“I like killing people because it’s so much fun.”
Those were the words embedded in a coded message sent by The Zodiac in July of 1969.
The letter was sent to the newspaper editors at The San Francisco Examiner.
This would not be the last encoded message with gruesome thoughts and details hidden
within.
The Zodiac is the most mysterious and elusive serial killer in United States history.
You and I are about to gather clues, look at crime scenes, and analyze hidden messages
to try and discover who The Zodiac really was.
Let’s delve deeper into the psyche of one of the most terrifying killers of all time.
Over the years more than 2,500 suspects have been put forth as The Zodiac Killer.
They range from Unabomber Ted Kaczynski to members of the Charles Manson family.
In the 1990’s suspect number one was Arthur Leigh Allen.
Allen was a Vallejo, California school teacher.
It is clear that The Zodiac could be anyone from an already known killer to a school teacher.
Our mission is to figure out where on this spectrum the real Zodiac Killer might lie.
There are two suspects who have not been completely ruled out thus far, and a third that has been
recently accused of being The Zodiac.
As investigators we will look at the evidence and try to come to our own conclusions.
The first suspect we will analyze is Lawrence Kane.
The Zodiac clearly had an understanding of coding.
He also had an affinity for Naval gear, such as combat boots and firearms.
Kane served in the Naval reserves where he would have learned coding and access to the
basic Naval gear that The Zodiac used.
In 1962 Lawrence Kane was in a car accident that resulted in a serious brain injury.
This injury may have altered his ability to control urges.
It could have led to a personality disorder through unbalanced chemicals and hormones
in the brain.
We know that The Zodiac struggled with internal conflict.
He reached out for help in several of his letters, even stating that he could not control
his urges to kill.
It has been claimed by some including a retired police detective that Kane’s name appears
in one of The Zodiac’s ciphers.
The Zodiac did write that he had embedded his name in his ciphers.
He taunted the authorities saying that if his code was cracked they would know who he
was.
Could Kane have put his name in one of the cipher’s because he was The Zodiac?
Or was it a coincidence?
Perhaps it was just a mistake by the retired detective when trying to break the code.
This evidence does not seem to hold up for our investigation.
Another connection between Kane and The Zodiac is through the murder of Darlene Ferrin.
Let’s take a closer look into this connection and the crime scene left behind.
On July 4, 1969 in Vallejo California a 22 year old mother named Darlene Ferrin and her
friend Michael Mageau were murdered by The Zodiac.
They stopped at Blue Rock Springs Park to enjoy Independence Day.
When interviewed after the attack Michael said that a vehicle pulled into the lot they
were parked in around midnight.
The driver got out and fired a 9mm handgun at the car.
Michael was shot in the jaw, shoulder, and leg, but lived to tell the story.
Darlene was hit several times and passed away on the ride to the hospital.
At 12:40 the police received a call from a gas station pay phone.
The voice on the other line took responsibility for the shooting.
The voice of the monster on the other line said, “I want to report a murder.
If you will go one mile east on Columbus Parkway, you will find kids in a brown car.
They were shot with a 9-millimeter Luger.
I also killed those kids last year.
Goodbye.”
The bluntness of the call was the most unsettling part.
It was after this confession that the first of The Zodiac letters were received by newspapers
in California.
The first set of letters were postmarked on July 31,1969.
Three different envelopes were sent to three different newspapers.
The writer claimed responsibility for two shootings and provided grotesque details about
the victims, weapons, and number of shots fired.
The writer also included one-third of a cipher in the letters and demanded publication.
The Zodiac threatened to kill again if newspapers did not publish the cipher.
It included the words, “I like killing people because it’s so much fun.”
This was the first cipher The Zodiac created and it was his longest.
The cipher was 408 characters long.
It was laid out in a 24 by 17 grid.
When police investigated the death of Darlene Ferrin her sister identified Kane as a man
who would bother Darlene at the restaurant where she worked.
Darlene’s sister only identified Kane from a photograph, but if there was a connection
between one of The Zodiac’s victims and Kane that would be something we should take
into consideration.
Lawrence Kane was also identified as having the ‘closest likeness’ to The Zodiac by
a San Francisco police officer who unknowingly saw The Zodiac moments after the murder of
a cab driver named Paul Stine.
Paul Stine was murdered by The Zodiac on October 11, 1969.
Stine picked up a man thinking it would be a routine cab ride, but he was dead wrong.
On the way to his destination The Zodiac shot him in the head and cut off a piece of his
shirt.
The Zodiac walked away from the scene of the crime just as police arrived.
The cops were mistakenly looking for a black man as the suspect.
They ignored the white man resembling the correct description.
Racial profiling was common at this time in U.S. history.
This murder was where the most famous sketch of the Zodiac Killer came from.
The case was considered just a routine robbery until The San Francisco Chronicle received
another letter from The Zodiac.
The letter began, “I am the murderer of the taxi driver.”
The envelope contained a blood-stained piece of Paul Stine’s shirt.
There could be no denying The Zodiac was responsible.
In the letter The Zodiac mocked the police for failing to catch him and threatened to
shoot children on a school bus.
On November 8th and 9th The Zodiac sent two more letters.
The latter being the longest message he wrote and claiming that police had stopped him near
the crime scene, but let him go.
This letter also included a recipe to make a bomb and a detailed diagram of the explosive.
It was clear that The Zodiac had the technical knowhow to make the device and was not afraid
to use it.
Perhaps Lawrence Kane learned basic engineering skills in the Navy to allow him to construct
the bomb The Zodiac described.
The following month a letter addressed to famous attorney Melvin Belli was received.
In it we get a look into the psyche of The Zodiac.
Its writer stated he was afraid that he would kill again.
The Zodiac asked Belli to help, as if he were fighting a battle within himself.
One side of his personality wanted to stop the mayhem, the other personality, the one
clearly in control, only wanted to kill more.
The Zodiac ended the note with, “Please help me I can not remain in control for much
longer”.
These personality shifts could be due to brain trauma similar to what Lawrence Kane succumbed
to in his car crash.
For right now though the connections between Kane and The Zodiac are superficial and more
evidence is needed.
It is time to turn our investigation to another man who was suspected of being The Zodiac
Killer.
His name was Ross Sullivan.
Several physical features of Sullivan are reminiscent of The Zodiac.
He sported a crew cut and glasses similar to the man in the police sketch from the Stine
murder.
He also wore Army jackets and military-style boots like those that left footprints at the
Lake Berryessa stabbing.
Lets delve further into The Zodiac murder of September 27, 1969 to see if we can uncover
more clues.
Bryan Hartnell and Cecelia Shepard were relaxing on the sandy shore of Lake Berryessa, just
north of Napa, California.
A hooded man with a white crossed-circle stitched over his chest snuck up and held them at gunpoint.
He bound their wrists and once they were secured plunged a hunting knife into Hartnell’s
back six times.
The Zodiac then stabbed Shepard ten times.
To complete the crime The Zodiac walked over to Bryan Hartnell’s car and used a pen to
draw a crossed-circle on the door.
He then wrote the dates and locations of previous attacks.
He called the Napa police and reported his horrific double murder.
Among the evidence that was uncovered at the scene were military boot prints, however,
there is no direct link to Sullivan in this case except his similar attire.
But, Ross Sullivan is connected to a different Zodiac murder in a much more concrete way.
On October 30, 1966 Cheri Josephine Bates left a note for her father saying she had
gone to the library at City College in Riverside.
The next morning her Volkswagen Beetle was found abandoned in the library parking lot.
Her body lay in an alley nearby, between two unoccupied houses.
She had been stabbed numerous times and her throat was slashed.
It was a bloody scene.
Police found a Timex watch and prints of military boots at the crime scene.
Nothing had been stolen and no sexual assault had been conducted.
The next month a local newspaper received a typed letter titled “The Confession.”
The murder wrote, “Miss Bates was stupid.
She went to the slaughter like a lamb.
I am not sick.
I am insane.”
These words made the authorities shudder.
They were dealing with a man who had lost touch with reality.
At first it was unclear if this was a Zodiac killing.
In April of that year the police received another letter stating that “Bates had to
die.
There will be more.”
The letter was signed with a symbol resembling the letter “Z.”
Could the Z stand for Zodiac?
Detectives later determined that The Zodiac was to blame for the murder due to similarities
between the Bates’ murder and his other killings.
Then the smoking gun arrived in a letter to The San Francisco Chronicle.
The Zodiac confirmed the authority’s theory that he had murdered Bates.
The letter stated, “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.”
A scary notion for the police to grapple with.
But what does Sullivan have to do with this murder?
Well, Ross Sullivan worked at the Riverside City College library where Bates had gone
to study and near where her body was found.
Coworkers said that Ross Sullivan had ‘made them uncomfortable and disappeared for several
days after the murder.’
Again this is not conclusive evidence, but it does link Sullivan to one of the earlier
Zodiac Killings.
Ross Sullivan also had mental health problems.
Although we are now more aware of the role mental health plays in someone’s actions,
in the 1960’s less research on the topic was available.
In 1967 Sullivan was hospitalized several times for bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.
These mental health diseases may have caused the dark personality of The Zodiac to manifest
itself, with, or without, the knowledge of Ross Sullivan.
It would seem that Sullivan has a clearer connection to a Zodiac murder than Lawrence
Kane.
Again there is no conclusive evidence at this time, but Sullivan’s actions do seem suspicious.
A more recent claim for who The Zodiac Killer was comes from a man named Gary Stewart.
Stewart believes that his father was The Zodiac.
It isn’t every day that a son convicts his father of being a notorious serial killer.
In 2014 Gary Stewart published his book The Most Dangerous Animal of All.
In his book he outlined evidence as to why he believes his father was the notorious Zodiac.
Stewart grew up without knowing his father.
His mother, Jude Gilford, was a fourteen year old fugitive married to her twenty-seven year
old husband Earl Van Best Jr.
After Stewart was born his father decided he had no interest in parental responsibility.
He left his newborn son in a Louisiana apartment complex stairwell.
If nothing else Van Best was a terrible father.
Upon being arrested for multiple crimes and negligence, Van Best ended up in a California
State mental hospital.
Jude Gilford put Stewart up for adoption at the time.
It wasn’t until Gary Stewart was a grown man that he connected his father to The Zodiac.
He first started making the connections when he was watching late night TV.
On the screen was the police sketch of The Zodiac.
Stewart instantly realized the close resemblance to a picture of his father and The Zodiac
drawing.
Gary Stewart claims that not only were his father and The Zodiac similar in their looks,
but in their interests as well.
He states that his father was interested in ciphers.
He also mentions that Van Best had a deep connection to The Mikado.
The Zodiac quoted the Arthur Sullivan opera in his letters.
Maybe Van Best and The Zodiac shared the same love for this opera because they were the
same person.
Gary Stewart also claims that his father was in the right place at the right time.
Van Best lived right around the corner from where The Zodiac hailed Paul Stine’s cab
and murdered him in 1969.
These connections are circumstantial at best and no definitive evidence connects Van Best
to being The Zodiac.
Later in his research Stewart begins to become more conspiracy oriented.
He claims that since his mother eventually married a San Francisco detective named Rotea
Gilford, that the police are covering up Van Best’s identity.
This seems far fetched, but Stewart says it may have been to protect Rotea Gilford from
being associated with The Zodiac’s first wife.
Stewart believes that there is one piece of evidence that proves without a doubt his father
was The Zodiac.
In one of The Zodiac’s most intricate ciphers the word Best appears.
This could be a coincidence, or the cipher being read wrong.
But to Stewart it is the smoking gun that his father, Earl Van Best Jr. was The Zodiac.
Something that keeps detectives and us at The Infographics Show up at night is did The
Zodiac ever stop?
Or did he just take a break and change his M.O.?
After his last letter on March 22, 1971 there was radio silence from The Zodiac for almost
three years.
It wasn’t until 1974 that he resurfaced again.
The San Francisco Chronicle received a letter on January 29, 1974 from The Zodiac.
In it was a nightmare come to life.
The Zodiac alluded to more murders in his note which read, “Me – 37, SFPD – 0.”
This has been interpreted as The Zodiac taking responsibility for 37 deaths and the San Francisco
Police Department arresting him zero times.
Since 1974 no one has heard from The Zodiac.
But this does not mean he was not, or is not, still out there.
What happened?
Where did The Zodiac go?
Why did he stop killing, or at least stop claiming his murders?
According to the FBI's National Center for the Analysis of Violent Crime, serial killers
may stop murdering others if something significant changes in their life.
One theory as to why The Zodiac stopped is that the police were coming too close to catching
him.
This may have scared him into changing his ways.
However, this does not seem likely as he constantly mocked the police for not catching him.
Another possibility is that the attention he was receiving from his letters and ciphers
was a substitute for killing.
Or it could have been something as simple as growing older and less able to carry out
his murderous desires.
Some psychologists have hypothesized that The Zodiac may have recovered from an identity
disorder or multiple personality disorder.
As he recovered he could have lost the urge to kill.
Or perhaps he was institutionalized and we just don’t know about it.
Yet, the scariest theory of all is that he just kept killing and never took responsibility
for it.
He even said in a letter postmarked November 12, 1969, "I shall no longer announce to anyone
when I commit my murders, they shall look like routine robberies, killings of anger,
few fake accidents, etc."
It is impossible to tell if he kept good on this promise unless we find out who The Zodiac
was.
If nothing else, The Zodiac is still the stuff nightmares are made of.
We know of at least five confirmed murders he committed, but it is possible he had 37
or more victims.
Some of his ciphers still have not been cracked and may hold clues to his identity.
The Zodiac Killer case is still an open and ongoing investigation.
As of yet, there is no definitive answer to who The Zodiac was or if he is still out there.
Now it’s time to check out “The Zodiac Serial Killer - How Did He Evade The Police?”
Or “Could This Be The Deadliest Serial Killer In History of Mankind?”
We can’t promise you’ll still want to leave your house after watching these videos
though.