be a Zodiac Killer in the modern age. Yeah, good luck. I don't think that could happen. I mean, there are killers who get away with it. But it takes... You have to be so far removed from society. You have to be so...

It takes a lot more effort than it did back in the 60s. Well, no, I don't think there could be a Zodiac Killer in the sense that I don't think you'd be able to send in letters to the San Francisco Herald or whatever, quoting them like this. They would find the microfibers of the stamp and find your home address. There's no shot that would fly. Yeah. They'd have surveillance footage of the person putting the letter in the box, basically, when he's sending it off. Yeah.

like there's no way they'd be able to get you pretty good like like i said kazinsky was in the 90s and they were like using his stamps to like find microfibers of tree samples to figure out what region of the country's in 2024 you're you're toast you're not getting away with it no way yeah so i think the zodiac is the last of these he's kind really which is good uh charlie do you have any final thoughts

Uh, nothing on my end. Just another, another great adventure with the boys here going through some awful shit. Another happy, you know, fulfilling conversation.

Yeah, I think we're all in agreeance though that it's like the most likely suspect is Arthur Lee Allen. But yeah. I also don't feel bad saying that because he was at least definitely a child molester, right? So who cares? Throwing everyone on his name. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Official statement of the red thread. We don't like him. If you're going to attribute it to someone, it may as well be the child molester, right? Yeah, yeah. That's a safe out. Yeah.

Who for some reason had bomb instructions in his basement, but whatever, whatever. For some reason, yeah.

All right. That's going to do it for this week's episode of The Red Thread. We really appreciate you guys all hanging out with us and listening to this just disappointing information, really. It sucks. But at least we had fun while we did it. And we hope you guys had fun at home or you listened in. If you're listening on Spotify, just a reminder, if you follow it and rate it, that's really appreciated. It definitely helps out with discoverability on Spotify. So, yeah.

Lots of thanks to everyone who does that. And lots of thanks to everyone for just listening in general. It means so much to us and we really appreciate it. We have a blast doing this. It's a lot of fun. So we hope that comes across to you guys and you guys enjoy it as well. That's it for me. If you guys want to say anything else.

Thanks, everybody. Yeah. Thank you all so much for being here. I'm having a ton of fun with the show and it means a lot to see you guys show up and support it. So thank you. We can't say thank you enough. It means a lot. Yeah. Thank you. And fuck Lee Allen for all that child molestation shit. And also possibly being the Zodiac killer, but mainly the child stuff. Yeah. All right. Thanks, guys. I'll see you next time. Thanks, everyone. Bye-bye. Bye. Bye. Bye.

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