One of the cornerstone arguments I put forward for the 1978 letter being genuine, was the fact that the introduction of "This is the Zodiac speaking I" on April 24th 1978 mimicked the introduction on the December 20th 1969 Melvin Belli letter. The 1969 and 1978 letters were the only two communications to date that failed to exclusively keep "This is the Zodiac speaking" as the introduction on the top line, with the grammatical error of not placing a "period" or "full stop" between "speaking" and "I" common to both. Bearing in mind that these two communications were connected through the word "control" (unique to these two letters), meant that if an image of the Melvin Belli letter had not appeared in the newspapers to date, the author of the April 24th 1978 letter likely fashioned the Melvin Belli letter, with added shirt piece. This was used to argue (along with other reasons) that the Zodiac Killer was the author of the 1978 letter.
To his credit, notable Zodiac researcher Cragle unearthed an article in The Napa Register on December 29th 1969 that dispelled this notion (see below). But when I proposed the idea - asking people to check if a newspaper image of the Melvin Belli letter existed - it took two years to achieve. This is with the combined power of the Zodiac internet community, and a comprehensive newspaper database at our fingertips.
To his credit, notable Zodiac researcher Cragle unearthed an article in The Napa Register on December 29th 1969 that dispelled this notion (see below). But when I proposed the idea - asking people to check if a newspaper image of the Melvin Belli letter existed - it took two years to achieve. This is with the combined power of the Zodiac internet community, and a comprehensive newspaper database at our fingertips.
The author of the 1978 letter had none of these advantages. Often described as a "lazy" hoaxer by document examiners, the author of the 1978 letter could have accessed the above article to mimic, by keeping hundreds of newspapers featuring the Zodiac Killer since 1968, by keeping hundreds of newspaper cuttings about the Zodiac Killer, by trawling through the microfiche of a public library, or they just got extremely lucky in mimicking the introduction (with grammatical error) and the use of the word "control", common to both letters. But there is another common theme binding these two letters, which is not visible in the article above. The Melvin Belli letter on December 20th 1969 and the April 24th 1978 letter both inserted an unnecessary word (just once) into the correspondence, spelled it correctly one alphabetical letter shy of completion, and then very neatly (almost ruler like) crossed out each word. This was unique to both these letters.
If somebody can find this section of the Melvin Belli letter in the newspapers (showing this correction technique), I will be eternally grateful. Is it more likely that the Zodiac Killer crafted the 1978 letter, with personal knowledge of the Melvin Belli letter and its composition, or is it more likely that a random hoaxer (described as lazy) went to extraordinary lengths to mimic the Melvin Belli letter? Or was the presumed hoaxer of the 1978 letter just lucky, creating all these similarities by accident?
The April 24th 1978 letter, stating "I am back with you. Tell herb caen I am here" was postmarked only 42 days after a voice message was left on the telephone answering machine of an individual living in the Mission District, using similar wording to that used in the letter, and claiming to be the "Zodiac". The telephone caller stated "This is the Zodiac. Tell the press I am back in San Francisco". Read more. Was this the Zodiac Killer twice, or the hoaxer twice?
Thanks to Cragle, another unusual mention in the above newspaper article may be relevant to 1978. It may indicate that the person who crafted the April 24th 1978 and May 2nd 1978 letters were one and the same - who had kept or read The Napa Register publication. The article above finished with the following text.
The April 24th 1978 letter, stating "I am back with you. Tell herb caen I am here" was postmarked only 42 days after a voice message was left on the telephone answering machine of an individual living in the Mission District, using similar wording to that used in the letter, and claiming to be the "Zodiac". The telephone caller stated "This is the Zodiac. Tell the press I am back in San Francisco". Read more. Was this the Zodiac Killer twice, or the hoaxer twice?
Thanks to Cragle, another unusual mention in the above newspaper article may be relevant to 1978. It may indicate that the person who crafted the April 24th 1978 and May 2nd 1978 letters were one and the same - who had kept or read The Napa Register publication. The article above finished with the following text.
The newspaper article stated "Belli said that he has a trial starting next week in Naples and plans to confer with fugitive Black Panther Eldridge Cleaver". Just eight days after the April 24th 1978 letter, on May 2nd 1978, the Channel 9 letter was mailed to KHJ-TV Studios, 5615 Melrose Avenue, Los Angeles,.claiming to have been mailed by the Zodiac Killer, It too mentioned Eldridge Cleaver. Bearing in mind the similarities between the April 24th 1978 and Melvin Belli letter, it is extremely curious that the very newspaper article that featured the grammatically unique introduction common to these two communications, would also feature the name of Eldridge Cleaver, that appeared in a "Zodiac" letter only eight days later.
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