antique, RobertUnmasked 26 страница

“Hundreds of people can be in a cab. There was emergency medical personnel at the scene, other officials at the scene. Nobody took anyprints at the time. They have a whole drawer ful of fingerprints that came out of that cab, and it’s an extremely arduous task and most ofare partial. I assure you the primary suspects have been checked. There’s no fingerprint matches anywhere.... Ken Moses, one of the bestmen in the state and SFPD has one of the best computer systems in the state. They certainly would have run that bloody print long ago had itout, but they didn’t preserve the crime scene wel enough, any of the prints, particularly the bloody print of the man believed to be. There were ambulance people there, there were other cops there. They are saying, how come this print doesn’t match up to the? It could have been the guy driving the ambulance got some of Paul Stine’s blood on his hands and then touched it and that’s the way ofbloody print.

“Incidental y, Al en wore size 10½ shoes, and that’s the size of the Wing Walker shoe print found at Lake Berryessa,” I said. I summarized theof the murders: “They usual y happened by a body of water on a weekend and usual y involved a young couple who were enjoying al theZodiac did not enjoy—intimate, loving relationships.”

“We interviewed everyone in this case,” said Conway. “We interviewed Kathleen Johns. I’m at kind of at a loss as how to explain it, but I don’twhat she described even happened, let alone that the Zodiac did it.” “Johns is the only one I thought was a little iffy,” I said. “As years go by,’ve come to believe more and more that the man who kidnapped her wasn’t Zodiac.”

“The only thing I put any stock in is a thing that I know for a fact,” said Conway. “Al this business about the phases of the moons and al thesein reality didn’t have to do with anything. It was a way for the Zodiac to play with people’s minds for his own perverse satisfaction.cryptograms, as it turned out, had no meaning.” The ciphers did, however, explain his motive and revealed the clue of The Most Dangerous, which led to his family and friends turning Al en in.”discussed my conversations with Al en. “It may have been because of the child molesting,” I said, “but when you work in the arts you get aof intuitive sense about things, and literal y my spine got chil s when I was around him. There was something about him very wrong. I often usedgo in and buy things—he worked in a hardware store—just a very scary guy, but highly intel igent. He had a degree in botany and biology.”

“Biology,” said Wil iams. “He said he didn’t quite get his master’s degree—he didn’t finish his thesis; he had finished the course work for a’s. His bachelor’s degree was in elementary education. And he said his I.Q. was—I wrote it down—in the 130s. ‘Certainly no genius,’ he, ‘but I am intel igent.’”

“He cal ed himself gifted,” said Conway. “That’s the terminology he used.”

“Real y,” said Wil iams. “‘My mind,’ he said ‘I believe is 136.’ I asked him about the cryptograms. ‘I was in the Navy,’ he said, ‘and what I did therechipping paint and then I was a third-class radioman. That certainly doesn’t make me an expert on cryptograms.”began naming his skil s. “Scuba diver, marksman... airplane pilot,” said Wil iams. “He knew explosive devices, cryptography, meteorology,”said, “charts (naval and pilot) and compass, writing, drafting, and graphics [his father was not only a Navy officer but a draughtsman]. Chemistry

[he was a chemist], guns [he col ected them], disguise and sewing [he was a Navy sailmaker]. He not only typed, but had the same kind of portablethe Riverside letters were written on.” “Phil Tucker,” said Bawart, “had given us the information that as a child Al en had been forced towith his right hand though he was natural y left-handed.”

“Sailor, pilot,” continued Conway. “In fact, he had some trophies for Hobie Cat. He was also a swimmer. The other thing he did, he was quite ancook. His living quarters were, as Rita could tel you, in the basement of his parents’ house. And every part of this little room was covered withfrom floor to ceiling. He was very wel read and could converse on any topic you could think of.”

“I heard Zodiac could quote Gilbert and Sul ivan by heart,” said the judge. “Could any of this be applied to Al en?”

“Absolutely,” said Conway. “We confirmed his interest in Gilbert and Sul ivan through his brother and other relatives. They also confirmed that hemisspel ed words. It wasn’t by accident. He’d write recipes for example and he’d spel ‘eggs,’ instead of ‘e-g-g-s,’ he’d spel it ‘a-i-g-s.’that was intentional just to get a chuckle out of people who would read it. He did that consistently with al kinds of things.” I recal ed that Al en in his interviews referred to Zodiac as “The” Zodiac, just as the kil er did in his letters.

“The most difficult part of this case is the handwriting issue,” continued Conway. “There are at least two or three people in the area of handwriting, and the one thing they say about the Zodiac letters is that they are consistent from the very first letter to the very last letter. Al the letterswords, handwriting is an absolute match. It’s one person who did those letters. That’s not an issue. The interesting thing, to go back to thecase, there’s only one piece of evidence that Zodiac had any thing to do with the Riverside kil ing, and that’s the kil er scratched someonto a desktop. The actual letter he sent that describes al the things that he said he did in this homicide is al typed. There was noor printing of any kind. The name signed on the bottom of the letter was ‘Enterprise.’” Conway was in error here: The letter had beento the Riverside Press-Enterprise. And Zodiac had also handprinted three Riverside letters.

“But the scratching on the desk of which a photo was taken, as Sherwood Morril said, that matches the Zodiac letters. Since then George and Igone to every expert there is and they unequivocal y without hesitation say, he was wrong, these are not a match to the Zodiac handwriting., plus the fact that the Riverside police already have a suspect. From their point of view their case was solved. This so-cal ed genius that wroteother book with al the mathematical equations, his whole premise—everything is built on the mathematics starting with the Riverside Case.I tel him the Riverside case didn’t have anything to do with it, his theory goes out the window. It didn’t shake him. He stil believes otherwise.”al had our blind spots. Captain Conway was convinced that Al en had never been in the Navy in spite of his claims of having been “a paint-.” Various women and their daughters Al en had known over the years spoke of his time in the U.S. Navy. Reports showed the same. Leighto being “less than honorably discharged” and he had gone to col ege on the G.I. Bil. The Navy connection was unshakable. His father’sfive years in the Navy alone would enable Leigh to make periodic visits to Treasure Island, work at Travis AFB, and buy Wing Walkers at aexchange.

“Judge,” said Wil iams, “I’d like to ask a few questions of the other panelists that I’ve wanted the answers to. If indeed Arthur Leigh Al en were the, I think both of you have indicated in the past that whoever was the Zodiac would someday prior to his death leave some message behind toeveryone know he was the Zodiac. If he was Al en, can you tel me why you think he didn’t and why the kil ings stopped when they did?” I thoughtmyself, he might not have left any message because he died suddenly of a heart attack, one so sudden he bumped his head. “From my point of,” said Conway, “he did leave that message. One of Zodiac’s letters talked about finding bombs in his basement. Wel, in fact there werein the basement of that house when we did the search warrant—there were pipe bombs. The other half of it is that he does leave thatby things that are in his basement and at the same time denying everything. There’s so many lies I caught him in, his denying things that’t have any relevance anymore. There was no letters whatsoever during the time he was in Atascadero state hospital. The last letter he eversays, ‘I am back.’

“There’s several reasons why the kil ings stopped—this is from discussions with the FBI experts. There’s a very famous FBI group back in, Virginia, that studies serial kil ers. My father used to be an avid deer hunter when he was a young man in his twenties and thirties. Aboutyears ago he quit deer hunting and I asked him why he quit. It’s not interesting to me anymore[, he said]. That explanation is real y simplistic,that’s probably the explanation for Al en if he was Zodiac.

“The other thing is that he was a very il man—he was fifty-eight when he died. He was extremely il and knew he was dying and he’d had thatness for some time. Even though he could stil get around he was not very mobile and there was a lot of focus on him as a suspect. Being a, being il, and losing interest—al adds up to the explanation as to why.”

“Did you find fingerprints?” Wil iams asked Conway. “Al en says in the interview that police told him during the interview process with the Val ejothat you have fingerprints on the pipe bombs under his house. He of course says it was some ex-con that had left them there before. He’t even know they were there. Did in fact you find fingerprints?”

“Let me answer that this way—he first denied having any knowledge whatsoever of any bombs existing in his basement, and when we told him offingerprints on the bombs—which there wasn’t, by the way. Then he had an explanation of how he was cleaning up the basement and movedfrom one spot to another. That’s the kind of stuff we went through with him al the time.”Bawart spoke from the audience. “You have to understand that back in the sixties law enforcement was doing a pretty good job. They’t real y communicating with each other—they didn’t have computers.”

“Getting back to the fingerprints [on the cab], every single [Zodiac] suspect that ever existed,” said Conway, “has been checked against thoseand no one has matched. The other problem is that the Zodiac bragged in his letter how he wouldn’t leave fingerprints anyway.”

“Can I ask the captain and Robert, in your mind, who is the Zodiac kil er?” said Wil iams.

“George, how do we answer that?” said Conway.

“Who is?” said Rita.

“I find,” said Bawart, “so many coincidences that point one direction, I feel it is no longer a coincidence, and I feel there are so many areas thatdirectly at Arthur Leigh Al en that I feel he is a viable suspect and in al probability the Zodiac.”

“Robert?” said Wil iams.

“That’s my opinion too,” I answered cautiously. Al en had died al too recently. “Al I can say is that of al the people who were ever brought to me—conferred with Dave Toschi, he showed me files and files and files—Al en is the best I’ve seen. Zodiac could be some anonymous person whoin the woods and has never been printed, but as far as I can tel, Al en is the best suspect they’ve come up with.”

“First of al there’s nothing wrong with circumstantial evidence,” said Conway, “if you understand what circumstantial evidence is—leaving aat the scene of a crime and denying you did the crime, circumstantial y we prove that you did do the crime because of the fingerprints atcrime scene.”Wil iams took out a letter Al en had mailed her. He’d scrawled a “Z” in the lower left-hand corner of the envelope. A similar “Z” had beenat the bottom of the 1967 Riverside letter. The postmark: “July 30, 1991 Oakland.” He had dated the letter inside August 1. The typed letter: “Dear Rita: Please pardon the informality, but I consider you a friend.”

“So I guess I’m a friend of the Zodiac,” said Wil iams, “if indeed he is the Zodiac. He just goes on to say that he appreciated the interview and hea knot in his stomach and goes on and on with compliments. He says ‘professionality’—interesting that he made up a word. ‘I wonder if that’s in the dictionary,’ he says. Certainly, he’s the kind of person who would have a dictionary there and wouldn’t use that word unless he real y. I’m afraid I never answered the man.”night some of the conference was briefly reported on KTVU: “Everything about the Zodiac is serious, giving the number of people he kil edat random... perhaps as many as fifty. Who was the Zodiac?” Rita Wil iams asked. “This is the Val ejo man many investigatorsto be the notorious Zodiac kil er, and is the first time his picture has been revealed. His name is Arthur Leigh Al en.” As archival film ran,iams asked Al en: “Are you the Zodiac kil er?” “There would be nothing farther from my mind,” he said. “I am certainly, most certainly, not thekil er.”

“But at San Francisco State University this afternoon,” continued Wil iams, “I was on a panel with people considered authorities on the Zodiacand for the first time publicly they said this. Al en seems to be the best suspect they’ve come up with,” she reported, quoting me. “There are soareas,” Bawart was seen saying, “that point directly at Arthur Leigh Al en that he is a viable suspect and in al probability the Zodiac.”

“But investigators never charged Al en with any of the kil ings connected with the Zodiac,” said Wil iams, “and last August Al en died. I intervieweda year earlier. He was fifty-eight then, a diabetic and on kidney dialysis. But back in the later sixties, when the clever kil er known as ZodiacCalifornia, Al en was in his late thirties, sixty pounds heavier, strong, and a biology graduate student. Police considered him a suspectfrom the beginning.

“The Zodiac kil er taunted authorities and the media, sending complex letters and ciphers,” Wil iams summed up. “Today Val ejo policesaid they never charged Al en because they couldn’t explain discrepancies in the Zodiac handwriting. Al en sent me this handwrittentyped letter after our interview.”iams’s 1991 interview, rerun that night, showed Al en col apsing and sobbing. What Rita Wil iams had observed stuck in my mind. “However,”said, “he didn’t real y cry. In looking at the tape, he kind of turned it on and turned it off. When Al en lifted his head his eyes were dry. I definitelyhe was pretending.” “There are so many lies I caught him in, his denying things didn’t have any relevance anymore,” said Conway. Al en liedwhen there was no reason to., February 14, 1997years had rushed by since the Valentine’s Day search of Al en’s home. Toschi rang me, sounding buoyant. “I’ve gotten cal s throughoutevening and today,” he said. “Something is up. One of the inspectors, Rich Adkins, just inherited the Zodiac case. When a friend of minecaptain of investigations, he said that Rich real y wanted to talk to me because he had gone through the files and just was a little curious aboutthings. He and his partner, a guy named Vince Repetto, paid me a visit Tuesday. I had some time, about a half hour, to talk to them about.

“Vince told me he’s never gone through everything that had been sent to Sacramento. He said, ‘For some reason everything wasn’t brought.’ They only had two boxes. That disappointed me. Sacramento should have returned everything that Armstrong and I accumulated., when they decided to bring everything up to Sacramento years ago, I felt that they had made a very, very serious mistake. I wasupset. A case of this caliber, known worldwide, and the work that Bil and I did on it (I have poor handwriting, but as I got older and moreI took better notes)—to do this, to shuffle it around in a cardboard box—you’re going to lose something. Someone is going to putin his pocket. You have to want to solve the darn thing! You have to!

“I hope they know where the rest of the files are in Sacramento and who’s got them. Repetto and Adkins said this morning they were going to goto Sacramento and have a look. What fascinated this Rich Adkins is that it is stil a mystery—that the case is stil active and that so many peopleaware of it. So many other people have kil ed more people than Zodiac. Adkins asked why was there so much interest al these years later. Ihim, ‘It’s a mystery—because of the letters, the ciphers, the codes. It’s taunting, it’s “Catch me if you can,” and “I’m crack-proof.”

“Rich asked me if I had ever spoken to Conway. When Al en died, he was quoted al over the place. Now they tel me he told Adkins he was goingretire in December.”

“Conway’s just very enthusiastic,” I said. “Some of his ideas are very good—such as paring the case down to its essentials.”

“San Francisco was puzzled why Val ejo didn’t simply close the case and this is what Inspectors Adkins and Repetto want to do,” said Toschi.

“What Rich Adkins asked of me is that if you—who are extremely knowledgeable—would be wil ing to talk with them. They’re two pretty good guys. I, ‘Graysmith is one of the most honorable men I’ve ever met in my life. I think he would want to talk to you.’ Adkins said, ‘After al this time, weto close it and we think we can.’ They want to give Armstrong and I credit. ‘What we want to prove,’ Adkins told me, ‘if it wasn’t for you takinginitiative when Al en’s brother cal ed and going to Val ejo and talking to Al en’s sister-in-law and brother... you guys made the case and didwork on Al en than any of the other jurisdictions who were closer to him.’”

“The one thing Val ejo can’t understand is why John Lynch and Les Lundblad were on this guy so early in the case,” I said. “Why? And this wasbefore the informants, Cheney and Panzarel a.”

“We never got that,” said Toschi sadly.

“What brought them to Al en? Two guys in independent police agencies both go right to Al en’s front door. There’s a little tiny piece missing.went out and talked to Al en after Blue Rock Springs and Lake Berryessa. And of course they have that knife story—‘I’ve been kil ing two.... ’”

“Yes. Adkins and Repetto even asked me if we could put Al en in Southern California. My memory was weak at that point, but I know you foundleads. The brother went and searched the basement of Al en’s house himself, and he found cryptography books. I told this to Adkins onand it blew him away.”night I opened more mail from Zodiac buffs. “Look under the stamps and the envelope flaps for saliva and attempt a DNA test on it,” Michaelsuggested. “Also check the letter that had a bloody cross drawn on it for DNA. Check the skin and hair fragments that victim Cheri Johad under her fingernails when found.” DNA, obtained from a variety of biological sources—blood, hair, semen, and saliva—had final ythe Zodiac case, as I was about to find out., February 15, 1997called Repetto at 9:00 A.M. and he wanted to meet right away. “I’m going to be getting on the road here and heading toward the city,” he told me.

“I’l cal my partner on the cel phone and I’l cal you back with a time we could meet, say around ten-twenty, ten-thirty this morning.” We set the placethe Mirabel e Cafe on Ninth Avenue, the site of the former Owl and Monkey Cafe, where I did al my writing.sat at my regular table in the front window and watched a light-rail car glide by. I recognized the two inspectors immediately as they crawled fromcar and entered the cafe. Adkins, tal, broad-shouldered, and energetic, had a bruise on his left cheek from a fight he had just had with a. Vince Repetto, older and more world-weary than his partner, squeezed into a chair. I soon wished they had canceled the meeting.had changed in the last hour.previous day Adkins and Repetto had gotten DNA results. Genetic markers on a Zodiac letter (they wouldn’t say which one) had matcheden’s DNA! However, a cal to Repetto after our conversation revealed a second run had showed no match. “I heard this bit of news just before Iup Rich,” he said., with his knowledge of chemistry, even in the late sixties and early seventies, would hardly have been so foolish as to lick an envelope or. While no such thing as DQ-Alpha DNA18 testing existed back then, blood and saliva typing procedures did. In 1976, Dr. Richard Wal erup the testing procedures and serology guidelines for secretor samples for the state crime lab in Santa Rosa. Genetic markers, a series of, energy-releasing molecules and enzymes present within the fluids of each individual’s body, could be lifted from stains. They could beby various high-tech serological tests. ABO testing involved long-lasting, stable molecules, and PGM testing dealt with more perishable. Secretor samples found in ABO existed in saliva, semen, and blood.the DNA false positive have come from a close relation? Had Al en had his mother lick the envelope for him? If so, under what pretext? Orwe been wrong al along? Toschi, Mulanax, Lundblad, Adkins, and Repetto and al the rest had believed that Zodiac was Arthur Al en. So did I.Al en did not match the handwriting, did not lick the letter they had tested, and had passed a lie-detector test, albeit in a drugged state. Whatbe the answer? I thought back to the possibility of two Zodiacs working as partners, an idea that Bawart had considered. Now I had thetask of tel ing Toschi about the meeting. He was crestfal en.

“Tuesday,” said Toschi, “they told me they were about a month away from hearing anything positive. I feel sorry for them. They were obviouslyin what was going on. Now one phone cal that says no, it deflates you. It’s a step backward.”

“I remember Al en lamenting in 1975,” I said, “that he hoped Zodiac would write a letter while he was at Atascadero to prove he wasn’t Zodiac. Ifconfederate was writing the letters for him, why wouldn’t he do so? The results of that DNA test is something I didn’t see coming.” I looked at my. From 1986 through 1991 I had gotten a steady stream of breathing and hang-up cal s. They had stopped with Al en’s death. I almost missed., February 16, 1997

“I spoke with Inspector Repetto,” I told Bawart.

“I know him,” Bawart said. “Vince runs his own private security outfit. They had him assigned to this thing after Deasy. Deasy was handling it forlongest time out of the Pawn Detail. Then they turned it over to this Vince. Of course, he had his other cases to work within SFPD.”

“SFPD got DNA results two days ago.” I said. “And it came up it could be Al en. But by the time they got back to me—less than an hour, they hada second report that said the sample didn’t match Zodiac. Can you think of anyone who might have written the letters for Al en?”

“You know, we even compared Cheney’s handwriting,” said Bawart. “And Sandy Panzarel a and Ron Al en, a pretty straitlaced guy.”

“Robert Emmett was teaching school in Germany when the letters stopped. I’m thinking they might want to test his DNA.”

“This is something that Conway had pressed for before he retired,” said Bawart. “As for the samples on Al en, I don’t know where San Franciscohave gotten them. I have the Val ejo coroner holding that stuff and he’s supposed to notify me if and when they get a request from San. I haven’t heard anything. Maybe Al en had his dog licking his stamps....”

“No, it was human DNA,” I said. I mentioned Andrew Todd Walker,19 the third important suspect in the case.

“I don’t dislike Walker,” said Bawart. “I just don’t think there’s enough definitive information on him to make it real y viable. These guys [a Navaligence officer and two CHP officers] pursue it as a hobby and that’s wonderful. They apparently have gone to the expense of stealing some ofsilverware. They paid for a DNA check, at least they told me they did. They have Walker’s DNA. You know, I’l bet you Walker and I bet you thisthat Harvey Hines likes—I bet you both of them, just to get everything off their backs, would submit to a DNA test.”

“Wel, sure. I sat down with Morril in the seventies. He studied some of Leigh’s printing I got from Ace Hardware. It’s looks fine—the three-stroke, al the rest. If they’re going to run a genetic test, then they should at least do al of the suspects.”

“I just wish that back in ’71-’72 Toschi and Armstrong would have fol owed up further. I wish they’d searched the home. I talked to Prouty, who washandwriting analyst who worked at DOJ that worked under Morril. And Prouty said he was losing it toward the end. I looked at that [desktop] stuff and I couldn’t make it [as Zodiac writing]. He died shortly after his retirement. I’m not sure Repetto or Adkins have ever viewed any ofreports... but nobody’s pounding on their door. Stine’s family isn’t there every day saying what are you doing about the death of my husband,, or whatever. And the same thing happens in Val ejo. The Ferrin family’s not pounding on the door. It’s the old adage—the squeaky wheel getsoil. I don’t blame Vince at al. He’s probably got a half-dozen cases where people are pounding on his door.” in al it had been a stunning development. Lieutenant Tom Bruton, SFPD homicide investigator, cal ed me. He had inherited the Zodiac case,heirloom passed down from generation to generation. Bruton wondered if I could provide some originals of the missing letters.

“Wel, what do you have missing?” I asked.

“The three-part-cipher letter,” he replied. That would have been the first Zodiac letter San Francisco had received.

“I have FBI reproductions of that. Would that do?”

“No. We thought maybe the original had been passed on to you. Kathleen Johns said that she received a second Zodiac Hal oween card andit on to you. Do you have that?”

“No. She means Paul Avery. However, you’re welcome to anything I have. I want to see this thing solved.” We spoke for a while longer, and then Ito ask a favor of my own. “I’ve been thinking about that DNA test done on Al en and I have two questions.”

“Go ahead.”

“First, where did they get a sample of Al en’s genetic material? He was buried in 1992.”

“We got it from the Val ejo coroner. They kept a sample of brain fluid or a brain fragment that they’d kept refrigerated.”

“That clears that up.”

“And the second point?”

“Which letter did they test?” I had in mind one of the early letters that contained squares of Paul Stine’s shirt. That bloodstained swatch wouldthe sender as Zodiac.

“We used the 1978 letter,” he said.

“The forgery?”, I had believed in that letter. But in 1978 one thing had troubled me. “Excluding Zodiac’s greeting cards, desktop, and car door, hiscommunications have al been written on 7½-inch-by-10-inch bond in letter-sized envelopes. The 1978 letter was on 8½-inch-by- 11-bond in a legal-sized envelope.” I knew now that not only was the 1978 letter a fake, but the SFPD knew it.

“What are the chances of a second test using one of the older letters?” I asked.said nothing.cal ed Toschi. He asked incredulously why they didn’t test a letter that contained a swatch of Stine’s shirt. “Since they wanted to know if I had anyletters,” I said, “I suspect they’ve either misplaced some or they’ve been stolen. The truth is, there’s not enough DNA on the remainingfor them to evaluate. They had tested for saliva in 1969-71 and found none. Only the 1978 fake had enough cel s for a test.” The SFPD latera chart of available Zodiac DNA:

“Zodiac letters and envelopes for 10/13/69, ENVELOPE PROCESSED FOR DNA—FEW CELLS. 11/8/69 Card: ‘Sorry I haven’t written’ dripping, ENVELOPE PROCESSED FOR DNA—FEW CELLS. 12/20/69, Contained piece of cloth from Stine’s shirt (per keel),PROCESSED FOR DNA—FEW CELLS. 4/20/70 ‘My name is... ’ (Cipher), ENVELOPE PROCESSED FOR DNA—FEW. 4/28/70, Card: (Sorry to hear...) ‘Blast... Buttons... ’ ENVELOPE PROCESSED FOR DNA—FEW CELLS. 6/26/70 Handwritten& map: ‘I shot a man with a.38... ’ ENVELOPE PROCESSED FOR DNA—FEW CELLS.”lab found some cel s in these communications:

“Handwritten note: 7/24/70 ‘Woman & baby in car... ’ ENVELOPE PROCESSED FOR DNA—CELLS FOUND. 7/26/70 ’I wil torture my

slaves waiting in paradice,’ ENVELOPE PROCESSED FOR DNA—CELLS FOUND. 1/29/74 ‘saw the Exorcist,’ ENVELOPEFOR DNA—CELLS FOUND.”the lost and unprocessed by the lab were these:11/9/69 handwritten note: “This is the Zodiac Speaking,—LOCATION OF ENVELOPE UNK.” Also apparently missing were the originalletters and ciphers of 7/31/69, the letter of 8/7/69, the 10/27/70 Hal oween Card, the 3/13/71 “Blue Meanies” letter to Times, the 3/22/71, “Sought Victim 12,” the 5/8/74 note signed “a citizen” and the 7/8/74 “Red Phantom” letter.report concluded with the tested letter: “4/24/78 Handwritten note ‘that city pig Toschi... ’ DNA SAMPLE OBTAINED/ NOT AUTHENTICLETTER.”Leigh Al en had not been ruled out as the Zodiac after al. Soon after Zodiac returned from the grave.

III, March 16, 1997Zodiac II, no one ever expected Zodiac’s murders to be emulated again. A Zodiac copycat had been horrific—a third Zodiac, inconceivable.for a third time the kil er’s undying persona reached out to bring death, this time some three thousand miles away. Kobe, a wel -to-do suburb

miles west of Tokyo. Kobe lay complacent in its relative safety, almost as murder-free as the rest of Japan. Hammer attacks against two girlsthe neighborhood on February 10 had rocked the community from its slumber. Today, Ayaka Yamashita, a ten-year-old, was bludgeoned anded by stab wounds to the head. Less than an hour later, a nine-year-old was stabbed and nearly bled to death., May 24, 1997a stormy morning, rain beaded on a plastic bag left at the green iron front gate of Kobe’s Tomogaoka Junior High. Though a light fog hadon the underside of the bag nearest the pavement, a human head was visible inside. A pitiful lock of black hair splayed and fanned outthe plastic. A schoolboy’s clouded face peered out. Only moments before, neighbors had glimpsed a stout man staggering under theof two black garbage bags as he rushed down a narrow street. “He was about forty years old,” they told police summoned to the junior high.victim’s head had been severed at the jawline with a hacksaw and sharp knife. The kil er had gouged his eyes out and stuffed a message in his. Written in red ink, the words ran with rain. Zodiac’s crossed-circle symbol was starkly legible. The kil er was strong and had used only hishand to strangle the boy. A search for the rest of the body began. The corpse, discovered in the wooded area of a fenced-in televisionstation, had been undressed, then redressed. The victim was Jun Hase, a mental y chal enged eleven-year-old last seen three days. Just after lunchtime, he had set out to visit his grandfather. Now neighbors recal ed a suspicious vehicle had been parked near the boy’s.

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