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Richard Grinell, Coventry, England
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A BETRAYAL OF TRUST

9/26/2018

 
When Stephanie Guttman turned down the opportunity to accompany Cheri Jo Bates to the Riverside City College library on the afternoon of October 30th 1966, did she make alternative arrangements that ultimately led to her early demise. Despite entering the library to acquire her reading material shortly after opening time, she left within minutes. Nobody remembers seeing the young girl from 6:30 pm to 9.00 pm that evening, indicating she exited the library and went elsewhere. She wasn't murdered until approximately 10:30 pm that night, when screams were heard in the vicinity of the alleyway. At approximately 9:30 pm a female student purportedly noticed a man standing in the fateful alleyway smoking a cigarette and exchanged brief greetings with him. It is therefore clear that Cheri Jo Bates had been murdered subsequent to this encounter. The following observations take a new approach to the murder of Cheri Jo Bates, based upon the structure and wording of the 'Confession' letter mailed one month later. 
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Everything contained in the 'Confession' letter was information readily available in the newspapers, however, this doesn't necessarily indicate that the author of the letter wasn't the killer. But there is a narrative in the letter that completely flies in the face of what was possible. The author of the 'Confession' letter described the middle wire of the distributor being pulled, the small knife and the cutting of the throat, which were all reported in the newspapers and totally correct, yet gave the impression that everything happened in one continuous timeline, which was impossible. The impression given, is of a woman who enters the library while her vehicle is being disabled, and then exits to find her car won't start. The good Samaritan then offers her assistance and escorts her to a promise of a lift in his vehicle just down the street, before stabbing her. We know Cheri Jo Bates wasn't murdered between 6:00 pm and 9:30 pm, so why does the author cover all his bases in convincing the reader he is the killer, but fail so horribly with the timeline?

Many details of the crime were printed in the newspapers, including an "awful scream between 10:15 pm and 10:45 pm and then a loud sound like an old car starting up". The author of the letter uses this scream in his letter, stating "she let out a scream once and I kicked her in the head," along with the presence of his vehicle: "I told her that my car was down the street and that I would give her a lift home".  However, if he knew she had exited the library to find her car disabled, then his story doesn't work from the standpoint of a 10:15 pm to 10:45 pm attack, as the library closed at 9:00 pm. Besides, he stated he followed her out of the library after about 2 minutes, and we know she left prior to 6:30 pm. Why is the author (if the killer) trying to give the impression that Cheri Jo Bates never left the campus that evening, when clearly her movements were unknown for approximately 4 hours?

The author blatantly disregards the time of 10:15 pm and 10:45 pm in his continuous timeline, but certainly makes use of the scream and vehicle, to give us the impression he had killed Cheri Jo Bates moments after she exited the library. Does he weave his vehicle into the story to convince us he had to travel a reasonable distance to arrive near the alleyway, and therefore lives a reasonable distance away, when in actual fact he lived within walking distance of the Riverside campus. If the author of the 'Confession' letter was the Zodiac Killer, he may have used this tactic nearly three years later, when using his vehicle as evidence he didn't live close to the payphone at Springs and Tuolumne after the attack at Blue Rock Springs.

If Cheri Jo Bates had left the library annex voluntarily before 6:30 pm and hooked up with somebody who lived nearby - who then escorted her back to her vehicle at around 10:30 pm, then the disabling of her vehicle could have taken place while she was present during an altercation. This would explain both windows rolled down, the right door being possibly ajar and the keys present in the ignition. A murder at approximately 10:30 pm with little passing traffic is an altogether more likely scenario, particularly when we consider the screams heard by eyewitnesses.

The author and killer would have been unaware at the point of writing, of a female student and man present in the alleyway with no body, and was desperate to shift the timeline 4 hours earlier, thereby ruling out any possibility of Cheri Jo Bates having ever left the campus to a nearby residence with somebody she knew. The use of his vehicle in the letter was the window dressing, to paint a completely different picture to the one that really happened that night - that Cheri Jo Bates was escorted from the campus on foot at around 6:30 pm by somebody she trusted. Somebody that would eventually betray that trust a mere 4 hours later.

BB
9/26/2018 05:27:37 pm

Richard
Could CJB have been taken out to dinner on a date - having stomach contents about 2-4hrs old present at her time of death 10:30pm. You may conclude that she was on a date - and that she went willing - as she was not removed form campus then forced to eat a nice meal. Therefore some two to four hours prior to death the earliest at about 6:30pm she went with "him" to a decent restaurant, if her stomach contents were steak and vegetables. It had to have been someone she knew. Who goes to dinner on the cuff with a complete stranger? Do I have the time line correct? Or, am I off? It is a rough speculation. I think you're really going somewhere with this time line. I think it can be organized to figure out what exactly happened on that Oct 30 (Devil's Night) in 1966. Did she get in an argument with him afterwards? I think you intimate that possible altercation? But, yes he was known to her. It is the only logical deduction.

Richard
9/27/2018 02:04:22 am

Cheri Jo Bates, it has been proven, ate a meal at approximately 4:30 pm at home, deemed to be consistent with the contents in her stomach at autopsy. She was a weight conscious woman and therefore extremely unlikely that she ate a second Sunday meal consistent with her original meal. I have written an article about pinpointing the time of death based on stomach contents, but in truth, the ability to use this to accurately calculate her time of death is flawed. I recently watched a documentary series called Murder, Mystery and My Family reviewing historic crimes which an expert in this topic stated "You can look at the normal rate of transit of food through the gut, but it makes the assumption that the person is digesting normally the whole time and that their broadly within the normal parameters for an average person. It's dangerous to pinpoint time of death by gastric transit and the rest of it, and is just not done. Even today the bracket of timing is plus or minus over 2.5 hours (over the same time period in a case similar to CJB)."
If she had gone to a restaurant for a prolonged period of time, couldn't we argue that the people who served the young woman, or possibly other patrons, would not have come forward when they read the newspaper coverage of her death in the days after the crime. The fact that nobody saw her whatsoever in these critical 4 hours is telling. She was likely out of public gaze.

Judith
9/27/2018 08:44:51 am

So really we have this incredible trail of evidence left behind by the Zodiac in the form of letters written, some in his own handwriting. I believe I read that law enforcement determined that the writer of the confession letter had knowledge and details of the murder which only the killer would know? Based on what evidence do you have regarding Cheri Jo immediately leaving the library? Your belief is that she left the library area and then returns later where she was murdered in the nearby alley? So yes, if that happened, where did she go and where are the eye witnesses who may have seen her during those hours? Did he lure her away? If so why did he return to the library to commit the murder? " let me take you back to your car" Pretty Chancey. Weird something doesn't match up here...

Richard
9/27/2018 10:44:14 am

No, there is nothing in the Confession letter that couldn't have been gleaned from the newspapers, including the middle wire of the distributor - described in the newspapers as the coil wire.
"The ignition coil is the unit that takes your relatively weak battery power and turns it into a spark powerful enough to ignite fuel vapor. Inside a a traditional ignition coil are two coils of wire on top of each other. These coils are called windings. One winding is called the primary winding, the other is the secondary. The primary winding gets the juice together to make a spark and the secondary sends it out the door to the distributor.
You'll see three contacts on an ignition coil, unless it has an external plug, in which case the contacts are hidden inside the case. The large contact in the middle is where the coil wire goes (the wire that links the coil to the distributor cap."
If she met somebody she knew and went to a nearby residence, then was escorted back to her vehicle, he may have wanted more than Cheri wanted to give, and lost control. He wouldn't be the first man who couldn't take rejection.
I don't know if the above article is correct, it is just a suggestion and a new approach to interpreting the letter. Of course, it may be totally wrong.

RTF
9/27/2018 09:01:21 am

I believe the "good samaritan" explanation is a flawed scenario - that is readliy accepted by many, unfortunately.
<br><br>The weather was hot, Cheri had the windows rolled down ready to drive away. A man approaches the car. He has a gun, probably concealed under a jacket over his arm so no one else can see it as he leans in, points the gun at her, and tells Cheri she is going with him.
<br><br>She leaves under duress, and under threat to not make a false move and to appear as if they are walking together normally.
<br><br>It's not logical that Cheri would leave the car unlocked, windows open, with library books in it, and wander off somewhere with someone on a night she was getting set to write a paper for the following day.
<br><br>That Cheri was held somewhere for several hours (with no sign of being gagged and bound) indicates she was held at gunpoint too. Then she was delivered back to the alleyway later on - for a specific reason, I assume.
<br><br>My guess is that her abductor delivered her back to the killer (a spurned suitor?) - who would be alibi'd up for 6.30pm, and who could do the terrible deed under cover of darkness, long after the library was closed.
<br><br>This jibes with Grant's theory of Cheri being held in fear for hours, and that her death involved two assailants.

Tom1
9/27/2018 03:52:30 pm

What if after checking out her books, she left to spend some time with her "boyfriend"? Was that the cover she used to tell her friends so that they wouldn't know that she was going to spend the evening with someone new? A jealous acquaintance, or an accomplice, could have disabled the VW in her absence and waited for her return.

Judith
9/27/2018 09:13:56 am

In that case there is more than one person who knows who the Killer is

BB
9/27/2018 09:31:34 am

These two empty houses CJB was killed between.
Was she held up in one of them and possibly raped?
Did someone else make it look like her car was disabled?
Hence, was there a proper rape test done?

RTF
9/27/2018 09:38:59 am

Yes, Judith. Well technically, both would be the killers. It could be that Cheri was a random victim. A couple of guys doing something gruesome for halloween kicks.

Judith
9/27/2018 10:00:06 am

Then who wrote the confession letter? Did I read that it was typed out on something that looked like teletype paper torn at the bottom or was that a different zodiac letter? Also I believe the byline had a specific number of spaces to denote his name. What kind of a person has knowledge of tracing of typewriters enough to send a very degraded carbon copy? Seems like someone who is educated in police forensic techniques. It is my personal belief that all law enforcement officer's DNA should be submitted and kept on file, if you know what I mean.


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