Mailed from Santa Clara or San Mateo County on December 27th 1974, the "Mary Pilker Christmas Card" became the second obvious communication about Donna Lass that has been connected to the Zodiac Killer case (she was the sister of Donna). The "Pines" postcard on March 22nd 1971 was clearly mailed by the Zodiac Killer, but what can be reasonably concluded about this festive offering 3 1/2 years later? A comprehensive argument has been put forward to reason that the Zodiac Killer was responsible for the deposition of Donna Lass' remains by Chubb Lake, near Yuba Gap and Camp Spaulding in Placer County, despite not being conclusive.

​If the Zodiac Killer was not the murderer of Donna Lass in 1970, then it would seem rather fortuitous that he used phrases like "pass Lake Tahoe areas", "around in the snow", "Sierra Club" and "Peek through the Pines", pasted onto an advertisement of Incline Village and directing us westwards, if he didn't know the burial site of Donna Lass. Not withstanding the fact that measurements between the Clair Tappaan Lodge "Sierra Club" and the punchhole in the postcard pinpointed the exact location her skull and jawbone were found in 1985/1986. This location in September 1970 was covered in several feet of snow amidst the pine trees, and was only accessible by vehicle from Highway 20 via Chubb Lake Road, Forty-Niner Way and Gonelson Canyon Road. Access to this area from Highway 20 looked extremely similar to the imagery present on the "Mary Pilker Christmas Card". Below I have added a little snow to the entrance of Chubb Lake and placed it alongside the Mary Pilker greeting card for comparison. We had to "peek through the pines" to discover the burial location.

The body of Donna Lass could have been disposed of in many ways by her killer, but both of these cards on March 22nd 1971 and December 27th 1974 featured snow and pine trees, which is exactly where her skull and jawbone were ultimately found "in 2 inches of snow" surrounded by pines. A killer such as Zodiac, who emphasized the afterlife in numerous communications throughout his campaign of terror, appeared to be suggesting that the spirit of (Saint) Donna Lass was now acting as a "Guardan of the Pines" - and by extension - was buried "around in the snow" close to somewhere resembling the imagery in the Mary Pilker greeting card.

I have scoured the internet for further clues to this mystery but have come up empty-handed, other than one reference to a Saint Domna of Nicomedia, who was a priestess of idols in the imperial palace in Nicomedia. She converted to Christianity after reading the Epistles of Saint Paul and was baptized by Bishop Cyril along with her servant. When Emperor Maximian discovered her true identity, he ordered her arrest and execution. The precise circumstances vary in different accounts, but she was ultimately martyred, often associated with the persecution that led to the martyrdom of 20,000 Christians on Christmas Day in Nicomedia. Despite the spelling of her name being slightly different, it must be noted that she was executed by beheading, with her life being commemorated every year on December 28th, the day the author of the Mary Pilker greeting card might have expected his December 27th 1974 offering to arrive at Sioux Falls in South Dakota by air mail. Although disturbing to contemplate, we know that the only remains of Donna Lass to be found was her head (skull and jawbone), so we don't know for certain if the entirety of her remains were transported to the area of Chubb Lake in Placer County.

If the roadway entrance to Chubb Lake was impassable due to the fall of snow in September 1970 (and assuming the remains were found in 1985/1986 where the killer deposited them), it would be almost impossible for the responsible to carry a body from Highway 20 to the location just east of Chubb Lake, which is described as "a mile northeast of Interstate 80" in the newspaper cutting above. The killer would have had to carry (or drag) Donna Lass 500 meters across mountainous and snowy terrain from the nearest access point on Highway 20..However, carrying just a head would be relatively easy. I don't want to belabor this grisly thought, but the Zodiac Killer didn't need to direct law enforcement to the entirety of her remains to prove he was responsible for her murder. The transport of an "offering" such as this from an area close to the Sahara Tahoe Hotel to Chubb Lake (about 70 miles) would have carried far less risk. 

If the Zodiac Killer was responsible for the Mary Pilker greeting card, was it a deliberate choice to send this communication at Christmas time, when he was able to deliver a veiled and sinister communication inferring the burial location of Donna Lass that would incorporate a festive scene to include "pines" and "snow"? Or was the date of December 28th an overriding factor in the author's decision to mail this greeting card just after Christmas day?​

​ANALYZING THE PINES POSTCARD WITH RESPECT TO THE LOCATION OF DONNA'S REMAINS
​​​PLOTTING THE DISTANCE OF THE DEAD ZONE
ZODIAC KILLER THREATS TO INCLINE VILLAGE IN NOVEMBER 1969

The newspaper coverage regarding the disappearance of Donna Lass began on September 22nd 1970 and continued with a flurry of articles until the end of the month. This was the period of time the Zodiac Killer was constructing his "13-Hole" postcard taking cuttings from the San Francisco Chronicle (September 23rd 1970), San Francisco Examiner (September 25th 1970) and Oakland Tribune (September 25th 1970). We know that the Zodiac responded to recent newspaper coverage about himself and random stories, so was he manufacturing and designing the "13-Hole" postcard in reponse to the unfolding story of Donna Lass.

​It had been documented that somebody claiming to be the Zodiac Killer had already contacted Incline Village (and other areas nearby), threatening to target school buses in late November and the first half of December.of 1969, which predated by over a year the Zodiac Boise Cascade advertisement at Incline Village, that he used in his "Pines" postcard on March 22nd 1971. If the threats to the Lake Tahoe region lasting several weeks in 1969 were the Zodiac Killer, then he had every reason to be following the story of a missing woman in Lake Tahoe in 1970, whether he was her murderer.or not. He would also have threatened several "Lake Tahoe areas" in 1969 before telling us to "pass Lake Tahoe areas" on March 22nd 1971. In fact, the Sacramento Bee newspaper article on December 15th 1969 just happens to contain the words "passed", "Lake Tahoe" and "areas" (shown below in blue)..

The "13-Hole" postcard, postmarked October 6th 1970, not only contained a running victim total of 13 to mirror his count on July 26th 1970, but he added a red crucifix directly underneath. The number 13 had a small line extending from the newspaper cutting on its bottom face, as if to indicate that the crucifix may play a role in the victim total. Was the Zodiac Killer expressing that he had currently killed 13 people to date, with one victim yet to be found, which he symbolized by the addition of a grave marker in the form of a crucifix?

​This was the only time the Zodiac Killer added a crucifix to his communications, and the only time he would have been playing into the narrative of a victim still currently alive and missing in the eyes of law enforcement. One can only speculate on its purpose, but if the Zodiac Killer had murdered Donna Lass and buried her in a grave at Yuba Gap in Placer County, the crucifix could signify a burial site. The Zodiac Killer, by not adding Donna Lass to the running total in the conventional manner, could have been the precursor to the game he would ultimately play 5 1/2 months later. A game that possibly came to fruition when he mailed the "Pines" postcard on March 22nd 1971 and added a fourteenth punch-hole in sinister fashion. 

A red crucifix most often represents the blood of Christ and the sacrifice of his crucifixion. In this instance, the Zodiac Killer may have been using this color to depict the murder of Donna Lass and a burial marker to his fourteenth victim, that he would cryptically suggest on October 27th 1970, and further elaborate upon on March 22nd 1971. However, did the red crucifix have a dual purpose as a red cross, bearing in mind Donna Lass was a nurse. The relationship between the Red Cross and nursing dates back to the influence of Florence Nightingale, who inspired the organization's founding and subsequent work in wartime and disaster nursing. Historically, nurses wore the Red Cross emblem for protection under the Geneva Conventions, though this is now rare outside of armed conflict. The Red Cross has a long-standing and deep connection to nursing in America, dating back to its founder, Clara Barton, a nurse and humanitarian. The American Red Cross relies heavily on the expertise of nurses and other health professionals as volunteers and staff to support disaster relief, community health initiatives, and blood drives. 

Irrespective of these speculative offerings, we definitely have a "Zodiac" threat on school buses around Lake Tahoe in 1969, a "13-Hole" postcard being designed by the Zodiac Killer the day after the disappearance of Donna Lass from Lake Tahoe was reported in the newspapers, and a "Pines" postcard stating "pass Lake Tahoe areas" with a further punch-hole. If the Zodiac Killer had sourced all his cuttings from the newspapers for the "13-Hole" postcard by September 25th 1970, why did he wait over a week into October to mail this communication? Was he waiting for the news stories of Donna Lass to fade away, to see if anything needed to be added to the postcard?

The prolonged threats toward school buses and schools in Lake Tahoe over several weeks in November and December 1969 mirrored the "Zodiac" threats toward school teacher Daniel Williams, which lasted from October 23rd 1969 to November 5th 1969. If they were hoaxers, they were certainly persistent ones.   

MORE ON THE "PACE" POSTCARD CUTTINGS ​

A while ago I wrote an article on the newspaper sources used in the construction of the October 6th 1970 "13-Hole" postcard, unearthed by many different contributors. Jarrett Kobek, author of "Motor Spirit" and "How to find Zodiac", identified the September 23rd 1970 San Francisco Chronicle article that contained the upside-down text of "THERE ARE REPORTS".. So I did a little extra digging and found that the overwhelming majority of the upside-down text can be found in this article (shown below).  The upside-down text read "There are reports city police pig cops are closeing in on me. Fk I'm crackproof. What is the price tag now". Everything in red can be sourced from this single article on page 54 of the San Francisco Chronicle. The word "I'm" can be found next to this article on page 54. On page 53 we can find "What is" (with the uppercase W). And on page 29 we can find "the price", "The price" and "double in price" (in darker print). However, these two words were not cut out together, so it's clear that the Zodiac Killer, knowing the message he wanted to send, originally sourced (and possibly pasted) the word "the" from the article below, before flicking back through the pages to the "Business Section" he had already read in order to find the word "price". This would have been the likeliest page to find this word. It can be found on page 53 along with "What is", so this is an option too. Everything in the upside-down Zodiac text was therefore sourced from three pages of the San Francisco Chronicle newspaper (pages 29, 53, 54). It must be noted that the word "pig", "closeing", "crackproof" and "tag" were all created using two cuttings (or more). 

The rest of the newspapers identified for the remainder of the text on the "13-Hole" postcard were found by Vasa Croe, Brubaker, Cragle and Jibberjabber. If I've missed anybody, please let me know. In total, three newspapers were identified: The San Francisco Chronicle on September 23rd 1970, The San Francisco Examiner on September 25th 1970 and the Oakland Tribune on September 25th 1970. These cuttings were sourced from newspapers published just one and three days after the news broke about the disappearance of Donna Lass from the Sahara Tahoe Hotel & Casino at Lake Tahoe. Donna Lass went missing on September 6th 1970, the newspapers first reported her disappearance on September 22nd 1970, and the upside-down text was sourced from the San Francisco Chronicle on September 23rd 1970. So was the "13-Hole" postcard a response to the abduction of Donna Lass?

​In an earlier article I examined the upside-down text "around in the snow" on the "Pines" postcard, believing that it may have signified the area where the body of Donna Lass could be found - and if we righted this text through 180 degrees by turning the postcard around, the "Sierra Club" pasting (Clair Tappaan Lodge) and the punch-hole would likely identify the location of Donna Lass' burial site. I believe it did to incredible accuracy. The upside-down text for the "13-Hole" postcard was sourced from the San Francisco Chronicle on September 23rd 1970, which was the day after her disappearance from the Sahara Tahoe Hotel & Casino was first reported in the newspapers. So was this text sourced with the express purpose of highlighting something about Donna Lass? The "13-Hole" postcard and "Pines" postcard both had inverted text and punch-holes.

Were the 13 punch-holes on the "13-Hole" postcard signifying the burial sites of his 13 victims? The Zodiac Killer victim total hadn't increased from July 26th 1970 to the time the "13-Hole" postcard arrived at the San Francisco Chronicle, so why didn't the Zodiac Killer increase his victim count in October to include Donna Lass from September 6th 1970, if he was her murderer? Was it because she was only currently recognised as a disappearance and the Zodiac Killer wanted to play games with law enforcement, which he would ultimately achieve when he mailed the "Pines" postcard on March 22nd 1971? Or was he writing "13" on the postcard as confirmation, because his July 26th 1970 letter claiming the same number of victims, was not currently published in the newspapers.   

But what was the article about on page 29 of the San Francisco Chronicle on September 23rd 1970, the day after Donna's disappearance was first reported in the newspapers, that the Zodiac Killer may have sourced to use the word "price" for his upside-down text on the "13-Hole" postcard? The Zodiac Killer had three choices on the same page. One was about the Sanoma mines, one was about stock prices, and the other was about the Boise Cascade Corporation, the very company whose advertisement he had used on the "Pines" postcard on March 22nd 1971. Therefore, a fighting possibility exists that the Zodiac Killer used a cutting about the Boise Cascade Corporation for both postcards, indelibly linking them together.  

As pointed out earlier, the Zodiac Killer also took cuttings from the Oakland Tribune on September 25th 1970, three days after Donna Lass was reported missing. If the Zodiac Killer had buried Donna Lass west of Clair Tappaan Lodge and the Boise Cascade Corporation developments at Incline Village, did he select the word "price" from the above page of the Chronicle newspaper article, knowing that he would later mail a cryptic postcard mentioning the "Lake Tahoe areas" and provide us with a further cutting from the Boise Cascade Corporation, but this time with directions to her remains? Even if the word "price" was not sourced directly from the Boise Cascade article above, and he instead opted to cut the word "price" from the darker "double in price" text on page 29, he would still have used two San Francisco Chronicle newspaper pages containing Boise Cascade articles to fashion both postcards. When the San Francisco Chronicle published this advertisement about Boise Cascade at Incline Village on March 19th 1971, did the Zodiac Killer seize his opportunity and decide to reveal the burial site of Donna Lass?. The Oakland Tribune on September 20th 1970 also ran an article about the Boise Cascade Corporation (see below). However, they mentioned "Incline Village", five days before the Zodiac Killer may have taken "price" from a Boise Cascade newspaper article, six months before he mailed a postcard on March 22nd 1971, using a Boise Cascade advertisement depicting Incline Village. .     

The Sierra Nevada mountain range straddles the border of California and Nevada, and encompasses the region of Lake Tahoe, the main focus in the "Pines" postcard mailed on March 22nd 1971, which gives us cryptic directions to the gravesite of Donna Lass. The young 25-year-old nurse went missing from the Sahara Tahoe Hotel & Casino in Stateline, Nevada on September 6th 1970, her whereabouts unknown until December 2023 when her partial remains were discovered about 20 miles west of Lake Tahoe's northern tip by a local fisheman.

During the prime Zodiac activity of letter writing between July 31st 1969 and July 13th 1971, the Zodiac Killer only ever laid claim to one murder outside of California, and that was Donna Lass from the state of Nevada. That is probably why the May 6th 1986 letter stated that the "body count" was growing all over the state of California and Nevada, despite abbreviating Nevada incorrectly. However, bearing in mind the only reasonable murder victim outside of California to be identified thus far was Donna Lass, who disappeared from a state that shares a border with California, it can be strongly argued that the Zodiac Killer was referencing the state of Nevada on May 6th 1986. The Zodiac Killer for the first time claimed the "body count" was growing, not the victim count. This may suggest that a body (or remains) had been found which consequently (and in part) increased the Zodiac total, rather than solely a confession of recent murders.          

The May 6th 1986 letter was claiming the recent double murder of Laotian couple Koy Ien Saechao (48) and Choy Fow Saelee (40), who were gunned down in their 1983 Mercury Cougar near the interchange of Highway 99 and I-5 in Sacramento by 15 small caliber bullets. They had been murdered between 3:15 am and 7:30 am on April 22nd 1986, in what appeared to be a motiveless and random attack. The Zodiac Killer was claiming these latest killings in his total of 100+, but didn't write "the victim count is growing all over the state of California and Nevada", by instead choosing to write "the body count is growing all over the state of California and Nevada".

​This may be extremely telling, when you consider that the remains of Donna Lass were discovered in late December 1985 and January 1986, yet she wasn't identified until December 2023. In other words, when both the skull and jawbone were discovered by January 19th 1986, nobody was aware that they were the remains of Donna Lass but for her killer. So it's quite remarkable that the Zodiac Killer referred to a "body count", including the state of Nevada for the first time, just three months after the discovery of her remains.

​The previous victim count announced by the Zodiac Killer dated back to the "Exorcist" letter on January 29th 1974, which amounted to a duration of over 12 years. To put this into perspective, the Zodiac Killer was now claiming a new "body count" that included Nevada, only three months after the remains of Donna Lass were found, 147 months after his last victim total. That is impeccable timing or extremely fortuitous, to not only invoke the word "body" in his count, but to include the state of Nevada where Donna Lass went missing from.          

The last time the Zodiac added a "plus" sign after his running kill count was when he wrote "17+" on March 13th 1971, insinuating the distant murder of Cheri Jo Bates in Riverside on October 30th 1966, about 4 1/2 years previous. The "plus" sign probably denoting the belated addition of this victim from many years ago. He did exactly the same on May 6th 1986, a few short months after the remains of Donna Lass were found, nearly 16 years after she was likely murdered. The addition sign used in 1986, when he wrote "the body count is growing now 100+", could mean exactly the same thing - that we should be looking for a long dead victim in Nevada in this instance, rather than Riverside. Two distant murders, both accompanied by a retrospective "plus" sign, may be suggestive that law enforcement (SFPD) should now credit each of the belated discoveries to his, the Zodiac Killer's running victim total. It must also be noted that the March 13th 1971 and May 6th 1986 letters were the only two Zodiac communications to sign off in this fashion (and order), with the mocking SFPD = 0, followed by the crosshairs and a hyphen, and then the running victim total and addition sign (see below).        

The newspaper articles above highlight a "Skull found in Sierra" and "Human remains found in Sierra" by Melvin Bennett in "two inches of snow", so it's pertinent to recollect how the Zodiac chose to emphasize the upside-down phrase "around in the snow", while using the "Sierra Club" pasting as a place marker on the "Pines" postcard. It is fairly clear at this point that the March 22nd 1971 "Pines" postcard with directions such a "pass Lake Tahoe areas" and a punch-hole, was pinpointing the location of Donna Lass' burial site. Factor in the observations made about the 1986 letter above, with the calculated measurements of the postcard which clearly showed the punch-hole landing squarely over the area her remains were found, and we seemingly have an author who knew exactly the burial location of Donna Lass, and the time period the skull and jawbone were found by Melvin Bennett and a later search party, headed by Deputy Lowell Carleton. Why would the Zodiac Killer mention the state of Nevada in 1986 if not for the recent breaking news? Only the killer of Donna Lass would have recognised this location as relevant to her murder and burial site. 

FINDING THE LOCATION OF DONNA LASS' REMAINS USING THE PINES CARD

Many people have questioned why the Zodiac Killer had latched onto the murder of Donna Lass (25) in South Lake Tahoe after she was abducted from the Sahara Tahoe Hotel & Casino on September 6th 1970, when he authored the Pines postcard on March 22nd 1971. Most of his threats centered around San Francisco and the Bay Area, so why did he infer his involvement in the disappearance of Donna Lass, who lived 165 miles away from Vallejo in Stateline, Nevada? Had the Zodiac Killer any previous and/or current connections to this area, that either drew his attention to her case in the newspapers, or did he abduct and murder the young nurse because he had a specific reason to be at that location in September 1970?

​The Zodiac Killer may have chosen Donna Lass as a victim because it was an area he frequently/occasionally visited for business, or had spent some of his time vacationing at Lake Tahoe. As previously mentioned, the Pines postcard mailed on March 22nd 1971 may not have been the first time the Zodiac Killer targeted South Lake Tahoe, when for several weeks in November 1969, during the height of his "bombing campaign" in San Francisco, several telephoned threats to school bus routes in Lake Tahoe were issued to Reno authorities, including Incline Village which became the centerpiece of his Pines card over a year later. The Zodiac Killer used a Forest Pines at Incline Village advertisement from the newspapers to attach to his postcard on March 22nd 1971. So what are the options?​

​Were the November 1969 threats to Lake Tahoe a hoaxer, who decided that the best way to convince law enforcement and the newspapers he was the genuine Bay Area murderer, was to target school buses around Incline Village, 207 miles from San Francisco? The obvious choice for a hoaxer aiming to convince police he was the genuine article, was to continue the threats in San Francisco or the Bay Area.

​However, if the threats were from the Zodiac Killer himself, then branching his terror beyond the Bay Area to spread fear into the wider community (especially somewhere he was familiar with), appears to be something that would satisfy his ego. If these threatening calls to Lake Tahoe occurred in the weeks before the above published newspaper article, then the calls were likely placed between November 3rd 1969 and November 23rd 1969 (if few weeks was a maximum of three). The Zodiac Killer's "Bus Bomb" letter was mailed on November 9th 1969.

​Is it possible that a hoaxer local to the Lake Tahoe area made the threatening calls to generate some "excitement" in the location they lived, which then featured in a Sacramento newspaper on November 24th 1969 and was stumbled across by Zodiac in March 1971, who decided to mail the Pines card with an Incline Village advertisement so as to capitalize on the threats to school buses from 16 months earlier? Is that a realistic scenario, bearing in mind that Donna Lass lived in San Francisco and worked at the Letterman General Hospital in Presidio Park (that Zodiac escaped into), before moving to South Lake Tahoe where she was abducted and murdered. The common thread being the Zodiac Killer.

​Isn't it more likely that the Zodiac Killer made the school bus threats to Lake Tahoe in 1969 because he had some connection to that area, which is why the disappearance of Donna Lass just over nine months later, on September 6th 1970, triggered his interest? He may have decided to claim his involvement in her disappearance (and murder) to continue the theme of Lake Tahoe, and thereby bolster his earlier threats as genuine. If his connection to the Lake Tahoe area was a viable one in 1969, then it is not without merit that he could be responsible for the young 25-year-old nurse's murder, Especially if the Zodiac Killer was familiar with Donna Lass (either directly) or through her friend, Jo Anne Goettsche, whom she lived with at 4122 Balboa Street in San Francisco during the Paul Stine murder (10/11/69). Jo Anne Goettsche had moved to 225 Mallorca Way in the Marina District in 1970 - an area Zodiac appeared to be heading towards as he traveled through Presidio Park on October 11th 1969. Could the Zodiac Killer have known (or become aware) of Jo Anne Goettsche's plans to travel from San Francisco to South Lake Tahoe to visit Donna Lass late on the evening of September 6th 1970? The timing of her disappearance less than 24 hours earlier may be significant. It's extremely unlikely that the Zodiac Killer got wind of Jo Anne Goettsche's intentions, but stranger things have happened.     

Officers in Lake Tahoe discounted the caller's claim that he was the Zodiac slayer, but I wonder what the same officers thought sixteen months later, on March 22nd 1971? 

EXTRA READING: WALKING TOWARDS THE MARINA DISTRICT  

Many people have asked the obvious question of why did the Zodiac Killer make the effort of obtaining a second Halloween card to painstakingly cut out the skeleton from this card to paste onto the October 27th 1970 card we are all familiar with? Thanks to the great work of SmallOrbit from the Reddit platform, we now know the identity of that second Halloween card. The Zodiac Killer would also cut out a rectangular section from around the eyes of a young girl from the inner portion of this second card, to affix onto the skeleton in the appropriate place. It appears as though a additional skeleton was pivotal to the choice of the Zodiac Killer once his October 27th 1970 Halloween card was opened. It may also be significant that he took the time to add the eyes of a female to the skeleton he pasted on his card inner. Bearing in mind that the Zodiac Killer was now claiming a fourteenth victim - and Donna Lass is the only victim he has ever claimed between July 26th 1970 and October 27th 1970 - we could be forgiven for believing the skeleton with the female eyes was meant to be Donna Lass. The thirteen eyes (representing thirteen souls) looking at the latest Zodiac victim in skeletonized form.

This 1970 greeting card, and the Pines postcard on March 22nd 1971, were the only two mailings by the Zodiac Killer to San Francisco Chronicle journalist, Paul Avery. The Pines postcard, with its "Lake Tahoe" reference and punch-hole, is widely believed to be referencing the burial site of Donna Lass. It's almost as though the Zodiac Killer was directing Paul Avery and law enforcement to the remains of Donna Lass on March 22nd 1971, who he had implied was his fourteenth victim by addressing Paul Avery five months earlier. If the Zodiac Killer was claiming Donna Lass as somebody he murdered in the Pines postcard on March 22nd 1971 - and he only raised his victim count by one between July 26th 1970 and October 27th 1970 - then the Halloween card's fourteenth victim had to be Donna Lass, who disappeared between these dates on September 6th 1970. There really isn't any other option.​

Having fashioned thirteen "floating eyes" on the Halloween card inner to possibly represent his previous victims, it may have necessitated the adding of female eyes to the skeleton's skull to represent his current victim. With the choice of a skeleton being representative of the time elapsed between September 6th 1970 and October 27th 1970, and the probability that Donna Lass had been buried in a shallow grave somewhere around Lake Tahoe, unlike his previous victims, who were discovered at the site they were murdered. It's possible that the choice of skeleton was indicative of Zodiac's lack of faith in law enforcement to find Donna Lass in the next few months, until such time he provided additional clues to the police to aid in the discovery of her body (such as the Pines postcard). But why would the Zodiac Killer choose to bury his latest victim, something he had never done before?

​Maybe because of his fascination with puzzles, having previously given us a code and map on June 26th 1970, in which he claimed to have buried a bomb somewhere in northern California. Then followed this up on July 26th 1970 by giving us the phrase "The Mt. Diablo Code concerns Radians & # inches along the radians", to further help pinpoint its location. If the Bay Area murderer was prepared to play games with a bomb, why wouldn't he play games with a body? This isn't beyond comprehension, because he mailed the cryptic Pines postcard on March 22nd 1971 with a punch-hole and associated directional markers, such as "pass Lake Tahoe areas", "Sierra Club" and "around in the snow". These were obvious location points designed to direct law enforcement to a specific area beyond the lake. In 2024, I used the punch-hole and the directional aids on the Pines postcard to identify an area by Chubb Lake and Yuba Gap, just 1,000 meters from where the partial remains of Donna Lass had been discovered in 1986 (but not identified until 2023). The punch-hole sat over the remains of Donna Lass.

It was also interesting that the Zodiac Killer had chosen a 1962 UX48 Abraham Lincoln postal card on March 22nd 1971, lacking postage and issued nine years before this mailing. So was the Abraham Lincoln card chosen for a specific reason? I noticed that the address side of the postcard had the crosshairs and "Zodiac" around the punch-hole, with the upper point of the crosshairs touching the letter "D", which was the first initial of "Donna". Across from this was the "Abraham Lincoln" stamp with the initials "A" and "L". If the punch-hole represented the burial location of Donna, then this could have been fashioned to read "D .A. L" or Donna Ann Lass. The front of the postcard pointing to her name, and the reverse side pointing to her burial location.  ​

Therefore, we have two cards, both addressed to Paul Avery in the space of five months. The Pines postcard appeared like a cryptic puzzle giving us clues to the name and burial location of Donna Lass, with the October 27th 1970 Halloween card only increasing the victim count by one since July 26th 1970, spanning the period that Donna Ann Lass was last seen at the Sahara Tahoe Hotel & Casino. A Halloween card, in which the Zodiac Killer went to great pains to add a second skeleton with female eyes to the card inner.

But what would be the point of burying Donna Lass and playing this quite extraordinary game of "hide and seek" with her body? Even if law enforcement had identified the general area of a possible burial site from the Pines postcard directions, there would be no guarantee they would find the specific location of her body after months or years had elapsed. I wonder if her burial site had been marked by the signature of Zodiac. On something like a heavy rock, that would stand the test of time? Although this may seem unlikely, it falls a long way short of impossible. 

On October 6th 1970, the Zodiac Killer mailed the 13-Hole postcard with the number 13 on the card, so why didn't the Zodiac Killer raise his victim count to fourteen here, if indeed, he was the murderer of Donna Lass on September 6th 1970? It is possible he wasn't ready to yet lay claim to this murder for any number of reasons, but could have pasted the phrase "Fk I'm crackproof" to indicate he had now achieved "Fourteen kills" (or "Fourteen killed") as another cryptic clue. The use of fourteen within this card could have begun the theme of "fourteen", which continued in the Halloween card three weeks later by way of "14" and "4-TEEN". The Halloween card symbol on the envelope and card inner also appeared to have the letter "F" in its design, so the Zodiac may have replaced "Fourteen killed" with "Zodiac Fourteen".

However, this doesn't change the fact that the Zodiac Killer, according to most researchers, was claiming the murder of Donna Lass on March 22nd 1971, and his victim count only increased by one between July 26th 1970 and October 27th 1970. Therefore, the Zodiac Killer, by mailing the Pines postcard on March 22nd 1971, has left us with the inevitable conclusion that the Halloween card must have been claiming Donna Lass as victim number fourteen. This being the case, are we to conclude that the skeleton he pasted onto the Halloween card inner, was the imagery of his misdeeds near Yuba Gap in Placer County? 

If the Zodiac Killer was the abductor and murderer of Donna Lass from the Sahara Tahoe Hotel on September 6th 1970, then one might have expected him to claim or insinuate her murder in his next communication, the 13-Hole postcard. Despite later suggesting his involvement in her murder on March 22nd 1971 when the Pines card was mailed, he never increased his victim count from the July 26th 1970 "Little List" letter to the 13-Hole postcard on October 5th 1970 by the Zodiac Killer, which spanned her abduction. Or did he increase the victim count and we simply didn't recognise it? The Pines postcard and 13-Hole postcard both contained punch-holes (suggestive of victims), both contained pasted text, and both carried inverted wording within the postcard. The inverted phrase of "around in the snow" on March 22nd 1971 was clearly referring to the murder and burial location of Donna Lass, so where was the reference to Donna Lass in the inverted text on October 5th 1970?

The construction of the October 5th 1970 postcard may have began just over two weeks after the disappearance of Donna Lass, because all the newspaper cuttings identified on the postcard were sourced from the Oakland Tribune, San Francisco Chronicle and San Francisco Examiner (all separated by only 9 miles)  The cuttings were taken from publications dated September 23rd and 25th. 

On the day the 13-Hole postcard was mailed, a newspaper article by The Orlando Sentinel carried the headline "Zodiac, Killer Of 5 or 13, Silent As Police Wait". The 13-Hole postcard carried a cutting of the number 13 and used the word "police" in the inverted text - so was this section of text giving us a clue to the total victims killed, which now included Donna Lass? The text read "There are reports city police pig cops are closeing in on me. Fk I'm crackproof. What is the price tag now?" Could this have been cryptic in nature, just like the Pines card mailed 5 1/2 months later, telling us surreptitiously that he was the murderer of Donna Lass and reading "There are reports city police pig cops are closeing in on me. Fourteen killed I'm crackproof. What is the price tag now?" In other words, responding to The Orlando Sentinel headline of "Zodiac, Killer Of 5 or 13" on October 5th 1970 (or earlier newspaper that carried the same or similar question).  

​It would mean that the main body of the postcard was reiterating the victim count from the Little List letter on July 26th 1970, but teasing us with the cryptic clue of "Fk" to suggest that there were now "Fourteen killied" in total. This may have been repeated when the Halloween card arrived 22 days later, on October 27th 1970, when he added 13 "floating eyes" to the card, but added the number "14" on the hand of the first skeleton, placed "4-TEEN" atop of the second skeleton, and used the letter "F" once again in the strange symbol at the foot of the card (and on the envelope). The "F" in "Fk" on the 13-Hole postcard may have denoted the number fourteen. The "F" in the strange symbol on the Halloween card may have also denoted fourteen, by combining "Z" and "F" to give us "Zodiac Fourteen". The four dots giving us a clue that "F" meant fourteen. This would mean that the Zodiac Killer gave us two cryptic clues containing the letter "F" in a span of 22 days. The Zodiac Killer could also have added the 14th punch-hole of his career to the Pines postcard, to make up for the one he deliberately withheld from the 13-Hole postcard on October 5th 1970. A postcard in which he decided to use "Fk" instead. But did the Zodiac Killer specifically invert his text in two postcards to represent one victim? That of Donna Lass.

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.    

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". 

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.

In January 1969 the "Inside Detective" magazine revealed details of the Cheri Jo Bates murder and the Confession letter mailed on November 29th 1966. The young woman was found close to the Riverside City College library on Halloween Day morning (October 31st 1966) by college caretaker, Cleophus Martin​.

Fast forward to October 27th 1970 and the Halloween card mailed by the Zodiac Killer, which Phil Sins believed contained characteristics of her murder and the 1966 typed letter. One of the main features of the Halloween card was the wording By Fire, By Gun, By Rope and By Knife, with the two Confession letters beginning with "The Confession" and the word "By", followed by several underscores. The Halloween card also featured the signature of "Z" for the first time, that three weeks later, on November 16th 1970, would become a pivotal argument of Paul Avery that the Zodiac Killer was claiming the murder of Cheri Jo Bates by using the letter "Z" to sign off two of the "Bates Had to Die" letters on April 30th 1967. In fact, the Halloween card communication used the letter "Z" twice, just like the 1967 letters (which had not been publicly released by October 27th 1970). This, off the back of the Little List letter on July 26th 1970, which contained the line "Some I shall tie over ant hills and watch them scream + twich and sqwirm" and appeared to borrow wording from the Confession letter. However, this falls short of producing an undeniable link between Riverside and the Zodiac Killer. We must find something from 1966 that was unreleased to the public, which the Zodiac Killer could have slipped into his Bay Area communications. The obvious place to look was the two communications following the Halloween card.

On March 13th 1971, the Zodiac Killer insinuated his involvement in either the murder of Cheri Jo Bates or the Riverside communications by writing "I do have to give them credit for stumbling across my riverside activity, but they are only finding the easy ones, there are a hell of a lot more down there". He followed this up with the Pines postcard on March 22nd 1971, which like the Halloween card, was personally addressed to Paul Avery. Because Paul Avery authored the newspaper article on November 16th 1970 about Riverside and the Confession letters, did the Zodiac Killer give any incontrovertible proof of his involvement in Riverside in the only communication that carried the name of Paul Avery subsequent to this date? (ie: the Pines postcard).

​The only time the Zodiac Killer used the word "attention" in his address on an envelope or postcard, was when he wrote "att. Paul averly=chronicle" on the address side of the Pines postcard. The only other time we see the word "attention" within the address of a communication linked to Zodiac, was the Confession letter envelope mailed to the Daily Enterprise in Riverside, with the wording "attn: crime". Bearing in mind that Paul Avery was instrumental in featuring the Confession letters in his newspaper article on November 16th 1970, it is noteworthy that the Zodiac Killer combined "attention" and "Paul Avery" four months later (on March 22nd 1971), when this same word was also abbreviated on the Confession letter envelope to the Daily Enterprise newspaper in 1966. It is standard practice to use the abbreviated form of "attention" (accompanied by a name) above the address on an envelope or postcard, but in both the Confession letter and Pines postcard the author abbreviates the word "attention" in the bottom left corner, under the address, Was this a further subtle clue of Zodiac's involvement in the Riverside communications? However, the Confession letter envelope mailed to the Daily Enterprise newspaper was released to the public on December 1st 1966 (see below).  PART TWO.   

The first three paragraphs are taken from a previous article, with the following information a completely new analysis.  

When determining whether the "concerned citizen" card mailed to Sergeant John Lynch on August 10th 1969 was written by a helpful member of the public or the Zodiac Killer, we need look no further than the "good citizen" letter mailed on October 7th 1969. Taking into consideration that the "concerned citizen" card was not in the public domain in 1969, the "good citizen" author would also adopt the word "citizen" in their signature, address the communication to Sergeant John Lynch once again, and refer to the July 31st 1969 cryptogram by mentioning "code letters", just as the "concerned citizen" author was addressing the "code letters" by supplying us with a key to the 408 cryptogram. Also, both communications would use the word "name" twice. 

​These are compelling reasons to believe that both communications were composed by the same author. The question being; is the wording in the "good citizen" letter that of a helpful citizen or a mischievous individual playing games with the police. The "good citizen" letter read "On occasion, while thinking of the code letters, the pencil wrote: Go to 56 Beach Street. I get the name Jerry, perhaps he knows people or his name is XXXXXXX".  

The "good citizen" letter was postmarked October 7th 1969 and mentioned 56 Beach Street, which is the old block numbering from the original planning maps, which comes out as 1654/1656 on the street numbering. The address at 1654/56 Beach St, San Francisco, California is a condominium home that measures 2,141 sq ft, and was built in 1938. Irrespective of the exact numbering, Beach Street is just 240 meters from the Presidio of San Francisco, where eyewitnesses saw a white male, about 40 years of age, weighing 170lbs, sporting a blond crewcut and wearing glasses, running into Julius Kahn playground shortly after the murder of Paul Stine on October 11th 1969. Of all the places in northern California or the Bay Area the author could select, the composer of the "good citizen" letter was not only referring to Zodiac's code letters, but managed to choose the location of Beach Street bordering the Presidio, in which the Zodiac Killer was seen running into just four days later. Possibly coincidence, but noteworthy nonetheless. The "good citizen" author may have been referring to Beach Street in San Francisco just a matter of days before the Zodiac Killer first struck in the big city, before mailing a letter on October 13th 1969, again detailing a destination in the form of a street name - this time "Washington St and Maple St".  ​

I have long believed that the Zodiac Killer lived in Vallejo during his first three crimes, but for the purposes of objectivity we will look towards San Francisco as a possible home location of the Zodiac during and after the Paul Stine murder (and possibly before). When the Zodiac Killer mailed the Bus Bomb letter on November 9th 1969 he gave us an indication to his movements in Presidio Park a month earlier, writing "The dogs never came with in 2 blocks of me + they were to the west + there was only 2 groups of parking about 10 min apart then the motor cicles went by about 150 ft away going from south to north west".

It was apparent that after entering Julius Kahn playground the Zodiac Killer suggested that he had traveled 2 blocks east, which placed him close to Presidio Boulevard that went from south to north west in the south-eastern corner of Presidio Park. From a location 150 feet shy of this road, he was extremely close to the Lyon Street steps and his exit route from the park. If the Zodiac Killer had headed northwards from this location to the Marina District and the area around 1654/1656 Beach Street, he could have opted to walk for 25-30 minutes or enter a vehicle parked on Lyon Street for the 5 minute journey. 
​
​If the Zodiac Killer mailed the "good citizen" letter four days before the Paul Stine murder, one could argue that he didn't just pluck the Beach Street address and the name "Jerry" out of thin air. It is possible that he lived close to this location (or within a reasonable distance) and was familiar with somebody who lived or frequented either 1654 or 1656 Beach Street. As an example, he could have lived somewhere within the green circle shown below  The reason I've positioned the circle this way will become evident in a moment.   . 

At the time of the Paul Stine murder on October 11th 1969 Donna Lass worked at the Letterman General Hospital in Presidio Park and lived at 4122 Balboa Street, San Francisco. However, according to Robert Graysmith she moved from this address a few months later and relocated to 225 Mallorca Way in the Marina District. If a few months was three or four, Donna Lass could have moved to 225 Mallorca Way in January or February 1970  Either way, it is possible she moved into an area where the Zodiac Killer lived. He was heading in this general direction after killing Paul Stine, and was referring to 56 Beach Street (1654/1656 Beach Street) on October 7th 1969, only four days before the murder. The 1654 Beach Street address was a mere 300 meters from the 225 Mallorca Way home that Donna Lass moved into. She would have spent several months at an address 300 meters from the residence mentioned in the October 7th 1969 letter, before heading off to South Lake Tahoe on June 5th 1970.

​In the Pines postcard on March 22nd 1971, the Zodiac Killer pasted "Sought Victim 12", indicating that he had previously targeted Donna Lass between the April 20th 1970 letter (10 victims) and the Button letter on June 26th 1970 (12 victims). Therefore, if the Zodiac Killer had sought her in San Francisco as victim number 12, he would have set his eyes on her between April 20th and June 5th 1970 (when she left for South Lake Tahoe). Because the Dragon card on April 28th 1970 didn't increase the Zodiac Killer's victim total, we can narrow down the time he sought Donna Lass as victim number 12 to between April 28th 1970 and June 5th 1970 (probably sometime in May 1970). During this time she would have been living at 225 Mallorca Way, close to the Beach Street residence. Donna Lass and the Zodiac Killer may have been living near to one another in the Marina District of San Francisco, in an area that had relevance to an address mentioned in one of Zodiac's letters. If we could positively identify the "Jerry" in the October 7th 1969 letter (assuming they exist), it may edge us a little closer to resolving this mystery. 

It has always been difficult to reconcile how the Zodiac Killer could be claiming Donna Lass as a victim when he failed to increase his count from the time of the Little List letter to the 13-Hole postcard, which spanned her disappearance on September 6th 1970 but maintained the victim count of thirteen.

On October 27th 1970, the Zodiac Killer attached the number 14 to the skeleton's hand to signify an increase in the victim count, next to the text "I feel it in my bones, you ache to know my name, and so I'll clue you in". What if the Zodiac Killer was asking us to guess the name of his fourteenth victim, who was represented by the skeleton, necessitating the adding of a blindfolded skeleton on the card inner to symbolize an identity hidden, with the wording "But, then why spoil our game". 

​The 13-Hole postcard may have used thirteen punch-holes to represent thirteen victims, the Pines postcard may have used one punch-hole to represent the murdered and buried Donna Lass, but in the Halloween card the Zodiac Killer only added 12 eyes to the one in the knot-hole of the tree, to make thirteen again. So was the inner skeleton our fourteenth unidentified victim that the thirteen eyes were looking at, with the author playing a sort of cryptic game to discover the victim's name? The sort of cryptic game he played with the Pines postcard, which also never made it clear what victim he was referring to.

In the Pines postcard it has been widely considered that the punch-hole was the burial site of Donna Lass, and we had to "peek through the pines" to discover her grave. This methodology may have been employed in the Halloween card with the eye looking through the hole in the tree, with the wording "peek-a-boo you are doomed". In other words, we had to "peek.through the pines" to discover her skeleton. The hole in the tree and the hole in the Pines postcard both being a window to death. The number count atop of the skeleton signifying a new, but yet undiscovered head count - and symbolic of a victim undiscovered for 51 days.

​This could play into the notion of the strange design on the envelope and card inner, where a case can be argued for a joined "L" and "F" with 4 dots in between, signifying "look four fourteen" or "look for fourteen" from a phonetic standpoint. With all thirteen eyes trained on the inner skeleton facing right, it's possible the author is asking us to look for a victim he was keeping close to his chest in some sort of macabre game (whether he was responsible or not). A game he would reinvent on March 22nd 1971. By October 27th 1970 it was still unknown what had happened to Donna Lass, so it's possible the Zodiac Killer played on this uncertainty in this card and the one five months later, which were both linked through journalist Paul Avery.  ​

Was the position of the pasted skeleton on the Halloween card inner representative of the "Danse Macabre", in which skeletons escort living humans to their graves in a lively dance. In this instance, the skeleton of Donna Lass leading us to her gravesite, not dissimilar to the Pines postcard, that seemed to carry instructions to her burial location. "The Danse Macabre, also called the Dance of Death, is an artistic genre of allegory from the Late Middle Ages on the universality of death. The Danse Macabre consists of the dead, or a personification of death, summoning representatives from all walks of life to dance along to the grave, typically with a pope, emperor, king, child, and labourer. The effect is both frivolous and terrifying, beseeching its audience to react emotionally. It was produced as memento mori, to remind people of the fragility of their lives and how vain are the glories of earthly life. According to legend, Death appears at midnight every year on Halloween. Death calls forth the dead from their graves to dance for him while he plays his fiddle. His skeletons dance for him until the cockerel crows at dawn, when they must return to their graves until the next year". Wikipedia. 

Was the design of the Pines postcard driven by a desire to inform investigator's where the body of Donna Lass was buried, or were the measurements related to it just an unusual coincidence? The initial point of interest was the upside down pasted wording of "around in the snow" and whether we had to flip the postcard through 180 degrees to locate the remains of Donna Lass "around in the snow". In doing so, it repositioned the punch-hole west of the "Sierra Club" pasting on a horizontal plane, exactly like the relationship between Yuba Gap and the Clair Tappaan Lodge Sierra Club. The 2.19 inch distance between the "Sierra Club" pasting and the center of the punch-hole was 14.02 miles using the Mount Diablo map scale of 6.4 miles to the inch, employed by the Zodiac Killer on June 26th 1970. This distance on Google maps landed just shy of Yuba Gap, 997 meters southwest of the jawbone of Donna Lass, within the 1.96 square mile circle represented by the punch-hole. Then we measured the radian angle between the home of Donna Lass and Yuba Gap, and the radian angle between the Sahara Tahoe Hotel & Casino and Yuba Gap, which both fell between 303 to 304 degrees. Five radians and magnetic north was 303.5 degrees in 1970. The three measurements of radians and inches (set to Magnetic North) that Zodiac suggested we use to locate his buried bomb on June 26th 1970 and July 26th 1970 can all be used in relation to the Pines postcard. The 2.19 inches from Clair Tappaan Lodge Sierra Club and the 5 radians set to Magnetic North from Donna's home or workplace, both fall inside the punch-hole on the Pines postcard.  

On July 26th 1970 the Zodiac stated "The Mt. Diablo Code concerns Radians & # inches along the radians" and positioned a crude black circle around his crosshairs, close to 4 radians and Magnetic North (246.2 degrees). It was clear that to locate his buried bomb we had to first use radians to locate a position around the circumference of his crosshairs and then use inches along that radian to pinpoint the target. The location "concerned" radians and inches, so the claimed buried bomb was likely to be close to a whole value but not necessarily exact.

​The Zodiac Killer's measurements were probably nothing more than a rough guide in 1970, which is why he placed SFPD next to the crude circle to help us on our way. Therefore, it was quite surprising to discover that both Yuba Gap and the center of the punch-hole were situated extremely close to 5 radians and Magnetic North (at most a one degree error). The distance between the Sahara Tahoe Hotel & Casino and Yuba Gap, and the home of Donna Lass and Yuba Gap measured 6.83 and 6.86 inches respectively (an 83% to 86 % accuracy over one inch). Both distances were approaching 44 miles by crow. A distance of 44.8 miles would have been 7 inches.

But if these radian values of four in 1970 and five in 1971 were deliberately engineered (or that we were required to use whole radian values to locate the buried bomb and buried Donna Lass), can we therefore conclude that the Pines postcard was mailed by the Zodiac Killer? If the Bay Area murderer placed his crude circle at a position representing 4 radians and Magnetic North on July 26th 1970, then he was using radians in a manner that was flawed. They should be measured anticlockwise from the 3 o' clock position, yet the Zodiac Killer gave us a zero on the Mount Diablo map in the north position and wrote "is to be set to Mag. N", suggesting that we needed to measure radians clockwise. This appeared his intention based upon the position of the crude circle. If the author of the Pines postcard wasn't the Zodiac Killer (and the 5 radians and Magnetic North from abduction to burial was intentional), then this individual would have made exactly the same error as the Zodiac Killer by using clockwise radians from the north position. How likely is that?   

On June 26th 1970 the Zodiac Killer mailed a Phillips 66 map with the instructions "the map coupled with the code will tell you where the bomb is set". He claimed he had buried a bomb. A month later another communication was sent with extra clues of "The Mt. Diablo Code concerns Radians & # inches along the radians" and crosshairs with a bold, black circle positioned at close to 4 radians set to Magnetic North (246.2 degrees). When the Zodiac Killer mailed the Pines postcard on March 22nd 1971 he used a punch-hole (another circle) and the wording "Sierra Club", "pass.Lake Tahoe areas" and "around in the snow", coupled with an advertisement of Incline Village, to probably direct us to the burial site of Donna Lass.

Using measurements between the "Sierra Club" pasting and the punch-hole (after inverting the postcard), I was able to determine that the 1.96 square mile punch-hole around Yuba Gap captured the location of the jawbone of Donna Lass, discovered on December 31st 1985. This suggested that the author of the Pines postcard knew where the remains of Donna Lass were. If the circles in both instances were the location of a buried mystery that we had to solve, could the Zodiac Killer have added another layer to the Pines postcard to identify the burial site of Donna, similar to the June 26th and July 26th 1970 letters? In other words, did the Zodiac Killer bury Donna Lass at a specific location west of Clair Tappaan Lodge Sierra Club?  

The three major locations regarding Donna Lass were her 3893 Pioneer Trail Road home, the Sahara Tahoe Hotel & Casino where she worked and the Yuba Gap area where her jawbone was found. So I placed a compass rose over the 3893 Pioneer Trail Road home and the casino, and calculated the position of Yuba Gap in degrees. From her 3893 Pioneer Trail Road home it measured 303.5 to 304 degrees. From the casino it measured 303 to 303.5 degrees. There could be a margin of error of one degree. The measurement of 303.5 degrees is exactly 5 radians and Magnetic North (5 X 57.3 + 17). Therefore, the Zodiac Killer may have twice given us a "circle" denoting a burial location, and both times it was positioned at a radian value plus Magnetic North. In 1970 from Mount Diablo, in 1971 from either the home or work address of Donna Lass.  

​A RE-EXAMINATION OF THE PINES POSTCARD [PART ONE)
A RE-EXAMINATION OF THE PINES POSTCARD [PART TWO]
A RE-EXAMINATION OF THE PINES POSTCARD [PART THREE] 

Expanding on my last article, I have calculated the position and area of the punch-hole on the Pines postcard to 1.96 square miles, and placed it over the map below. If the punch-hole was intended to be a burial or deposition site, then the measurement and direction of this punch-hole with respect to the "Sierra Club" pasting on the card, coupled with the map scale, means that the jawbone of Donna Lass falls inside the punch-hole created by the author of the postcard (shown on the map below).This technique was previously used by the Zodiac Killer on June 26th 1970, when he used radians and inches along those radians to pinpoint the location of a buried bomb. Only this time in the Pines postcard it was a human being. 

Years ago I identified a location for this bomb alongside a road close to Ingleside Police Station of 4 radians and 5 inches (tilted to Magnetic North). Long time Zodiac researcher, Andrew Gray, later took these measurements and slotted them into the Z32 code, reading "Estimate Four Radians and Five Inches". The word "estimate" allowed for a margin of error. When the Zodiac Killer crafted his Bus Bomb letter on November 9th 1970, he may have used the 9 o' clock position tilted to Magnetic North to identify the Salesian High School of teacher Daniel Williams, who had just been targeted for death by somebody claiming to be the Zodiac Killer. The 9 o' clock position had been highlighted along with 0, 3 and 6 on the June 26th 1970 Phillips 66 map.

So this technique of using a clock face, radians and inches (measurements) to identify a location, is not without precedent. On this occasion the Pines postcard author placed the punch-hole of 1.96 square miles.over the remains of Donna Lass. This location also landed on the 9 o' clock position of a clock face from the Sierra Club of Clair Tappaan Lodge. But were these measurements created deliberately by the Zodiac Killer, or was he just lucky when he applied the "Sierra Club" and punch-hole 2.19 inches apart on the same horizontal plane, and used "around in the snow" upside down, which when flipped through 180 degrees forced a change and corrected their east-west relationship to one another? It's rather curious that the newspaper read in January 1986 that remains had been "found in 2 inches of snow", given that the author of the postcard likely expected her to be found "around in the snow". Read more.  

​A RE-EXAMINATION OF THE PINES POSTCARD [PART ONE)
A RE-EXAMINATION OF THE PINES POSTCARD [PART TWO]
A RE-EXAMINATION OF THE PINES POSTCARD [PART THREE]   

In previous articles I wanted to evaluate how accurate the Pines postcard was in identifying the location where the jawbone of Donna Lass was discovered on December 31st 1985 near Yuba Gap. Because the phrase "around in the snow" was inverted 180 degrees and we had a punch-hole in the postcard that many believed was her burial location, I decided to flip the postcard upside down. What we notice from here is that the center of the punch-hole is now west of the "Sierra Club" pasting, with the center of each being in perfect horizontal alignment. The postcard used by the author was a USPS Abraham Lincoln 4 Cent Blank Postcard that measured 5 9/16 by 3 1/4 inches (5.56 by 3.25 inches). 

​So using the map scale of 6.4 miles to the inch, used by the Zodiac Killer when mailing the Mount Diablo Phillips 66 map in 1970, I measured the distance between the "Sierra Club" pasting and the center of the punch-hole. It measured 2.19 inches, which I multiplied by 6.4 miles to the inch, to get a distance of 14.02 miles. Drawing a perfectly horizontal line westwards from Clair Tappaan Lodge, the 14.02 miles ended just above Interstate 80, directly below the eastern edge of Chubb Lake (in the top right image shown below). The jawbone location was only approximated as one mile northeast of the I-80 at Yuba Gap (in the top left image shown below). I then had to calculate the distance between the location identified by the Pines postcard and the actual (but approximated) location of the jawbone. The remains of Donna Lass could have been deposited or buried anywhere in California or Nevada, yet the Pines postcard identified a location only 997 meters (or thereabouts) from the actual location of the jawbone (if my interpretation is correct). This can be seen in the bottom image below.

If I had drawn a line on Google maps from Clair Tappaan Lodge to the estimated location of the jawbone, it would have measured 13.62 miles, so from a distance standpoint, the accuracy was 97.1%. The angle deviation was approximately 2 degrees. In other words, there was an error of 997 meters over 14.02 miles. But was the Pines postcard created with these calculations in mind, or was it purely accidental? The phrases on the postcard such as "pass Lake Tahoe areas", "Sierra Club", "peek through the pines" and "around in the snow", pasted onto an advertisement of Incline Village, with a punch-hole added to the postcard, does lend to the notion of an author giving us directional markers. That is why I decided to measure the distance between Clair Tappaan Lodge (Sierra Club) and the punch-hole. 

The distance from the "Sierra Club" pasting to the right side of the punch-hole (with the postcard inverted} is 2 1/16 inches (2.06 inches), which when multiplied by the map scale of 6.4 miles to the inch, gives us a distance of 13.2 miles. Westwards from Clair Tappaan Lodge, this takes us to Vista Point just below Yuba Pass. Therefore, from the right side of the punch-hole to its center encompasses 13.2 miles to 14.02 miles, with the jawbone estimated at 13.62 miles and inside these parameters. The jawbone was 2 2/16 inches from Clair Tappaan Lodge, with the center of the punch-hole at 2 3/16 inches from Clair Tappaan Lodge, meaning its author had 1/16 inch error to the location the jawbone was ultimately discovered. The left edge of the punch-hole measures 14.78 miles. This means that the punch-hole will capture 1.58 miles east to west and north to south. The jawbone will comfortably fall inside the punch-hole. All figures were rounded off to two decimal points.
​
The punch-hole may have denoted the burial site on both sides of the postcard, with the letter "D" of Zodiac and initial "D" of Donna positioned over the crosshairs, and the Abraham Lincoln stamp, initials "A" and "L" positioned horizontally to the right. This gave us "D", "A" and "L", the initials of Donna Ann Lass originating from the punch-hole. . 

A RE-EXAMINATION OF THE PINES POSTCARD [PART ONE)
A RE-EXAMINATION OF THE PINES POSTCARD [PART TWO]
A RE-EXAMINATION OF THE PINES POSTCARD [PART THREE]