Paul Avery The information provided here will be nothing new to people who have read the comments of the previous article, but I wanted to expand on that article for people who don't want to trawl through the comments section.
On November 16th 1970 Paul Avery produced a comprehensive newspaper article about a potential connection of Zodiac to the Riverside murder of Cheri Jo Bates and the associated communications, which included the Desktop Poem. The newspaper article detailed the two Confession letters mailed on November 29th 1966 and read "Two unstamped envelopes, one addressed in large black print to the Riverside Press-Enterprise, the other to "Homicide Detail", were dropped into a rural mailbox". The newspaper article then detailed the three "She/Bates Had to Die" letters from April 30th 1967 and the writing on the Riverside Desktop Poem.
The only communication featured visually on November 16th 1970 was the "She Had to Die" envelope mailed to the "Press Enterprise" newspaper, with two 4 cent Abraham Lincoln stamps issued on November 19th 1965 (see image below). In other words, Abraham Lincoln was integral to the "She Had to Die" envelope and the Paul Avery article. The next communication mailed by the Zodiac Killer to Paul Avery was the Pines postcard on March 22nd 1971 featuring 4 cent pre-stamped Abraham Lincoln postage from 1962. The Pines postcard had insufficient postage for 1971, yet the Zodiac Killer chose this postcard from 9 years earlier. Was this a deliberate choice to mimic the postage from the "She Had to Die" envelope and send a subtle message to Paul Avery? The Pines postcard was the first and only time the Zodiac Killer used Abraham Lincoln postage during his known reign of terror. Ordinarily I would say this was coincidence, until you consider the Confession letter envelope mailed to the Riverside Press-Enterprise as well.
On November 16th 1970 Paul Avery produced a comprehensive newspaper article about a potential connection of Zodiac to the Riverside murder of Cheri Jo Bates and the associated communications, which included the Desktop Poem. The newspaper article detailed the two Confession letters mailed on November 29th 1966 and read "Two unstamped envelopes, one addressed in large black print to the Riverside Press-Enterprise, the other to "Homicide Detail", were dropped into a rural mailbox". The newspaper article then detailed the three "She/Bates Had to Die" letters from April 30th 1967 and the writing on the Riverside Desktop Poem.
The only communication featured visually on November 16th 1970 was the "She Had to Die" envelope mailed to the "Press Enterprise" newspaper, with two 4 cent Abraham Lincoln stamps issued on November 19th 1965 (see image below). In other words, Abraham Lincoln was integral to the "She Had to Die" envelope and the Paul Avery article. The next communication mailed by the Zodiac Killer to Paul Avery was the Pines postcard on March 22nd 1971 featuring 4 cent pre-stamped Abraham Lincoln postage from 1962. The Pines postcard had insufficient postage for 1971, yet the Zodiac Killer chose this postcard from 9 years earlier. Was this a deliberate choice to mimic the postage from the "She Had to Die" envelope and send a subtle message to Paul Avery? The Pines postcard was the first and only time the Zodiac Killer used Abraham Lincoln postage during his known reign of terror. Ordinarily I would say this was coincidence, until you consider the Confession letter envelope mailed to the Riverside Press-Enterprise as well.
"BATES HAD TO DIE" ENVELOPE (1967, NOT 1966 AS SHOWN IN THE NEWSPAPER}
The Confession letter envelope mailed to the Press-Enterprise newspaper (see below) also featured in the Paul Avery article on November 16th 1970, and was "addressed in large black print". This envelope contained the footnote of "attn: crime", meant for the crime department of their newspaper. As stated above, the next Zodiac communication addressed to Paul Avery was the Pines postcard carrying the footnote "att. Paul averly=chronicle" on the address side. Both of these footnotes were unconventionally placed in the bottom left corner under the address of the newspapers, rather than top and center, above the address. Since Paul Avery was involved in the coverage of "crime", both communications made a point of addressing the relevant personnel within the newspaper, using the word "attention". This was also the first and only time the Zodiac Killer did this in any of his correspondence. We now had the 4c Abraham Lincoln postage and "attention" seemingly mimicked from the Confession and "She Had to Die" envelopes, mailed to the Press-Enterprise newspaper. The Confession letter envelope to the Press-Enterprise newspaper had been made public on December 1st 1966, so it is possible the Pines card was deliberately engineered by the Zodiac Killer to somewhat mimic this communication.
The final connection is more tenuous, but there is a strong argument that the Riverside Desktop author was reminiscing in the present tense about the attempted murder by knife of Miss Atwood. She was stabbed several times on the Riverside campus by Rolland Taft on April 13th 1965, but managed to escape and survive. Here is a relevant snippet from a previous article:
All we have to do to connect the desktop poem with the Confession letter, is look at the title of the desktop poem, which reads "Sick of living/unwilling to die". The desktop poem begins with "Sick of living", and the Confession letter states "I am not sick. I am insane". The desktop poem title uses the word "unwilling", to which the Confession letter states "She was then very willing to talk to me" and "She went very willingly". One referenced an unwillingness to die, whereas one claimed Cheri Jo Bates went "willingly" to her death. In other words, Miss Atwood resisted her death and didn't die "that time", but Cheri Jo Bates died hard and willingly. The desktop poem title uses the phrase "to die", with the Confession letter stating "I said it was about time. She asked me "about time for what". I said it was about time for her to die". This brings forth another connection between both communications with the word "time" central to both. The desktop poem uses the word "time" twice, when stating "She won't die, this time someone'll find her. Just wait till next time", whereas the Confession letter uses the word "time" three times by stating "I said it was about time. She asked me "about time for what". I said it was about time for her to die". We have the words "sick", "unwilling" (in root form) and "time" from the desktop poem, used 6 times in the Confession letter by way of "sick", "willing", "willingly", "time", "time" and "time". In fact, the words "die" and "time" are used in the same context in both communications by the sentences "she won't die, this time someone'll find her" and "I said it was about time for her to die". If you add in the three Bates letters of "Bates had to die", "She had to die" and "She had to die" into the equation, we have the phrase "to die" used 5 times in all three communications.
Miss Atwood escaped the clutches of Rolland Lin Taft in 1965, expressed by the desktop author when they stated "she won't die, this time someone'll find her", but reminded everybody that the next time Cheri Jo Bates wouldn't be so lucky by finishing the poem with "Just wait till next time. rh". That "next time" may well have been Riverside, Halloween, denoted by a lower case "r" and "h".
All we have to do to connect the desktop poem with the Confession letter, is look at the title of the desktop poem, which reads "Sick of living/unwilling to die". The desktop poem begins with "Sick of living", and the Confession letter states "I am not sick. I am insane". The desktop poem title uses the word "unwilling", to which the Confession letter states "She was then very willing to talk to me" and "She went very willingly". One referenced an unwillingness to die, whereas one claimed Cheri Jo Bates went "willingly" to her death. In other words, Miss Atwood resisted her death and didn't die "that time", but Cheri Jo Bates died hard and willingly. The desktop poem title uses the phrase "to die", with the Confession letter stating "I said it was about time. She asked me "about time for what". I said it was about time for her to die". This brings forth another connection between both communications with the word "time" central to both. The desktop poem uses the word "time" twice, when stating "She won't die, this time someone'll find her. Just wait till next time", whereas the Confession letter uses the word "time" three times by stating "I said it was about time. She asked me "about time for what". I said it was about time for her to die". We have the words "sick", "unwilling" (in root form) and "time" from the desktop poem, used 6 times in the Confession letter by way of "sick", "willing", "willingly", "time", "time" and "time". In fact, the words "die" and "time" are used in the same context in both communications by the sentences "she won't die, this time someone'll find her" and "I said it was about time for her to die". If you add in the three Bates letters of "Bates had to die", "She had to die" and "She had to die" into the equation, we have the phrase "to die" used 5 times in all three communications.
Miss Atwood escaped the clutches of Rolland Lin Taft in 1965, expressed by the desktop author when they stated "she won't die, this time someone'll find her", but reminded everybody that the next time Cheri Jo Bates wouldn't be so lucky by finishing the poem with "Just wait till next time. rh". That "next time" may well have been Riverside, Halloween, denoted by a lower case "r" and "h".
Thanks to Ricardo Gomez Ricardo Gomez of Mk-Zodiac showed the possible inspiration for the Riverside Desktop poem through a newspaper article from - you've guessed it - the Press Enterprise once more. The newspaper carried the headline "Clean-Cut Youth Sought in Stabbing". This was the referring to the attempted murder of Miss Atwood, who undoubtedly would have had "blood spurting, dripping and spilling" over her dress. But the Desktop Poem began with "cut, clean", appearing to mimic the newspaper headline. The Desktop Poem seemed to borrow from the Press-Enterprise headline of "Clean-Cut Youth Sought in Stabbing" from April 17th 1965, as did the Pines postcard when it used the pasted word "Sought", despite being sourced from a later newspaper headline. If this last observation isn't stretching the truth too much, we now have the 4c Abraham Lincoln postage, the "attention" attribution in the bottom left corner, and the word "sought" from the Pines postcard relevant to the three Riverside "communications" from 1966 and 1967.
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