David Oranchak (zodiackillerciphers.com) and Nick Pelling (ciphermysteries.com) unearthed some extremely interesting information regarding the Albany letter mailed by the Zodiac Killer on August 1st 1973. The letter postmarked Albany, New York was mailed to the Albany Times Union newspaper declaring "You were wrong, I am not dead or in the hospital. I am alive and well and I'm going to start killing again. Below is the name and location of my next victim. But you had better hurry because I'm going to kill her August 10th at 5:00 pm when the shift change. Albany is a nice town". It contained a code stating "(name) Albany Medical Center this only the beginning". The Albany letter was a direct response to a New York Daily News article about the Zodiac Killer on July 22nd 1973.

The Zodiac Killer was continuing his well-worn method of constructing his communications based upon recent newspaper articles he had read. The snippet on the left from the New York Daily News carried all the ingredients to shape the response given in the Albany letter, including the reply that he was "not dead or in the hospital" and his inclusion of a cryptogram with the letter. His rebuttal came with a threat to kill a female member of the Albany Medical Center during a shift change. Based on everything we know about the Zodiac Killer and his propensity for creating terror, it is extremely likely that this chosen victim was a real individual selected from this hospital.

If the Zodiac Killer applied the same methodology he had used in the past, claiming victims such as Kathie Snoozy, Debra Furlong, Richard Radetich, Donna Lass, Cheri Jo Bates and Kathy Bilek, along with possible future victims such as Diane Kennedy Pike and Daniel Williams, then there is good reason to believe he sourced his potential victim's name from the newspaper, rather than ambling around the hospital identifying potential targets in person or trawling through a phone book. The potential target, more than likely, had been featured in the newspapers which mentioned her working at the Albany Medical Center. 

One suggestion by David Oranchak for the name of the woman in the Albany letter was Connie Shenly (as shown below), but this name (in the short format) has not been found in any relevant and recent newspaper articles prior to August 1st 1973 . As David pointed out, some of the characters in the cryptogram are less than clear, so there is margin for error when attempting to decode the cryptogram. Between Nick Pelling and David Oranchak, the name "Consuelo" was put forward as a possibility because this could be reasoned based on the first eight characters of the cryptogram and the newspaper article unearthed by David Oranchak in comments. The newspaper article from the Times Record in New York on April 20th 1973 mentions the upcoming wedding of Miss Barbara Jeanne Zonitch of Watervliet and F. Michael Consuelo on Friday, August 17th 1973. She is detailed as a graduate of Troy High School in 1965, who was working at the Albany Medical Center Hospital at the time. Although "Consuelo" is a surname in this instance, when used as a forename it is sometimes shortened to "Connie". ​The threat to kill such a woman on the latest available Friday (August 10th) before her wedding, may be something the Zodiac Killer factored into the equation. When the Zodiac Killer mailed this letter on Wednesday, August 1st (or possibly a day earlier) he had every opportunity to select Friday, August 3rd 1973, but for whatever reason chose the weekend before the wedding. Of course, this assumes many things, such as whether this woman was ever the chosen target at all. However, she did work at the Albany Medical Center, she had an upcoming wedding one week after the proposed attack, and her married name fits into 5 of the first 8 characters of the cipher, despite the remaining 4 characters of the first 12 remaining problematic (unless these 4 are not part of the name, and are a mistake connected to the word "only" in the cryptogram message, which should have originally read "this is the beginning").

Admittedly, this newspaper article was dated just over three months before the arrival of the Albany letter on August 1st 1973, so it may be difficult to argue a strong connection unless the wedding between the eventual couple, Michael and Barbara Consuelo, was featured again in the newspapers closer to August 1st 1973. It may be productive for anybody with a subscription to newspapers.com to search the newspapers in and around Albany, New York in the July of 1973, or within the New York Daily News published on July 22nd 1973, which triggered the writing of the Albany letter in the first place. 

This is a good line of thinking by Nick Pelling and David Oranchak regarding the identity of the woman threatened in the Albany letter, and it could suggest that the Zodiac Killer spent considerable time in the New York region during this time period. It is fairly obvious that a threat on a female at the Albany Medical Center by the Zodiac Killer would have been taken very seriously by law enforcement, who would undoubtedly have informed the hospital and its staff of developments, and likely upped security during this period. If Barbara Zonitch Consuelo was the target of the threat in 1973, it's very likely she is unaware of the suggestion to this day.

​The 408, 340 and 148 character ciphers of the Zodiac Killer have officially been broken, and all revealed coherent messages. The Albany cipher was also genuine, containing the message "Albany Medical Center this only the beginning". Therefore, it's reasonable to assume the opening part of the message contained the name of his target, because without a readable or genuine name the threat would lose its impact through a perceived lack of knowledge by its sender. The specificity of name, location and time undoubtedly carries greater weight from the aspect of terror, despite the fact the Zodiac Killer was unlikely to have ever followed through after giving police notice of his proclaimed intentions. If the woman in the message isn't Barbara Zonitch Consuelo, then the real target may still be found in the pages of a New York newspaper in the weeks prior to August 1st 1973.

Anna Kane (26) was found strangled to death alongside the Ontelaunee Trail in Pennsylvania on October 23rd 1988, but her killer was not identified until 2022 after a breakthrough in genetic genealogy. Male DNA was retrieved from her clothing during the initial stages of the investigation and ultimately failed to produce a match to anybody in the database. Sixteen months after her murder, in February 1990, somebody mailed a sinister letter to the Reading Eagle newspaper with intimate details about the crime and signed it from a "concerned citizen". The DNA retrieved from the saliva on the sealed part of the envelope matched the DNA from the clothing of Anna Kane, inextricably linking the sinister letter to her murder, and dispelling any notion that the communication was mailed by a hoaxer. In 2022, the genetic genealogy analysis performed by Parabon NanoLabs identified Scott Grim, who had died aged 58, only four years earlier. 

On the condition that Inspector David Toschi was correctly exonerated from having mailed the April 24th 1978 letter, it is logical to conclude that the DNA retrieved from the sealed part of this envelope was from the Zodiac Killer, when you consider the inside information that would have been required to create this communication. The 1978 letter had to be authored by either somebody from law enforcement or the murderer of taxicab driver Paul Stine, because of their intimate knowledge of the visual design of the 1969 Melvin Belli letter. There is a widespread misconception being portrayed regarding the testing of Zodiac envelopes (based around events in 2002) that all forensic DNA specialists cannot reason the pitfalls of using DNA collected from the outer surface of envelopes and stamps, believing these highly intelligent professionals are completely devoid of common sense. Nobody in their right mind would consider testing the outside of the envelopes from early Zodiac letters as a productive means to securing the DNA from the Zodiac Killer, irrespective of whether a particular individual has done so.

The arguments used by some individuals in the Zodiac community have attempted to shed doubt on the bloody fingerprints from the Paul Stine taxicab based upon the idea it was a free-for-all at the crime scene, which they have no justification or reason to believe. The same individuals (with suspects) will never give the 1978 letter fair consideration as a Zodiac letter because they know it can potentially rule their suspect out of the investigation, hence they will discredit the bloody fingerprints on the taxicab and the 1978 letter as being from the Zodiac Killer in absence of valid reasoning. Too many people continue to claim a letter is not from the Zodiac Killer because of "handwriting and tone" rather than tackle the points brought forward for its authenticity and attempt to discredit them. It would be productive for these individuals to compare the "handwriting and tone" of the July 31st 1969 trinity of communications with the Melvin Belli letter and try to reason why the tone of these letters are consistent with one another, while simultaneously explaining why the Zodiac Killer is incapable of switching the tone of a letter by design. Stating a letter's tone isn't Zodiac, is an utterly meaningless statement because the handwriting and tone of a letter is subjective to the person interpreting it. Some Zodiac researchers, who once exuded confidence in the bloody taxicab fingerprints and the existence of usable salivary amylase, immediately backpedaled and used subterfuge once they became attached to a suspect whose fingerprints and DNA were already in the system. Having a suspect in tow will inevitably cloud your judgement when investigating the Zodiac case. Not one single researcher who has a suspect in tow (whose fingerprints are on file), will ever argue that the bloody fingerprints on the taxicab of Paul Stine are Zodiac's. Every single Zodiac researcher who thinks Ross Sullivan is the Zodiac Killer will never accept any Zodiac communication subsequent to his death in 1977. They will reject the 1978, 1986, 1987, 1990 and 2001 communications irrespective of any amount of evidence you can produce, because they have already made up their mind that these communications were not authored by the Zodiac Killer. Even if they had never set eyes on these communications, they have already concluded they are hoaxes in advance. Their conclusions are preconceived through the suspect and not the available evidence.    

Knowing that we have the possibility of running the DNA from the 1978 letter through the genealogical process, why would anybody object by using the argument they are confident that the 1978 letter was written by a hoaxer based on nothing more than a cursory glance of handwriting, which is unscientific by its very nature. The statements in 2018 regarding communications from early Zodiac activity undergoing renewed testing makes little sense, when we consider that DNA has already been discovered on the 1978 letter. If investigators stand by their claim that David Toschi was cleared of any wrongdoing in the manufacture of the 1978 letter, then there should be no barrier to using the DNA found on this communication to potentially advance the case. The 1978 letter that ruled out both Arthur Leigh Allen and Lawrence Kane as being the Zodiac Killer. However, if investigators know the identity of the individual who deposited the DNA on the 1978 letter (for example, David Toachi), then it follows that they would have no current interest in pursuing this line of investigation through genealogy. The 1978 letter cannot be ruled out by handwriting, so why the apparent reluctance in pursuing this avenue to unearth the identity of the Zodiac Killer? Or maybe genealogy has been employed and nothing was found. 

You will hear or read claims that the Kathleen Johns incident, or the Donna Lass abduction/disappearance couldn't have been Zodiac because he had never abducted somebody previously (how do we know that). You will hear or read that a victim who was raped, bludgeoned or strangled to death couldn't have been Zodiac because he had never done this previously (how do we know that). These claims, again, are without foundation. Therefore, when Zodiac targeted taxicab driver Paul Stine, we could claim it wasn't him because he had apparently never done it before. The claim he killed taxicab driver Ray Davis in 1962 could be dismissed because we cannot find evidence of something similar prior to this murder. In fact, Zodiac couldn't have wore a costume during the Lake Berryessa crime or murdered a couple on a lonely road, because he had never done it before (how do we know that). There has to be a first time for everything in life, but we simply don't know when that was for Zodiac.

​Somebody stated that the 2001 communication made racially derogative comments, never done before by Zodiac. If this is justification for ruling out the 2001 communication, then we can rule out every single Zodiac communication where he did something for the first time, such as the Melvin Belli letter which expressed vulnerability and mental fragility in direct contrast to the July 31st 1969 letters that threatened more murder and mayhem if his demands were not met. Some may suggest the Melvin Belli letter was simply mocking investigators and the Jim Dunbar Show escapade, but this again requires the reader to interpret the tone of a letter to meet their own ends or argument. How many people on Twitter have posted thousands of benign comments before posting something racially offensive and had to apologize or be cancelled. They could say "it wasn't me because I've never done that before", which I doubt would convince many as a strong argument. Others will say that certain communications don't "feel right", and therefore are unlikely to have been authored by the Zodiac Killer. Our feelings have absolutely no bearing on whether a communication is genuine or otherwise. We have DNA from the 1978 letter, so whatever our feelings are about this letter based on handwriting and tone, the importance of using this letter to shake the ancestral tree should be our first port of call. 

However, this wasn't the only similarity between the Melvin Belli letter and 1978 letter. Not once, in any of the widely touted list of authenticated Zodiac Killer communications from July 31st 1969 to January 29th 1974, did the killer ever cross out a spelling mistake (or otherwise) with a straight line (he blacked out errors). The Badlands card (not authenticated) on May 8th 1974 did scruffily cross out the misspelling of consternation, but failed in any capacity to identify its sender, such as the Zodiac introduction or his crosshairs. The Melvin Belli letter on December 20th 1969 and the April 24th 1978 letter both inserted an unnecessary word into the correspondence, spelled it correctly one alphabetical letter shy of completion, and then very neatly (almost ruler like) crossed out each word. Not only did the 1978 letter carry the identical introduction and punctuation error as the Melvin Belli letter, as well as being very deliberately and carefully written, but both inserted an unrequired word into the message before crossing it out, despite it being spelled correctly thus far. These are the only two communications up to April 24th 1978 that carried both of these features. The newspaper reports of the Melvin Belli letter never showed an image of the letter, or the straight line deletion of the so-far correctly spelled word, meaning the author of the 1978 letter could never have copied the aforementioned deviant introduction, or this 'correction' technique from the Belli communication, unless he authored both.          

When we look at the similarities between the Melvin Belli letter and 1978 letter described above, we also have to note that the 1978 letter was specifically using language adopted from the Belli letter when stating "I am now in control of all things". Just over eight years earlier, the Belli letter stated  "I will loose control again and take my nineth & possibly tenth victom" and "I will loose all controol of my self & set the bomb up. Please help me I can not remain in control for much longer". Therefore, the introduction similarity of "This is the Zodiac speaking I" between the two letters ​(with grammatical error), and the crossed out wording only existing in these two letters up to April 24th 1978, in all likelihood influenced the author of the 1978 letter when designing this latest correspondence. The introduction, the correction technique, and the use of the word "control" regarding the Zodiac Killer's mindset were unique only to these two letters up to April 24th 1978. Since these anomalies could not have been reasonably created without access to an original image of the Melvin Belli letter, it is reasonable to conclude - because Paul Stine's shirt piece was included with the Belli letter - that the 1978 letter is a genuine Zodiac correspondence without any doubt. 

Exactly one year before the murder of Paul Stine in Presidio Heights, Melvin Belli appeared in an episode of Star Trek on October 11th 1968 entitled "And the Children Shall Lead", playing the character Gorgan. When referencing the Melvin Belli letter in 1978, the Zodiac Killer stated "I am waiting for a good movie about me. Who will play me". 

Excerpt from Wikipedia on And the Children Shall Lead: "The federation starship Enterprise arrives at the planet Triacus. Captain Kirk, Dr. McCoy, and First Officer Spock beam down in time to witness the death of Professor Starnes, the leader of a scientific expedition team. The other members of the expedition, apart from their five seemingly unconcerned children, seem to have died at their own hands. The crew bring the children back to the Enterprise, where McCoy evaluates them and determines that they are suffering from lacunar amnesia, unaware of what happened to their parents and unable to grieve. However, when left unattended in one of the ship's rooms, the children chant an evocation and summon a glowing humanoid named Gorgan. He advises them to take control of the crew in order to get to Marcus XII, his preferred destination. The eldest child, Tommy, uses mental powers Gorgan has bestowed on the children to trick the crew into steering the ship while presenting illusions that make them think they are still in orbit above Triacus. Upon reviewing a troubling expedition film recorded by Starnes, Spock, McCoy, and Kirk return to the bridge to find the children and Gorgan fully in control of the crew. Unable to break their hold on the crew, Spock observes that the children are merely possessed by Gorgan, who must be the evil embodiment of an ancient group of space-warring marauders released by Starnes's archaeological survey".

1978 letter: "I am now in control of all things". ​

The 1998 San Francisco Police Department DNA chart of suspected Zodiac correspondence shows that DNA was obtained from the 1978 letter, but it was deemed not authentic. If we believe that investigators correctly cleared Inspector David Toschi of any wrongdoing in the manufacture of the 1978 letter, then it is hard to argue against this communication being created by the same individual who mailed the 1969 Melvin Belli letter, with added shirt piece from the Paul Stine murder. The Zodiac speaking introduction with grammatical error on the opening line and the correction technique employed in the 1978 letter, which mimicked the Melvin Belli letter from 1969 (allied to the use of "control" in both communications), could only have been reasonably crafted by one person. If it wasn't David Toschi who wrote the 1978 letter, it was the Zodiac Killer. The DNA obtained from the 1978 letter has already ruled out both Arthur Leigh Allen and Lawrence Kane many years ago. The 1978 letter being genuine would also rule out Ross Sullivan, who died in 1977. If David Toschi didn't author the 1978 letter, the search for Zodiac DNA is effectively over - we have had it for 25 years and counting.      

As shown numerous times before, we can usually find the inspiration for Zodiac communications by looking at the most recent newspaper articles published in the Bay Area or Los Angeles. The November 21st 1969 letter to the San Jose Police Department was possibly directed at the recently widowed Diane Kennedy Pike, whose husband James Albert Pike had met an unfortunate death in Israel in September (information provided by Cragle). The letter caused enough alarm to institute 24-hour surveillance on the young woman and her residence. Information regarding this letter is sparse, but the language adopted in this communication is taken directly from the last San Francisco Chronicle newspaper article on November 13th 1969 entitled Zodiac 'Legally Sane', featuring the Zodiac Killer's 340 cipher and investigators attempts to snag the murderer of five.    

The newspaper snippet on the left reads "Through physical clues Zodiac has clumsily left behind at crime scenes and bits and pieces of information about himself he has inadvertently revealed in letters sent to The Chronicle, police feel sure there will be no doubt they have the right man in custody when an arrest is made". Eight days after this newspaper article was released, and thirteen days after he had claimed seven victims (the canonical five and the two San Jose murders of Snoozy & Furlong), the Zodiac Killer wrote to the San Jose Police Department and responded to "there will be no doubt they have the right man in custody when an arrest is made", by writing "There's no doubt I will do my Thing". The Zodiac Killer was clearly confident that no arrest was forthcoming, and his reign of terror would continue by doing his "Thing". His chronological list of victims by using months of the year would continue, when he wrote November=8 in his latest letter. He also added a short six character code of ~+62+~.  

His next letter, postmarked December 7th 1969 from Fairfield, was shown to be authentic by pre-empting the pleading nature of the Melvin Belli letter and his use of another code of 38 characters. This code contained similar characters to the 340 cipher, unlike the following 13-Symbol and 32-Symbol ciphers. It opened the door to the possibility that the 38 character code was somehow related to the 340 cipher and maybe contained a clue to its construction. Druzer, an avid and diligent Zodiac researcher, mailed me the 38 character code deciphered with the 340 cipher key. The result is mostly garbled, but he drew my attention to the final line of both codes ending in "death". The Zodiac Killer only took a 4+ horizontal combination of characters from the 340 cipher to the 38 character code on two occasions. Those were HER> and AIKꞮ+, which spelled the standalone words of IRON and DEATH before the diagonal shift was applied to the 340 cipher to reveal the message. Despite the last two rows of the 340 cipher being a mixture of forward and backward reading words, the word "death" sits at the end of both the 340 and 38 character ciphers, indicating that this word likely concludes the message in each instance. 

Other horizontal words do exist in this format, however, the Zodiac Killer gave us 4 and 5 characters which bound the 340 and 38 character ciphers together, and both formed English words. The Zodiac Killer began and ended his 38 character code with two prominent sections from the start and end of the 340 cipher, both of which contained visible words before any shift was applied (the final word remaining static). This may be another observation, which confirms to the doubters the December 7th 1969 letter as an authentic Zodiac communication. Unless of course, the 38 code hoaxer identified two passages of 4 and 5 characters from the undeciphered 340 cipher, that just happened to accidentally find two English words after the 340 key was applied. This hoaxer would also have to guess that by separating the prominent ZO∆AIKꞮ+ characters on the bottom line of the 340 cipher, into AIKꞮ+ on the bottom line of the 38 character code, he would be reducing these characters to create something meaningful. He apparently did. By separating these characters into the five visible at the end of the 38 character code, he created the word "death", just like the solved 340 cipher. Druzer pointed out the same thing, stating "The most curious/compelling feats are that the author isolated actual words, most notably death, and that he refrained from copying Zodaik, which would certainly be expected of a hoaxer". In other words, he dismantled the ZO∆AIK element, while leaving Ɪ+ in place, to form "death" as the final word on the 38 character code. This appears to show knowledge of the hidden message in the 340 cipher. 

The above image from the San Francisco Chronicle on November 13th 1969 shows the correlation on three rows of the 38 character code to the 340 cipher. We have 4, 5 and 5 characters from three rows of the 38 character code, organized in the correct order to three rows on the 340 cipher. The crucial 10th row of the 340 cipher which begins the second section of the 3-part cipher (9, 9 and 2), contains the four symbols of ~+62+~ in the correct order (and FB which numerically equals 62). Both the November 21st 1969 and December 7th 1969 letters were unreleased to the public, so it would be difficult to envisage how two different authors would choose to supply two relatively short codes that mimicked important features of the 340 cipher independent of one another. The three rows of the Z38 highlighted in blue rectangles above, all either begin or end a row on the 340 cipher - as does the six character code of the November 21st 1969 letter. Was the 38 character code on December 7th 1969 a clue to the construction of the 340 cipher or somehow related to the message ultimately found within it? If so, then the short code of ~+62+~ in the November 21st 1969 letter could be somehow related to the 340 cipher also. The December 16th 1969 letter, also mailed from Fairfield, contained another short code of five characters. This completed a quartet of puzzles from the Zodiac Killer in just over a month.

​The Zodiac Killer was likely reading this newspaper article on November 13th 1969 when he used the wording "There's no doubt I will do my Thing", so it's perfectly feasible that the presence of his 340 cipher prominently displayed within this article, may have been the inspiration to provide further codes based upon its construction. The newspaper article concluded with "Amateur cryptographers by the hundreds were at work trying to decode the cryptogram from Zodiac published in yesterday's Chronicle. It was an amateur - a Salinas teacher - who cracked Zodiac's cipher message in August to which he said the people he killed would serve him as his slaves in paradise. One cryptographer, who has studied the latest message, says it definitely contains word patterns hidden in the 340 symbols. "There is a definite message" he said. "Testing shows it is not just gibberish. Once that is determined then it's just a matter of patience before it pieces itself together". Did the Zodiac Killer take note of this section and provide "bits and pieces" in his next two codes to help in its decryption? 

The following is an amalgamation of previous articles: 

​Six months after the Zodiac Killer's Albany, New York letter and code, another letter would arrive at the San Francisco Chronicle on January 30th 1974. Postmarked the day before (January 29th), this letter was a curious blend of The Exorcist movie (1973) and the comedic opera The Mikado (1885), two productions separated by 88 years.

The Zodiac Killer plagiarized The Mikado twice in the July 26th 1970 letter, but this appeared to have some purpose in relation to his hunting activities - that the Zodiac Killer had created a list of potential victims, who he would then kill and ultimately torture in paradise. This seemed at odds with his use of The Mikado in 1974. Any suggestion that the Zodiac Killer was contemplating suicide at this juncture because of his choice of Tit-Willow, appeared to be dashed in the following paragraph when he stated "If I do not see this note in your paper, I will do something nasty, which you know I'm capable of doing". The notion that the Zodiac Killer had reached a watershed moment and was about to ditch the pseudonym he had coveted for so many years, would also be premature, when he mailed the 1978, 1986 and 1987 letters, all containing his infamous introduction of "This is the Zodiac speaking".

​The 1978 and 1987 letters had one thing in common with the 1974 letter, in that they all carried the wording "yours truly" or "yours truley", followed by a colon. This wording is commonly used before a signature, with the colon used to separate two independent clauses when the second explains or illustrates the first. In the 1978 and 1987 letters the Zodiac Killer follows "yours truly" with "guess", whereas, he inserts the plagiarized verse from Tit-Willow where his signature should be placed in the 1974 Exorcist letter. The primary conclusion to draw from this, is the Zodiac Killer was yet again asking us to "guess" his name through the verse of Tit-Willow. 

He may have been bluffing, but giving us his first name in such cryptic fashion could never be realistically used as evidence against him, because any conclusions drawn from this verse through subjective interpretation, would never have any standing in a court of law. There are five things in relation to The Exorcist movie and the Tit-Willow verse that point to one name. There is also another that points backwards to the April 20th 1970 letter, when the Zodiac Killer teased us with his name by stating "My name is", followed by a thirteen character code. The Exorcist book was written by William Blatty in 1971, which told the story of a twelve-year-old girl possessed by a powerful demon, that was later adapted by director William Friedkin in the film version released on December 26th 1973. The Tit-Willow verse from The Mikado was created by William Schwenck Gilbert, which contained multiple examples of "Will" and "Bill" within words such as "Willo" and "Billowy" (Will and Bill being short for William). This verse followed The Exorcist introduction and the promise of a signature by use of "yours truley". If we look at the next paragraph in the Tit-Willow verse from the complete version, it reads "Now I feel just as sure as I'm sure that my name Isn't Willow, titwillow, titwillow". Very reminiscent of the "My name is" letter, but in this instance "My name Isn't". 

Now let us take a look at the final paragraph of the Exorcist letter where he wrote "If I do not see this note in your paper, I will do something nasty, which you know I'm capable of doing". This mirrors his very first communications on July 31st 1969 when he wrote "I want you to print this cipher on your frunt page by Fry Afternoon Aug 1-69, If you do not do this I will go on a kill ram page Fry night that will last the whole week end. I will cruse around and pick of all stray people or coupples that are alone then move on to kill some more untill I have killed over a dozen people". On July 31st 1969 and January 29th 1974, he concluded both correspondences with the threat "to kill" more people if his letters were not published in the newspapers. In his decoded 408 cipher, he wrote "To kill something gives me the most thrilling experence". To the best of my knowledge, this is the only time the Zodiac Killer used the word "something" prior to January 29th 1974 - and used it in reference "to kill something". So, when we look at the final paragraph of the Exorcist letter where he wrote the words "I will do something nasty", it is apparent that "to kill something" was his likely threat. The Zodiac Killer then finished the letter with another puzzle (likely decoded by Kevin Robert Brooks). 

Despite having reservations that the murderer of Cheri Jo Bates was the author of the Confession letter, let us look at certain aspects of the Confession letter in relation to the published details of the crime and the unpublished details of the autopsy report by November 29th 1966. Many of the newspaper articles prior to November 29th 1966 mentioned the stab wounds to her arms, back and face, along with her throat being slashed, but I could find none that mentioned stab wounds to her breasts, or any mention of Cheri Jo Bates being choked or strangled (unless you know better). The autopsy did show she had at least seven incised wounds across her throat and one stab wound to her right arm, although no concrete evidence of any stab wounds to her face (rather, blunt force lacerations and abrasions to her lip, chin and left cheek). The following snippet is the relevant part of the Confession letter pertaining to the autopsy report.

It seems unusual that Cheri Jo Bates received three stab wounds to her breasts, with no other stab wounds to her front torso, bearing in mind the author of the Confession letter infused a sexual element into their typing, by stating "Her breast felt very warm and firm under my hands" and mentioned "cutting off female parts to deposit for the whole world to see". The author was claiming contact with her breast region just before stating that "she died hard". The author also stated that he initially grabbed Cheri Jo Bates around the neck and mouth, and choked her. This could explain the petechial haemorrhaging visible on her forehead at autopsy. The Confession letter then mentioned her lips twitching before he kicked her in the head, which could explain the 2cm ragged non-gaping oblique laceration to the left side of her lip, and the dark blue-gray slightly swollen discoloration of the mucocutanous portions of the upper and lower lips to the right side - both consistent with a kick to her head while in close contact with the driveway floor - and to the claims in the Confession letter.

The stab wounds (as explained in the previous analysis) to her left breast (2), right breast (1), right axillary fold (1) and right upper arm, grouped on an approximate 10cm vertical plane, is also consistent with an assailant holding the victim around the neck (possibly with their left arm) from behind, and stabbing backwards into the upper torso and upper right arm of Cheri Jo Bates, thereby resulting in the relatively close grouping of stab wounds to her frontal region. Her right arm being motioned across her body for protection would explain the two stab wounds to the upper right arm and right axillary fold. In fact, had she been stabbed here while using her right arm for protection over her chest, it would further narrow the horizontal plane width of the incoming knife. After thrusting Cheri Jo Bates to the driveway floor and kicking her in the head, the author of the Confession letter then claimed he "plunged the knife into her". This, too, is consistent with the one knife wound to her back detailed at autopsy. The word "plunged" maybe suggestive of a downward strike as she lay face down on the driveway floor, before he "finished the job out cutting her throat". The limited details given in the Confession letter are consistent with the previous analysis and the autopsy report, yet insufficient to fully claim that the author and murderer are one and the same.
PART ONE  PART TWO

If we want to discover the motivation and design of a Zodiac communication, we usually have to look no further than one or two newspaper articles precedent to the correspondence in question. Can the preceding newspaper article in the San Francisco Chronicle on October 12th 1970 tell us anything about the Halloween card mailed on October 27th 1970, including an answer to the strange symbolism depicted on the envelope address side and card inner.

The newspaper article was entitled "Gilbert and Sullivan Clue to Zodiac". Therefore, it shouldn't be any surprise that the Zodiac Killer chose a greeting card that opened with the wording "From your secret pal. I feel it in your bones, You ache to know my name, And so I'll clue you in". This was the only communication thus far that contained white text, which the Zodiac Killer adopted by adding 4-TEEN, BOO and the symbolim at the foot of the card, rather than using pasted newspaper clippings. The Zodiac Killer was very likely claiming 14 victims when he wrote this total on the skeleton's hand on the front of the card, followed by a head count of 4-TEEN above the second skeleton on the card inner, and concluding with the symbolism at foot of the card. 

The Zodiac Killer likely combined his victim count of 4-TEEN with the claimed murders of four teenagers by October 27th 1970. Having claimed the August 3rd 1969 San Jose murders of Kathie Reyne Snoozy (15) and Debra Gaye Furlong (14) in his Dripping Pen card by the addiition of "Aug" within a monthly chronological victim count, the Zodiac Killer was effectively telling us that he was incorporating 4 teenagers in his Halloween card victim count of fourteen - David Faraday, Betty Lou Jensen, Kathie Snoozy and Debra Furlong. The October 12th 1970 newspaper article stated "And he is now claiming 13 persons. Homicide detectives who've been hunting Zodiac for nearly two years frankly admit he is as much an enigma now as he was on Dec. 20, 1968, when he chalked up his first two victims. On Dec. 20, 1968, he gunned down teen-agers David Faraday and Betty Lou Jensen". The Halloween card entry of a hyphenated 4-TEEN, not only incorporated his first two victims within his total, but "chalked them up" in blackboard style writing. The Zodiac Killer had written "14" on the hand of the first skeleton, "4-TEEN" over the skull of the second skeleton, so it could be argued that the symbolism at the foot of the card containing what appeared to be a joined "F", was likely "fourteen" as well  The symbolism could represent "Zodiac Fourteen" or "Zodiac Victims Fourteen" (with the four dots representing the four teenagers, just as he had incorporated them by separating "4" and "TEEN" earlier). His victim totals all neatly chalked up within the Halloween card.

The vast majority of the newspaper article was dedicated to the two act comic opera, The Mikado, and the search for individuals who may have played Ko-Ko in recent years, Many Zodiac researchers have considered whether the Zodiac Killer was of British origin, had British parents, or was influenced by British theatrical plays, based upon the language he adopted in his communications. It is extremely likely that the Zodiac Killer chose to write PEEK-A-BOO around the knothole of a tree because he knew the alternative British term for this saying.

​"Peekaboo (also spelled peek-a-boo) is a form of play played with an infant. To play, one player hides their face, pops back into the view of the other, and says Peekaboo!, sometimes followed by I see you!  There are many variations: for example, where trees are involved, "Hiding behind that tree!" is sometimes added. Another variation involves saying "Where's the baby?" while the face is covered and "There's the baby!" when uncovering the face". Wikipedia. A British term for "peek-a-boo" is "peep-bo" - which just happens to be one of the characters from The Mikado.

​The Zodiac Killer chose the introduction on the Halloween card outer in response to the newspaper article entitled "Gilbert and Sullivan Clue to Zodiac", because it stated "And so I'll clue you in". He then responded to this introduction by inserting "peek-a-boo" around the knothole of a tree, with an eye peering from within. A saying which has the alternative of peep-bo - a character from the Gilbert and Sullivan opera. The teaser of "I'll clue you in" and the answer of "peep-bo" both inspired by The Mikado featured in the October 12th 1970 newspaper article. The Zodiac Killer would not give us the Ko-Ko investigators were desperately attempting to track down, only the protector or ward of Ko-Ko.

Many esteemed researchers in the Zodiac community like to say that some of the most beneficial and trusted information in the case can be found in the pages of original source documentation, such as the police reports and FBI files. They say this, until information is revealed within them that doesn't conform with something related to their suspect, or when a long held belief or consensus narrative about the case has been dismantled using the very original documents they praise. One simple example is the SLA letter mailed on February 3rd 1974. Despite the first two documents ever produced on this letter clearly showing that the letter was postmarked February 3rd 1974 from Los Angeles, certain websites and outlets want to keep pushing the myth of a February 14th 1974 postmark, because it's an inconvenient truth that goes against everything they have always believed. The consensus narrative of the Zodiac case has, and always will be, more important than the truth. 

Here is the section regarding LeRoy Sweet in the October 12th 1969 police report: "Assistant traffic manager of Yellow Cab, LeRoy Sweet responded and gave reporting officers the victim's identification. Mr. Sweet further stated the last dispatch given the victim was at 9:45 pm to 500 9th Ave. apt. #1. Victim allegedly never arrived at the above location as the dispatch was reassigned to another cab at 9:58 pm". The prevailing narrative is that the Zodiac Killer entered the taxicab somewhere by the intersection of Mason and Geary Streets in the theater district of San Francisco and then traveled to the Presidio Heights district. But Mason and Geary (or Union Square) is unlikely to be where Paul Stine was when he received the 9:45pm dispatch from LeRoy Sweet, asking him to pick up a fare from 500 9th Avenue.

The journey time from Mason and Geary (or Union Square) to 500 9th Avenue on a busy Saturday night is about 12 to 13 minutes. Therefore, if LeRoy Sweet knew that Paul Stine was in the vicinity of Mason and Geary or Union Square at 9:45pm when he gave him his second fare that night, he would have known that Paul Stine's journey time to 500 9th Avenue would have him arriving there at 9:58pm. So why did the police report state that another taxicab was allocated to that address at 9:58pm, when that was the time Paul Stine was expected at the address? Unless, of course, Paul Stine wasn't near the theater district when he received the 9:45pm dispatch - and the dispatch was given to him much closer to Washington and Cherry Streets, with the Zodiac Killer already seated in the taxicab. Paul Stine may have been already heading to Presidio Heights when he accepted the dispatch to 500 9th Avenue. One would assume that LeRoy Sweet knew exactly where Paul Stine was at 9:45pm because he expected Paul Stine to arrive at 500 9th Avenue earlier than 9:58pm. So when he didn't, LeRoy Sweet reassigned the dispatch to another taxicab.      

For example: if Paul Stine was two minutes away from the intersection of Washington and Cherry, and 5 minutes away from 500 9th Avenue when he received the 9:45pm dispatch, then LeRoy Sweet (and possibly the resident of 500 9th Avenue) could have expected Paul Stine's arrival at the address at 9:50pm. If the customer was in a rush and became impatient by 9:58pm, then it's reasonable to conclude they rang the Yellow Taxicab Company again and another taxicab was summoned to that address.

​If the expected time of arrival was 9:58pm from Mason and Geary Streets and the customer knew this, then there would have never have been any need for LeRoy Sweet to reassign another taxicab to the address that night. However, if Paul Stine arrived at Washington and Cherry two minutes after the 9:45pm dispatch, then he arrived at the murder scene at 9:47pm, eight minutes before the 9:55pm time of attack given in the police report (supposedly when the three teenagers first looked out of the window). If this was the case, then what was the Zodiac Killer doing in the taxicab for eight minutes? The further back towards Mason and Geary Streets (or Union Square) we take the taxicab when the 9:45pm dispatch was given by LeRoy Sweet, the less reason the customer has to become impatient and for another taxicab to be assigned to that address. 

Paul Stine would likely have been traveling along Highway 101 from the San Francisco International Airport after his first fare was dropped off, and may have exited Highway 101 and Interstate 80 by 7th Street to pick up a random fare at the theater district - so the Zodiac Killer could have entered the taxicab anywhere in this locality. The taxicab meter reading taken at the crime scene supports the Zodiac Killer entering the taxicab in this area. However, when LeRoy Sweet gave Paul Stine the final dispatch, he was possibly much closer to Presidio Heights than once considered. Many will not like this analysis of a killer arriving at Washington and Cherry up to eight minutes prior to the 9:55pm attack time, because it doesn't conform to the widely held narrative of a taxicab driver being murdered the moment he parked up at the Washington and Cherry intersection. The statements of LeRoy Sweet may be erroneous, but they are what they are. Is it possible this extra time was swallowed up by something that occurred at the intersection of Washington and Maple Streets - the destination written in the taxicab trip sheet? 

The following examination is not a claim to the factual dymamics of the crime committed on October 30th 1966, but one interpretation regarding the senseless murder of Cheri Jo Bates in the driveway alongside the Riverside City College library.​ 

On the left there is an approximate set of measurements of the female anatomy, and the only five incised and non-abraded wounds to the front side of Cheri Jo Bates' upper body. The five wounds are clustered in an area measuring 20cm horizontally and 10cm vertically. While these could be caused by an individual standing in front of Cheri Jo Bates, it is evident that none of these wounds inflicted by a knife had significant depth penetration to prove immediately fatal.

If the killer had been holding or choking Cheri Jo Bates around the upper chest or neck from behind, then this compression could increase intra-capilliary pressure by restricting the venous return of blood, and thereby creating the petechial haemorrhaging evident on the forehead of the young woman. A killer securing her from behind, holding the knife in his right hand (or possibly left) and stabbing backwards toward her heart region, could easily have produced this grouping of injuries to her breast region and upper arms in the initial phase of the attack. The natural response by a victim would be to raise their arms and hands to protect this vital region, in addition to attempting to grab the wrist of the attacker (possibly resulting in the watch being ripped from her assailant) and could have caused the only three described "laceration" wounds to the dorsal side of Cheri Jo Bates' left hand (2) and right index finger. This may also have been the moment that Cheri desperately clawed backwards at her assailant's hair, ripping out some head hairs that collected in the blood at the base of her right thumb. 
​
Cheri Jo Bates, at this juncture, would have received eight strikes from a bladed instrument (5 to her front upper body and possibly 3 to her hands/fingers) in an attack that could have been mere seconds in duration, followed by her being thrust forward into the hard driveway floor. However, it must be noted that the two injuries to her left hand described as lacerations by F. Rene Modglin (24 & 25 in the autopsy report) could be injuries sustained through impact with the driveway floor. One is a Y-shaped laceration at the junction of the wrist and hand, often caused by the blunt force trauma of a weapon or impact from a hard surface. The other injury was an irregular laceration in the mid area, in line with the middle finger. Both these lacerations to her left hand were to the dorsal side, so could be sequential injuries as she was thrust forward and down. Therefore, it's possible only the "laceration" to the lateral aspect of her right index finger was caused by a knife blade (2cm, interrupted and moderately deep). Cheri Jo Bates had a 2cm non-gaping cut to her left upper lip, a series of three non-gaping lacerations to her left cheek and an area of blue-gray discoloration to the skin of her left cheek, all of which could be caused by an impact across the driveway floor as she was thrust from behind. Some abrasions and discoloration to the midline of her chin possibly received in the same motion. The slightly swollen discoloration to her upper and lower lips on the right side could have resulted from Cheri Jo Bates shifting her head position and further force being applied by her assailant. Although petechial haemorrhaging can be caused by choking or compression of the chest cavity, it can also be caused when excessive pressure is applied to tissue (e.g., when a tourniquet is applied to an extremity or the person is struck across the face with an open palm of the hand). In the case of Cheri Jo Bates, the forehead petechiae noted at autopsy could have been caused as a result of her head being pressed into the hard uneven ground.. 

The entirety of the abrasions to her hands and fingers were located on her right hand (possibly her dominant hand), that could have been received as she was forced to the driveway floor, as she attempted to arrest her descent (and some caused by subsequent struggling while being pinned to the ground}. There were no abrasion-type injuries detailed on her left hand at autopsy, suggesting her right hand was the dominant force when in contact with the driveway floor. 

The final phase of the attack may have been the solitary knife wound to her back and the seven lateral knife wounds across her neck, ultimately severing her right common carotid artery and right superficial jugular vein, resulting in death in several minutes. The attack could have lasted less than 30 seconds.  PART ONE  PART THREE

An archived forum post on May 4th 2000 from ZodiacKiller.com concerning the once Riverside Detective Steve Shumway stated "Until now, a key piece of evidence supporting RPD’s claim has been withheld. With permission from lead detective Steve Shumway, I am revealing a fact that directly points to the Bates murder as being a classic “crime of passion:” Cheri Jo Bates was stabbed 42 times.

Where Steve Shumway acquired this information is irrelevant, because it is pure fiction. In fact, Cheri Jo Bates was stabbed less than a third the amount of times claimed by Steve Shumway. A cursory glance across the 26 entries from the external examination by autopsy surgeon F. Rene Modglin shows that Cheri Jo Bates received no more than 6 incised wounds to her torso and arms (discounting the two abraded lacerations to her left forearm). Her neck received 7 incised wounds that transected the thyroid cartilage, right common carotid artery and right superficial jugular vein, indicative of a blade being drawn across the neck. Claims that Cheri Jo Bates was nearly decapitated is another wild dramatization of an already brutal and senseless murder. Also, attempting to manufacter an argument that this crime was possibly committed in an act of rage by somebody who had a relationship or was known to the victim, cannot be credibly argued based on the number of stab wounds the victim received.

Cheri Jo Bates had received three wounds to her breast region and one to her back (4 in total to her torso), none of which were life threatening (disregarding prolonged blood loss). She had two moderately superficial cuts to the anterior and medial upper left lobe of her lung, with no.pulmonary embola significant atelectasis (collapse of lung tissue with loss of volume). The three incised wounds to her breast region measured 1.9cm (0.75 inches), 1.7cm (0.67 inches) and 1.4cm (0.55 inches). F. Rene Modglin had calculated, based on the entirety of the wounds, that the minimum knife dimensions would be half inch wide and three and a half inches long. The wounds may have measured slightly more than half an inch at autopsy, but this is dependent upon the angle of delivery and removal of the knife as it entered and exited the body. But the incised wounds to her breast region and back (0.59 inches) suggest a blade of half an inch wide or fractionally bigger. Her right upper arm had only one gaping wound measuring 4cm (1.6 inches), suggestive of an angled strike with the blade, with another wound measuring 1.5cm to her right axillary fold (right armpit). Her left arm carried two "somewhat abraded lacerations" of 3.5cm and 4cm, that were not necessarily indicative of a knife wound. A laceration is caused by blunt force trauma (crushing or ripping blow) with evident tissue bridging and minimal blood loss (except for the scalp). An incised wound (by a knife in this case) exhibits no tissue bridging and greater blood loss.

​Unfortunately, the autopsy uses the word laceration throughout to show the knife wounds in this case, making it difficult to disseminate what is meant when describing the wounds to the face and hands of Cheri Jo Bates. The "2 cm oblique ragged edge fresh non gaping laceration of the upper lip on the left side, that angles laterally from above and extends completely through the thickness of the lip", is likely a blow from either the fist or foot of the murderer, or contact with the ground. As were the "series of three fresh lacerations of the skin of the left cheek, angling from above in front slightly downward and posteriorly". These injuries to her face were interspersed with abrasions (possibly received from the driveway floor). Her hands received numerous abrasions, but only three of the wounds to her hands were described as lacerations by F. Rene Modglin. There were twelve injuries to her hands described at autopsy (10 presumably to her dominant right hand and two to her left hand). F. Rene Modglin described two lacerations to her left hand and one to her right, leaving nine abrasion type injuries remaining (and so making the twelve described injuries). One entry in the autopsy described a few light linear criss-crossing abrasions of the right hand (I attributed this as one injury). If F. Rene Modglin used lacerations to describe incised wounds from a blade, then Cheri Jo Bates only had three defensive wounds to her hands. The numerous abrasions to her hands most likely received from contact with the driveway floor.     

As a consequence of the above findings we can determine that none of the knife wounds to her torso, arms and hands would have proved fatal had she escaped at this point and received fairly prompt medical assistance. Assuming the "lacerations" to her hands were not caused by crushing or tearing blows (and were knife wounds), then Cheri Jo Bates received just three incised wounds to her hands, of which, two were to the dorsal side (knuckle side) of her left hand, and one to the medical aspect of her right index finger. So was Cheri Jo Bates placing her hands over her breast region attempting to protect that vital area during the initial phase of the attack, thereby receiving these wounds to the back of her hands? (and possibly the two abraded lacerations to her left forearm).

​However, discounting these two abraded lacerations, which were on the volar surface (palm side) of her forearm (and assuming Cheri Jo Bates had her hands in front of her chest for some time during the attack), then she received eight incised wounds from a knife blade while standing, likely delivered by an assailant securing Cheri Jo Bates from behind during this period. Can we conclude that Cheri Jo Bates had been thrown or forced to the ground during the next phase of the attack, then punched and kicked, before being stabbed once in the back with a knife as she lay struggling on the driveway floor? All the abrasions and lacerations to her hands described at autopsy by F. Rene Modglin were to the dorsal side of her hand (knuckle side). Her fingers received injuries, but none were detailed to the palms of her hands in the autopsy report. 

We have a killer who failed to deliver any imminent life threatening injuries to the front of Cheri Jo Bates' body, with limited knife penetration to any part of her torso (whether delivered standing up or kneeling over her). Although not proven, it appears the final part of the attack occurred when Cheri Jo Bates was lying face down, with one stab wound to her back, followed by the knife blade being drawn across her neck seven times. Was this attack the product of a youthful and inexperienced lightweigt, who failed to deliver any killer blows during the initial phase of the attack, who ultimately resorted to attacking her neck region? Or is it impossible to conclude the maturity and experience of the murderer based on anything contained within the autopsy report generated by F. Rene Modglin?   PART TWO  PART THREE

On October 17th 1970 there is a strong possibility that the Zodiac Killer mailed a correspondence from Berkeley to Dr. Edward C. Adams, a psychiatrist and docent (teacher), who resided at 102 Camino Don Miguel, Orinda, California. The postcard was clearly a threat towards the family, stating "Mon Oct 12, 1970. Edward Adams. The Zodiac is going to change the way of committing murders. I shall announce when I shall commit my murders, The Adamses are Next. you taught me to mean it.  ADAMS YOU ARE NEXT. Zodiac". If this was the Zodiac Killer, why did he choose to target Dr. Adams from Orinda? The Zodiac Killer would often claim or insinuate his involvement in murders (and possible murders), such as Richard Radetich, Donna Lass, Kathie Snoozy & Debra Furlong, and Cheri Jo Bates - so what was the purpose of this communication - and what triggered it? The pasted wording of "you taught me to mean it" and "Adams you are next" would suggest the Zodiac Killer was implying he had previously crossed paths with Dr. Adams. The statement of "you are next" would have carried more weight as a threat had Dr. Adams been aware of a recent murder in close proximity to his residence - thereby adding more terror to the postcard. Could this have been a factor in the Zodiac Killer (or copycat) selecting Orinda as a destination to mail this latest communication?

About three-quarters of a mile from his residence, six months earlier, on Friday, April 10th 1970, Barbara Bates Keenan (42) was found shot dead with a .22 caliber gun in the kitchen of her 8 La Campana, Orinda home at approximately 3:45 pm by her 14-year-old daughter, Margaret. She had suffered two bullet wounds to her head and one to her back in an apparently motiveless attack. She had the cord from a steam iron wrapped around her neck, having apparently been struck on the back of the head with it also. However, it was concluded at autopsy that strangulation wasn't the cause of death. There was no signs of robbery and she had not been sexually molested. Investigators believed that the murderer knew the victim. Her husband, Oakland Insurance Executive Harold F. Keenan (45), was not a suspect in her murder.   

Newspaper reports outlined that Barbara Keenan was an elementary school student teacher in Concord before assuming substitute teacher duties last fall. She had graduated from U.C. Berkeley, where she had met her husband in 1949, and was married in 1950. Edward C. Adams attended  the University of California, Berkeley for his undergraduate work and was a docent (teacher) at the Robinson Jeffers Foundation and was a member of the San Francisco Psychoanalytic Society.

The Zodiac Killer may have targeted Diane Kennedy Pike in a letter to the San Jose Police Department on November 21st 1969 and Daniel Williams for two weeks beginning on October 23rd 1969. Diane Kennedy Pike was an American writer and educator who lived in San Jose at the time this threatening letter was mailed. She was a school teacher at Willow Glen High School in San Jose between 1962 and 1964. Daniel Williams was a Salesian High School teacher in the city of Richmond, living at 1234 Bush Street in Martinez, when he was threatened by a series of malicious phone calls just before the arrival of the Dripping Pen card..Both the phone caller and letter writer claimed they were the Zodiac Killer. 

I am not suggesting that the Zodiac Killer had any hand in the murder of Barbara Keenan, but as an avid newspaper consumer, had the Zodiac Killer read about the murder on April 10th 1970 in any publication and chosen to target Edward C. Adams six months later, who lived just 3,730 feet from the residence of Barbara Keenan? If Edward C. Adams was aware of the murder in his neighborhood, then the out-of-the-blue threat on him and his family stating "you are next", may have engendered a higher degree of gravitas. ​By targeting the Adamses in Orinda, so close to a brutal murder just six months earlier, it's possible the Zodiac Killer was hoping that investigators may consider his involvement in the unsolved murder of Barbara Keenan. In terms of topography, both residences are heavily shrouded with trees on Google maps. Whether this was the case in 1970 I am unsure. The Zodiac Killer never outright claimed his involvement in the attacks on Richard Radetich, Donna Lass, Kathie Snoozy & Debra Furlong, and Cheri Jo Bates by name, but insinuated his participation - so it's possible - in this instance - he had hoped that the statement of "you are next" to Edward C. Adams, meant that investigators would consider him a suspect in a recent and close previous - that of Barbara Bates Keenan. If Edward C. Adams and Barbara Keenan were known to each other, the threatening postcard on October 17th 1970 would have had greater significance.  

The San Francisco Chronicle ran a very clever newspaper article on October 22nd 1969 challenging the Zodiac Killer to issue another cryptogram that would surely contain his name. However, they did this hoping that the Zodiac Killer would create a cipher down the path they had guided him towards. By dropping the name Edgar Allan Poe into their challenge, they were relying on the Zodiac Killer choosing a cipher technique described in the essays of the American writer and poet, thereby increasing their chances of solving it.

​The murderer of five not only responded by employing the first cipher technique described in Poe's A Few Words on Secret Writing to create the 340 cipher, but also inserted one of Poe's poems into the message. Here is a portion of the newspaper article: "Dr Marsh told the Examiner today: "The killer wouldn't dare, as he claimed in letters to the newspapers, to reveal his name in the cipher to established cryptogram experts. He knows, to quote Edgar Allan Poe, that any cipher created by man can be solved by man. Zodiac has not told the truth in his cipher messages to the Examiner, the Chronicle and the Vallejo Times-Herald. Zodiac has not done this, because to tell the complete truth in relation to his name -in cipher code - would lead to his capture. I invite Zodiac to send The American Cryptogram Association a cipher code - however complicated - which will truly and honestly include his name".  

The first section of Poe's essay mentioned the encryption technique of using scytala to conceal a message. In cryptography, a scytale (also transliterated skytale), is a tool used to perform a transposition cipher, consisting of a cylinder with a strip of parchment wound around it, on which is written a message. This online scytale decoder can be used to unearth the message in the Zodiac Killer's 340 cipher, which used a period 19 shift. Quite the coincidence that the Zodiac Killer would employ a similar technique from the very first portion of the essay 'A Few Words on Secret Writing'. This alone is not evidence of a connection between the newspaper article, Edgar Allan Poe and the Zodiac Killer, but the following observations may change your mind.     

Five months later, the Zodiac Killer would then mail the "My name is" cipher on April 20th 1970, apparently responding to Dr. Marsh directly, with "This is the Zodiac speaking. By the way have you cracked the last cipher I sent you? My name is...."  In the essay 'A Few Words on Secret Writing', the second cipher technique described by Poe involves splitting the alphabet into two parts of 13, A to M, and N to Z. The Zodiac Killer's code this time contained 13 characters, beginning with A and ending with M.

But what is really interesting, is that the essay then suggests the notion of a perpetually shifting alphabet by creating two concentric circular pieces of pasteboard, with one placed inside the other and fixed, while the other can rotate. On each, the alphabet would be written (or random characters). By shifting the outer circle a certain number of spaces, different letters can represent others in the message. Bearing in mind the Zodiac Killer created three circled 8's, I considered the idea of placing Zodiac's 13 characters in two concentric circles with the characters aligned. In other words, A on the outer circle aligned with the A on the inner circle ,E on the outer circle aligned with the E on the inner circle, N on the outer circle aligned with the N on the inner circle, etc. Then I just shifted the outer circle 8 spaces clockwise, so that the 8's aligned with three new characters. Those characters were ME and the Zodiac crosshairs (shown above in the red boxes). 

Ordinarily, this would appear a little crude and unconvincing, if it wasn't for the fact the Zodiac Killer mailed the Exorcist letter on January 29th 1974, switching from his usual crosshairs equalling his victim total, to "Me" corresponding with his victim total. He often allotted SFPD=0, while giving himself the latest victim total (10 in the April 20th 1970 letter). If "Me" corresponds to a victim total and his crosshairs correspond to a victim total, then "Me" corresponds to the crosshairs (and Zodiac). The shifting of the 13 character cipher by a factor of 8 to create the message "Me (crosshairs), would be similar to the period 19 shift employed in the 340 cipher.

The Zodiac Killer must have known that by creating a 13 character code, he was making it practically unsolvable using standard cryptographic methods. By using this method, employing a simple "shift of 8" technique, we at least get a crude message that he used later in the Exorcist letter: "This is the Zodiac speaking. By the way have you cracked the last cipher I sent you? My name is Me (crosshairs)"   

The Zodiac Killer likely mailed this communication knowing it would arrive at the San Francisco Chronicle offices on April 21st 1970, which tallies with the only date supplied in the essay 'A Few Words on Secret Writing'. The Chronicle stated on April 22nd 1970 that "in a letter received yesterday, Zodiac claims he has killed again". A letter dated April 21st was noted by Edgar Allan Poe after a challenge had been laid down in Graham's Magazine. The responder to the challenge stated "In the April number of your magazine, while reviewing the translation by Mr. Walsh of “Sketches of Conspicuous Living Characters of France,” you invite your readers to address you a note in cipher". This was reminiscent of the direct challenge given to Zodiac by Dr. Marsh, to encode his name in cipher form.  

The Zodiac Killer would almost certainly have been aware that Edgar Allan Poe was a poet, so it would be rather fitting had Zodiac incorporated one of Edgar Allan Poe's poems into one of his ciphers or codes. We had to wait 51 years to find the answer to this question. In December 2020, David Oranchak, Sam Blake and Jarl Van Eykce cracked the 340 cipher, which ended with the likely message of "I AM NOT AFRAID BECAUSE I KNOW THAT MY NEW LIFE IS DEATH. LIFE WILL BE AN EASY ONE IN PARADICE". The moving epitaph to his recently deceased wife, written by Edgar Allan Poe, was delivered in the form of poetry and entitled "To One in Paradise". 

​Are all these connections to Edgar Allan Poe a coincidence?  

After his displeasure that the citizens of San Francisco would not wear "some nice buttons", the List Letter on July 26th 1970 continued with a future tense narrative from The Mikado's As Some Day it May Happen, proclaiming how the Zodiac Killer was set to torture his slaves in paradise, by stating "some I shall tie over ant hills and watch them scream and twich and sqwirm". Despite the Little List letter being unreleased to the public on October 5th 1970, the 13-Hole postcard continued the narrative, now proclaiming in the past tense he had effectively succeeded in torturing his slaves, claiming "Some of them fought it was horrible". It can be argued that this goes a long way to authenticating the 13-Hole postcard as a Zodiac communication. This communication, mailed on October 5th 1970, was followed by another pasted postcard from Berkeley, California on October 17th 1970, which also used cuttings to convey the message, and threatened "Adams You Are Next Zodiac".  It was addressed to Dr. Edward C. Adams, who resided at 102 Camino Don Miguel, Orinda, California. It appears that this postcard was mailed by the same individual as the 13-Hole postcard, but with the October 5th 1970 communication having already been published in the newspapers, we cannot be sure this latest postcard was not created by a copycat. An examination of the adhesive used on both communications would be highly beneficial in determining joint authorship. This determination could be crucial, because if we can prove both were authored by the Zodiac Killer, we may be able to physically place the Zodiac Killer in San Bernardino, alongside Riverside,  in 1969. We could place the Zodiac Killer mailing a letter just 19 miles from the murder site of Cheri Jo Bates.

A letter postmarked Montclair, California on November 10th 1969 and addressed to an individual in Clarinda, Iowa, carried the message "Mr. (redacted) Your Next. The Zodiac". This format was nearly identical to the Edward C. Adams postcard, again using cuttings from a newspaper or magazine. The Montclair mailing was also sent during the hub of Zodiac activity. No communications had apparently been mailed by the Zodiac Killer since the October 13th 1969 Paul Stine letter, but this inactivity was broken by the November 8th 1969 and November 9th 1969 Dripping Pen card and Bus Bomb letter, shortly followed by the Montclair mailing on November 10th 1969 from San Bernardino. If the Adams postcard was the Zodiac Killer, then how high a probability do we place on the Montclair mailing being from the Zodiac Killer, bearing in mind this was addressed to another male individual, with a near identical message, using cuttings from a publication - and more crucially - not released into the public domain when the Edward C. Adams postcard was mailed nearly one year later. If the Montclair mailing was Zodiac, we can place him extremely close to Riverside three years after the Cheri Jo Bates murder. A murder that hadn't been publicly linked to the Zodiac Killer on November 10th 1969.    

Another fascinating aspect of the Montclair, San Bernardino mailing, was that it was fashioned using school notebook paper, just like the three Bates' letters mailed in Riverside on April 30th 1967, later claimed to have been authored by an individual from San Bernardino in 2016. These too, contained an extremely succinct message. If we can link the Montclair mailing to the Adams postcard, and therefore the 13-Hole postcard, we can almost certainly place the Zodiac Killer mailing a letter close to Riverside in November 1969, placing new emphasis on the three Bates letters mailed in April 1967, and shedding further doubt on the lacklustre claims of the individual in 2016. Unless of course, he is the Zodiac Killer. which I seriously doubt as a viable option. A Freedom of Information (FOIA) request for an unredacted version of the below FBI file may unearth the identity of the individual in Clarinda, Iowa, and uncover any commonalities between him and Edward C. Adams. If this individual was a certified psychiatrist, just like Dr. Adams, it could be an extremely interesting avenue of research. And placing the Zodiac Killer mailing a letter close to Riverside at the beginning of his campaign of terror in the Bay Area, could shed a whole new light on the murder of Cheri Jo Bates in 1966 and the communications associated with the case.  

It has regularly been stated that there was an approximate four year hiatus in Zodiac communications from 1974 to the arrival of the "I am back with you" letter on April 24th 1978. If you believe in this 4 year absence of Zodiac communications, then the following information from page 204 of Robert Graysmith's Zodiac paperback book should be of interest. Despite Robert Graysmith often playing loose with the facts of this case, the following information within his book concerns Inspector David Toschi directly.

​It stated that on March 13th 1978 at 2300 hours (just over a month before the "I am back with you" letter) somebody made a sinister phone call to an individual living in the Mission District of San Francisco, whose home voice recorder had stored the message. Apparently David Toschi responded to this incident. When played, the message read "This is the Zodiac. Tell the press I am back in San Francisco". The reportee stated he has no idea why the call came to him. Over four years had elapsed since the January 29th 1974 Exorcist letter, yet here we have a malicious phone call from somebody claiming to be Zodiac with the words "I am back", just over a month before the April 24th 1978 letter mailed to the San Francisco Chronicle stating "I am back with you". Another comparison between the two is "Tell the press I am back" and "Tell herb caen I am here". Both concerning the newspapers. Herb Caen was a San Francisco humorist and journalist whose daily column ran in the San Francisco Chronicle for nearly sixty years. 

Would Inspector David Toschi seriously listen to a sinister voice recording with these words, then fashion a hoax letter 42 days later using the same phraseology, while inserting the wording "That city pig toschi is good". While possible, it seems wholly implausible. After four years of perceived inactivity, what is the likelihood that the San Francisco voice recording and letter are two separate individuals perpetrating a hoax with identical wording, within a month and a half of one another? As with the Oklahoma radio station recording of an individual claiming to be Zodiac, I suspect this recording was also summarily dismissed as a hoax and lost to the hands of time. I am not suggesting it was the real Zodiac Killer, but losing or tossing away potential evidence that may later gain significance, should be avoided. This voice recording may have seemed unimportant on March 13th 1978, but less so on April 24th 1978.

​On May 5th 1978, just 11 days after the "I am back with you" letter, somebody claiming to be the Zodiac Killer phoned the San Mateo Police Department and falsely reported that a bomb had been set in the Transamerica building at 600 Montgomery Street (the same street of Melvin Belli's residence in 1969). Although it is difficult to separate the hoaxers from the real Zodiac Killer, we do have the common phraseology in the voice recording and letter on March 13th and April 24th 1978, that while not compelling, is nonetheless interesting.  

Although I believe the Cheri Jo Bates murder and accompanying communications have nothing to do with the Zodiac Killer, it would be foolish to unequivocally rule out of any of the commonly mentioned pre-canonical crimes suggested as possibly being the work of the Bay Area killer. So let us once again examine the Halloween card on October 27th 1970, that inspired Phil Sins to contact American journalist, Paul Avery, shortly after its arrival at the San Francisco Chronicle, and point out his thoughts on the relationship between the Halloween card and the murder of Cheri Jo Bates on October 30th 1966. Even though a link between the Zodiac murders and Riverside had been considered the previous year by investigators, this wasn't common knowledge on October 27th 1970. Phil Sins was also unaware that three letters had been mailed to the Riverside Press Enterprise, Riverside Police Department and Joseph Bates on April 30th 1967 by somebody claiming to be the killer of Cheri Jo Bates.

​In 2012, Mike Morford of Zodiac Killer Net interviewed Phil Sins, who stated that despite going to the Riverside Police Department with Paul Avery "where the letters & desktop were discussed or shown", he himself did not get to see them. Therefore, he had no knowledge regarding the contents of the Bates' letters when he drew his original conclusions between the Zodiac and Riverside cases. And neither, have we yet proved, did the Zodiac Killer. This is why the Halloween card and the Zodiac Killer's previous letter, the Little List letter mailed on July 26th 1970, are so curious. If not responsible for any of the Riverside activity, the Zodiac Killer could have been aware of the Cheri Jo Bates case and the Confession letter when he mailed both the Little List letter and Halloween card, because the Inside Detective magazine published on January, 1969 featured both. However, he wouldn't have been aware of the three Bates' letters (had he not been the author).  

Had the Zodiac Killer read the Inside Detective magazine and thought now is the time to plant the seed in investigators minds that he may have been responsible for the Riverside murder? The Confession letter mailed on November 29th 1966 read "She died hard. She squirmed and shook as I chocked her, and her lips twiched. She let out a scream once and I kicked her in the head to shut her up". The Little List letter on July 26th 1970 read "Some I shall tie over ant hills and watch them scream + twich and sqwirm". Did the Zodiac Killer deliberately group this sequence of words together (including the misspelling of twich) to encourage individuals to draw the comparison between both communications and force investigators to strongly consider his involvement in the Riverside murder (and authorship of the Confession letter)? Or were these word comparisons sheer coincidence? Before you draw any conclusions, it is important to consider the Halloween card, which followed three months later.

The whole premise of the Halloween card cover was seemingly chosen on the understanding that when the card was opened it would reveal his name. One notable feature of the card was the prominence of the word "By", followed by the four methods of death. The Zodiac Killer had written "By Fire, By Gun, By Rope and By Knife". The 1966 Confession letter also tempted us with a name, when the author began his typewritten letters with "The Confession", followed by the word "By" and several underscores. The word "By" playing a significant role in both communications. We also have the Halloween theme running through the 1970 card and the Riverside murder of Cheri Jo Bates, whose lifeless body was discovered on Halloween morning. But it's the addition of the "Z" symbol (meant to infer "Zodiac") placed at the foot of the Halloween card that conjures the most interest. The Zodiac Killer had mailed 15 confirmed communications prior to October 27th 1970 (probably in excess of 20), yet he had never once used the letter "Z" to sign off a communication. In fact, no communication subsequent to October 27th 1970, verified or otherwise, ever signed off with the letter "Z".​

​The only time the Zodiac Killer used the letter "Z" as a signature, was in conjunction with Halloween on October 27th 1970. This is what is so interesting about the potential "Z" like signatures accompanying the April 30th 1967 Bates' letters, concerning the murder and discovery of Cheri Jo Bates' body on Halloween morning. Letters that the Zodiac Killer would have had no knowledge of on October 27th 1970, unless he was the unlikely author of these three communications. Of course, the signatures on the Bates' letters may not have been the letter "Z", and the "Z" signature on the Halloween card may just have been a fortunate coincidence, but these three letters would have been unknown to Phil Sins when he contacted Paul Avery about a Zodiac connection. So, I suppose the discovery of the Bates' letters was an added bonus to Paul Avery when he entered the Riverside Police Department in 1970, and ultimately made the "Z" connection between the cases. Was it extremely fortunate for the Zodiac Killer to tie together Halloween, the prominent wording of "by" and the perceived "Z" signature - in combination with the common phraseology between the Little List letter and Confession letter, just three months previously - or did the Zodiac Killer have inside information through law enforcement and/or the newspapers, thereby enabling him to create the seed in the mind of investigators - or was he involved in the murder and/or letter writing in Riverside four years earlier?

The Zodiac Killer may have done exactly the same thing on November 8th 1969 when he claimed seven victims within the Dripping Pen card, forcing investigators to draw the conclusion he was responsible for the murder of Kathie Snoozy and Debra Furlong in San Jose on August 3rd 1969 by the addition of "Aug" in his chronological list of months. As he did on March 22nd 1971, mailing us another cryptic card, this time encouraging investigators to connect him to the Donna Lass disappearance on September 6th 1970 by the addition of "Lake Tahoe areas" and "Sought Victim 12". Once Paul Avery had connected the Riverside and Zodiac murders together, the Zodiac Killer then cemented that notion by giving "credit for stumbling across his Riverside activity". However, not once did he ever categorically claim or prove these murders were his. He only let investigators draw such a conclusion.