ZODIAC CIPHERS
RICHARD GRINELL, COVENTRY, ENGLAND
  • Home
    • Search This Site With Google
    • The Mount Diablo Map and Code Solution
  • Zodiac News
    • Zodiac News Archive
    • Santa Barbara Attack
    • Cheri Jo Bates
    • The Confession
    • Riverside Desktop Poem
    • Bates Letter
    • The Forgotten Victims
    • Welsh Chappie - Zodiac News
  • Lake Herman Murders
    • Blue Rock Springs Attack
    • Vallejo Times Letter
    • Examiner Letter
    • Chronicle Letter
    • Complete 408 Cipher
    • Vallejo and Benicia Map
    • Kathie Snoozy and Debra Furlong Murders
    • Debut of Zodiac Letter
  • Lake Berryessa Attack
    • Presidio Heights Attack
    • Call to Chat Show
  • 340 Cipher
    • Bus Bomb Letter
    • Betsy Aardsma Murder
    • The Fairfield Letter
    • Melvin Belli Letter
    • Santa Barbara Murders 1970
    • Modesto Attack
    • My Name is Cipher
    • Dragon Card and Button Letter >
      • Phillips Road Map
    • The Sleeping Bag Murders
    • The Little List Letter
  • The Halloween Card
    • Lake Tahoe Disappearance
    • Los Angeles Times Letter
    • The Monticello Card
    • The Exorcist Letter
  • SLA Letter
    • Red Phantom Letter/American Greetings Card
    • The 1978 Letter
    • Los Angeles Times Newspaper Articles
    • Zodiac Letters Real or Fake
    • Zodiac Documentary
    • Unsolved Mysteries
    • The Colonial Parkway Murders
  • Suspects
    • Arthur Leigh Allen
    • Rick Marshall
    • Lawrence Kane
    • Theodore Kaczynski
    • Richard Gaikowski
    • Gareth Penn
    • Jack Tarrance

FORTY MINUTES

1/17/2015

 
Many theories have been put forward in an attempt to locate the likely home residence of the Zodiac Killer during the period of his four confirmed attacks, presuming of course he had a fixed abode. But if he did, where was it and did he leave any clues to point us in the right direction? This has been tackled many times before under the banner of geographical profiling, but like anything, it relies heavily on a presumption of fixed residence, the killer's working pattern, traveling distances, buffer zones, the least effort principle and such like. Here we will make one preliminary assumption based on the killer's movements directly after the murder and attempted murder of Darlene Ferrin and Michael Mageau at Blue Rock Springs on July 4th 1969, that in all likelihood he headed for the safety of home after the attack, and examines a timeline that suggests that San Francisco was an unlikely destination. This does not entirely preclude San Francisco as a possibility for a base location, it just suggests that if he traveled home that morning, San Francisco would have seemed an odd choice, bearing in mind what we know of the events that night in the vicinity of the Blue Rock Springs park.  
PictureClick the picture to enter this area on Google Maps.
After the attack, the Zodiac Killer exited Blue Rock Springs parking lot at approximately midnight and made the phone call to Nancy Slover at 12.40 am at the intersection of Springs and Tuolumne. The intervening 40 minutes are unknown. It has been stated many times that we have a missing 30 minutes, as we know the journey time to the payphone is roughly 10 minutes. However, this is factually incorrect, as it makes the assumption of redundant time. If the killer, for example, headed to his Benicia home and returned to the payphone, he had 40 minutes available to him, as he did if he lived en route to the payphone, or right beside it. The missing 30 minutes takes a premise that 10 minutes is wasted time.

But the question still remains, he made a phone call 40 minutes after the attack, when it could conceivably have been made as early as 12.10 am. So what was the Zodiac Killer doing during this time period? Was he disposing his weapon nearby or at home, was he parked up somewhere, or was he just driving aimlessly around in the night.

There are good reasons to believe the killer was a resident of Benicia because the driving time to this location for the safe disposal of the weapon and a turnaround time of 10 minutes, takes us back to the payphone at Springs and Tuolumne at approximately 12.40 am. But if he was a resident of Vallejo, a home location somewhere in the vicinity of the payphone is equally credible, particularly as some have suggested, he walked back to the Springs and Tuolumne intersection as a means of drawing less attention to himself. It has also been noted that prime suspect Arthur Leigh Allen's residence at 32 Fresno Street was only half a mile, or as little as 9 minutes walking distance from the payphone. A journey time to Fresno Street from Blue Rock Springs Park is about 10 minutes, the walk to the payphone is 9 minutes, leaving a turnaround time of 21 minutes, had the killer gone straight home to this residence. But the question remains, if the killer was a resident of San Francisco and headed for home immediately after the Blue Rock Springs attack, where is the logic applied to the missing 40 minutes and the choice of payphone? Are we to assume he drove around randomly in the night, or sat in his car for a notable period of time, made the call to Nancy Slover and then departed for San Francisco.

PictureClick the picture to enter this area on Google Maps.
Whatever route you take from Blue Rock Springs Park to San Francisco, there are innumerable opportunities to make a phone call on the journey home, and most, if not all, provide a much safer option than placing the call at Springs and Tuolumne. If the killer lived in San Francisco, the perfect buffer zone from the murder scene to his residence would be a mid point between the two locations. But based on San Francisco, the received phone call at Springs and Tuolumne appears on the face of it an unnecessary risk. The missing 40 minutes can be explained with Benicia or Vallejo on the understanding that his primary motive was to ditch the weapon before he placed the call. The same cannot be said of San Francisco, despite the reasoned argument that most of the Zodiac Killer's correspondence was mailed from this location, suggesting this was more likely his place of work rather than his doorstep.

Of course, it would be presumptuous to exclude San Francisco based on this analysis alone, as there are other possibilities, but if the Zodiac Killer's first thought was to head home after the Blue Rock Springs attack, this choice of payphone has relevance. Had the Zodiac Killer headed across the bay, he would still have had a thirty plus mile journey ahead of him to the safety of home, seemingly in contradiction to traveling west towards the heart of Vallejo, some 40 minutes after the attack, and placing a phone call that inherently could have been made from anywhere. 




Comments are closed.
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture

    All
    13 Hole Postcard
    148 Character Cipher
    1978 Letter
    1986 Letter
    1987 Letter
    2001 Happy New Year Card
    Albany Letter
    Allan/Peyton Murders
    Arthur Leigh Allen
    Atlanta Letter
    Betsy Aardsma
    Blue Rock Springs Attack
    Bus Bomb Letter
    Button Letter
    Call To Chat Show
    Carol Beth Hilburn
    Channel 9 Letter
    Cheri Jo Bates
    Cipher Theories
    Citizen Card
    Concerned Citizen Card
    Confession Letter
    Daniel Williams Poisoning
    Debut Of Zodiac Letter
    Deep Real Estate Ad
    DMV Letter
    Domingos/Edwards Murders
    Donald Lee Bujok
    Donna Lass
    Dragon Card
    Earl Van Best Jr
    Eureka Card
    Exorcist Letter
    Fairfield Letter
    Fingerprint Evidence
    Forecast For Cancer
    Forecast For Leo
    Gareth Penn
    General News Articles
    Gilbert And Sullivan
    Good Citizen Letter
    Halloween Card
    Hood/Garcia Murders
    Internet Articles
    Joan Webster
    Johnny & Joyce Swindle
    Judith Hakari
    Kevin Robert Brooks
    Lake Berryessa Attack
    Lake Herman Road Murders
    Lake Tahoe Disappearance
    Larry Kane
    Leona Roberts Murder
    Los Angeles Letter
    Melvin Belli Letter
    Mike Morford (Morf13)
    Modesto Attack
    Molina/Rodriguez Murders
    Monticello Card
    My Name Is Letter
    Nancy Bennallack
    New Canaan Letters
    Novato Letter
    Oakland A's Letter
    Pines Card
    Possible Zodiac Attacks
    Possible Zodiac Letters
    Presidio Heights Murder
    Radians
    Red Phantom Letter
    Richard Gaikowski
    Riverside Desktop Poem
    Robert Salem Murder
    Ross Sullivan
    Saechao/Saelee Murders
    San Jose Code Letter
    Santa Claus Card
    Scorpion Ciphers
    Scotch Tape Letter
    Sla Letter
    Tamalpais Valley Attack
    Ted Kaczynski
    Telegraph Avenue Incident
    The 340 Cipher
    The 408 Cipher
    The Celebrity Cypher
    The Little List
    The Mikado
    Thomas Horan
    You Are Next Letter
    Zodiac Letters Poll
    Zodiac Postage
    Zodiac Theories

    Picture

    RSS Feed

    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    The Zodiac Killer may have given us the answer almost word-for-word when he wrote PS. The Mt. Diablo Code concerns Radians & # inches along the radians. The code solution identified was Estimate: Four Radians and Five Inches To read more, click the image.
    Picture
    Picture
    The Zodiac Atlas: The Zodiac Killer Enigma by Randall Scott Clemons. Click image for details.
    Picture
    The Zodiac Killer Map: Part of the Zodiac Killer Enigma by Randall Scott Clemons. Click image for color version
    For black and white issue..
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture

    Archives

    May 2025
    April 2025
    March 2025
    February 2025
    January 2025
    December 2024
    November 2024
    October 2024
    September 2024
    August 2024
    July 2024
    June 2024
    May 2024
    April 2024
    March 2024
    February 2024
    January 2024
    December 2023
    November 2023
    September 2023
    August 2023
    July 2023
    June 2023
    May 2023
    April 2023
    March 2023
    February 2023
    January 2023
    December 2022
    November 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    December 2012
    November 2012
    October 2012
    September 2012
    July 2012
    January 2012

Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Photos from Marcin Wichary, zAppledot, vyusseem, Alex Barth, Alan Cleaver, jocelynsart, Richard Perry, taberandrew, eschipul, MrJamesAckerley