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I'll start with the bold section: I agree that the Domingos-Edwards murder in June, 1963 may had been Z's earlier 'work': it has a lot of the trappings of confirmed murders by Z later on, though no known communication was ever sent afterwards, unlike with Z's known killings. Otherwise, it has a good amount of similarities. Authorities investigating Zodiac suggested a connection around 1971, which was made public. When the murders occurred in 1963, they received remarkably little press coverage outside of the immediate area (they were killed on a beach off Highway 101). I wonder if there were others even before this one? It just does not really have the marks of an amateur...he shot both victims while running (while both the shooter and the two victims were running!). That takes a remarkable amount of skill and a cool nerve.
The Bates killing I think has less chance of being connected to Z---aside from the letters sent afterwards, the crime itself does not look much like the ones Z committed at all--I think she was killed by someone she knew. Its a very up-front and personal type of murder: she was stabbed many times, had overkill and that points much more to a personal rage of some kind, not the sort that Z did.
Z really is almost in a class by himself where it comes to serial murderers. The fact that he seems to de-escalate is most unusual. The first confirmed killing by him (Jensen-Faraday, Dec. 1968), both were killed by shotgun. After that, each time where he attacks a couple, one lived, which was the male each time. Then he killed Stine last, which looks different than the others, though he sent in proof with his letter (part of Stine's bloody shirt). So, he was capable of changing his MO a bit, which is also unusual.
I am going to follow your format here and respond to the italicized first. YES. I think this de-escalation could be seen as almost a character trait of Z's, it is so unusual and so outside the normal construct. If you consider it closely, most serial killers' MO is bound by their own compulsions, right? Whatever that driving force was, it somehow always made it into the modus operandi one way or another. For instance, posing, or mutilation, or taking away body parts, or sexual assault. There is a particular trait that is a manifestation of their driving force. Sexual sadism, or rage, usually. Now, you don't SEE rage in Z. You don't see rage in the killings. There is something decidedly CEREBRAL about all of it. As if its all a comic book, a mythos. The MYTHOS is the freaking motive, really. Damn, maybe I'll write a book about the case someday and call it that
Just an armchair observation- I have read many times of survivors of these types talking about how the killer would somehow "go blank", get glassy-eyed, some kind of possession really (not demonic, not going there, but....). Its a pretty common notion also mentioned by serial killers themselves- that everything would go silent, some talk about "something taking over"..and I think those are manifestations of that "typical" killer instinct coming to the fore. Again, you don't see that with Z. I'll mention again the fact that Bryan Hartnell said that Z actually told him, "I'm nervous". Yet he was able to stop with Stine long enough to get in the front seat and take off part of his shirt, wipe the cab down (apparently, not very well) and WALK not run away from the crime scene. Something about that whole scene made him feel comfortable. More comfortable than LB. But, again, you don't have the blindness born of rage or sadism taking over. Certainly killers can be very cunning and calm and must be to enter houses at night, for instance, or grab someone off the street. But many then descend into fulfilling their twisted fantasies in one form or another once the victim is subdued and vulnerable. Z never went that far, even with LB which was still a rather perfunctory killing by most serial killers standards. Which again, all screams to me that his fantasies were far larger than that. He wanted to throw a terrifying web over the North Bay Area without actually committing the sort of grisly killings that betray a real blood lust or rage or components of sexual torture. His whole THING was the persona of Z, the mythos.
So, Z was probably a sociopath and exhibiting a peculiarly sociopathic method in his actions. Which explains his ability to be calm enough in the Stine killing to tear the shirt off and walk away, his nerve at committing a crime in broad daylight in a public park, his cajones at writing the media with codes and the hood and all that. But sociopaths aren't all serial killers, of course. Actually the numbers are pretty small. Serial killing ITSELF is still a rare phenom, and has always been a rare thing, despite the hubub over it.
SO you have a sociopath who obviously doesn't have a problem killing people when it gets right down to it, but he doesn't have an out-of-control compulsion to kill either. His mojo is firmly worked by the impersonal FEAR and power. But not even the kind of power that killers derive from rape, for instance, or defiling a victim in some way. He didn't have a NEED for that. I can think of a million ways in which a guy like, say, Arthur Shawcross, would have committed these crimes. Or Dahmer or Bundy or any of those nearly archetypal dudes. I mean, they would have been taking BODY parts away with them, posing tableaus of body parts in the streets. Z was so RESTRAINED. These things in and of themselves make him a strange bird, indeed.
As far as the pre-killings go, that has been looked at extensively by other researchers and apparently the coastal areas of CA in the early sixties DID see a spate of shootings that mostly involved no fatalities. I believe in San Diego there were reports of someone firing off a shotgun from a cove at some sunbathers, that sort of thing. There were other happenings I don't have at hand in my mind but I do recall that there were numerous incidents that could perhaps be linked rather easily to the murders of LE and RD. There is a Ventura detective (I believe) who is still researching the case and put together a multi-part docu about it. Its a bit amateurish, but the heart shows through. He really wants it solved.
Frankly this case and so many others remain unsolved and its become my entire motivation to help apprehend people in these cold cases. CA is littered with them.
I am going to follow your format here and respond to the italicized first. YES. I think this de-escalation could be seen as almost a character trait of Z's, it is so unusual and so outside the normal construct. If you consider it closely, most serial killers' MO is bound by their own compulsions, right? Whatever that driving force was, it somehow always made it into the modus operandi one way or another. For instance, posing, or mutilation, or taking away body parts, or sexual assault. There is a particular trait that is a manifestation of their driving force. Sexual sadism, or rage, usually. Now, you don't SEE rage in Z. You don't see rage in the killings. There is something decidedly CEREBRAL about all of it. As if its all a comic book, a mythos. The MYTHOS is the freaking motive, really. Damn, maybe I'll write a book about the case someday and call it that
Just an armchair observation- I have read many times of survivors of these types talking about how the killer would somehow "go blank", get glassy-eyed, some kind of possession really (not demonic, not going there, but....). Its a pretty common notion also mentioned by serial killers themselves- that everything would go silent, some talk about "something taking over"..and I think those are manifestations of that "typical" killer instinct coming to the fore. Again, you don't see that with Z. I'll mention again the fact that Bryan Hartnell said that Z actually told him, "I'm nervous". Yet he was able to stop with Stine long enough to get in the front seat and take off part of his shirt, wipe the cab down (apparently, not very well) and WALK not run away from the crime scene. Something about that whole scene made him feel comfortable. More comfortable than LB. But, again, you don't have the blindness born of rage or sadism taking over. Certainly killers can be very cunning and calm and must be to enter houses at night, for instance, or grab someone off the street. But many then descend into fulfilling their twisted fantasies in one form or another once the victim is subdued and vulnerable. Z never went that far, even with LB which was still a rather perfunctory killing by most serial killers standards. Which again, all screams to me that his fantasies were far larger than that. He wanted to throw a terrifying web over the North Bay Area without actually committing the sort of grisly killings that betray a real blood lust or rage or components of sexual torture. His whole THING was the persona of Z, the mythos.
So, Z was probably a sociopath and exhibiting a peculiarly sociopathic method in his actions. Which explains his ability to be calm enough in the Stine killing to tear the shirt off and walk away, his nerve at committing a crime in broad daylight in a public park, his cajones at writing the media with codes and the hood and all that. But sociopaths aren't all serial killers, of course. Actually the numbers are pretty small. Serial killing ITSELF is still a rare phenom, and has always been a rare thing, despite the hubub over it.
SO you have a sociopath who obviously doesn't have a problem killing people when it gets right down to it, but he doesn't have an out-of-control compulsion to kill either. His mojo is firmly worked by the impersonal FEAR and power. But not even the kind of power that killers derive from rape, for instance, or defiling a victim in some way. He didn't have a NEED for that. I can think of a million ways in which a guy like, say, Arthur Shawcross, would have committed these crimes. Or Dahmer or Bundy or any of those nearly archetypal dudes. I mean, they would have been taking BODY parts away with them, posing tableaus of body parts in the streets. Z was so RESTRAINED. These things in and of themselves make him a strange bird, indeed.
As far as the pre-killings go, that has been looked at extensively by other researchers and apparently the coastal areas of CA in the early sixties DID see a spate of shootings that mostly involved no fatalities. I believe in San Diego there were reports of someone firing off a shotgun from a cove at some sunbathers, that sort of thing. There were other happenings I don't have at hand in my mind but I do recall that there were numerous incidents that could perhaps be linked rather easily to the murders of LE and RD. There is a Ventura detective (I believe) who is still researching the case and put together a multi-part docu about it. Its a bit amateurish, but the heart shows through. He really wants it solved.
Frankly this case and so many others remain unsolved and its become my entire motivation to help apprehend people in these cold cases. CA is littered with them.
Very good points again!
Another aspect of the Z case that I have long been curious of, and some people have mentioned, is the possible relationship between whomever Z actually was/is and Darline Ferrin (who was killed July 4, 1969 at Rock Springs in Vallejo--and her boyfriend Michael Majaeu survived)...there were some who felt Darline might had known her killer.
Now, considering that thought, I have long pondered the striking resemblance between Darline Ferrin and Betty Lou Jensen (who was killed Dec. 20, 1968 with her friend David Faraday on outside of Vallejo). I have wondered if perhaps the killing of Jensen was mistaken identity. It could just be coincidence, but I do find their resemblance interesting.
I don't have anything to add to the topic, but I just wanted to say that I'm very impressed with some of these theories. You guys have really thought hard about this stuff.
Very good points again!
Another aspect of the Z case that I have long been curious of, and some people have mentioned, is the possible relationship between whomever Z actually was/is and Darline Ferrin (who was killed July 4, 1969 at Rock Springs in Vallejo--and her boyfriend Michael Majaeu survived)...there were some who felt Darline might had known her killer.
Now, considering that thought, I have long pondered the striking resemblance between Darline Ferrin and Betty Lou Jensen (who was killed Dec. 20, 1968 with her friend David Faraday on outside of Vallejo). I have wondered if perhaps the killing of Jensen was mistaken identity. It could just be coincidence, but I do find their resemblance interesting.
I have as well.
Its probably a reasonable assumption to think that there was something in those girls, that type of girl, that set Z off. There is the whole matter that perhaps Darlene Ferrin was the real target and Betty Lou was just mistaken for her. But it was something about those kids parked in a vehicle that seemed to provoke him.
Or, it could have been merely a matter of choosing victims who would tend to isolate themselves off by their lonesomes making them more vulnerable. But if that were the case, he could have chosen prostitutes. And he didn't. So certainly the victims were convenient and also probably infuriating to him for some reason.
Certainly Darlene worked at a diner that was nearly right across the street from Arthur Leigh Allen's house, and there is the whole business of someone mentioning that there was a guy who had been stalking her or bothering her somehow that was named Lee. Which is not a big deal, of itself. Were it not the remaining mountain of little things that ALA seems to get stacked on him throughout this case. Don Cheney, the friend of ALA's who went to the police claiming that ALA had told him all about wanting to be the Zodiac and his plans for murdering people, mentioned that they had gone to a diner and there was a girl that he thought looked like Darlene Ferrin that he and Allen chatted with and Allen mentioned wanting to ask her out on a date.
I'm willing to bet I'm not the only person in here you guys have fascinated. The Zodiac Killer, and really unsolved murders/disappearances in general is a very interesting subject, and it's nice to see it fleshed out by knowledgeable crime geeks. Makes it more fun for us laypeople.
I'm willing to bet I'm not the only person in here you guys have fascinated. The Zodiac Killer, and really unsolved murders/disappearances in general is a very interesting subject, and it's nice to see it fleshed out by knowledgeable crime geeks. Makes it more fun for us laypeople.
I am and always have been so interested in this stuff I have changed my major from engineering to criminalistics. And that brings me to a point I haven't even brought up.
I am taking a fingerprinting class right now and we had to read an article about how fingerprinting experts sometimes do get it wrong. Its very few, but it happens. And naturally my mind went to that bloody partial that was recovered from Stine's cab, which is the ONLY print that has been discovered other than some smudged ones off one of the phones Z called from (after Blue Rock Springs, I believe).
Learning about partial prints, I am really beginning to wonder just how carefully that partial could be compared to 2000+ suspects that were examined throughout the official investigation. Certainly it can never be entered into a database, because it isn't a full profile. So, what you have is a situation where the naked eye has to match up to the full print of a suspect. I can imagine that there is a certain degree of error that could take place when you consider it could have been a palm print, or a any part of the fingers. Depending on how large that partial is, it could still possibly match up to a suspect if someone sat down with the time and expertise and reexamined those prints. CAREFULLY. Again, it would all depend on the naked eye, and in the depths of a high-pressure investigation there is a possibility that mistakes would be made.
I have as well.
Its probably a reasonable assumption to think that there was something in those girls, that type of girl, that set Z off. There is the whole matter that perhaps Darlene Ferrin was the real target and Betty Lou was just mistaken for her. But it was something about those kids parked in a vehicle that seemed to provoke him.
Or, it could have been merely a matter of choosing victims who would tend to isolate themselves off by their lonesomes making them more vulnerable. But if that were the case, he could have chosen prostitutes. And he didn't. So certainly the victims were convenient and also probably infuriating to him for some reason.
Certainly Darlene worked at a diner that was nearly right across the street from Arthur Leigh Allen's house, and there is the whole business of someone mentioning that there was a guy who had been stalking her or bothering her somehow that was named Lee. Which is not a big deal, of itself. Were it not the remaining mountain of little things that ALA seems to get stacked on him throughout this case. Don Cheney, the friend of ALA's who went to the police claiming that ALA had told him all about wanting to be the Zodiac and his plans for murdering people, mentioned that they had gone to a diner and there was a girl that he thought looked like Darlene Ferrin that he and Allen chatted with and Allen mentioned wanting to ask her out on a date.
Thanks, Zephryr, I'm just a nerd nerding out
I do think seeing couples in parked cars, generally alone at 'lovers' lanes' enraged Zodiac. While he hardly mentions sex in his communications explicit (nor was there any evidence of sexual molestation of his known victims), he comes across as a loner. He does mention, interestingly enough, "getting rocks off", or words to that effect, in the first Cypher, which was solved. He basically says killing is better than sex for him and while there was no actual sexual assaults committed, I do think a sexual frustration of some sort was a driving force behind is rage. It was the manner in which he chose to express it, is what is unusual about him and his crimes. I think he was probably at least sexually functional.
I do think seeing couples in parked cars, generally alone at 'lovers' lanes' enraged Zodiac. While he hardly mentions sex in his communications explicit (nor was there any evidence of sexual molestation of his known victims), he comes across as a loner. He does mention, interestingly enough, "getting rocks off", or words to that effect, in the first Cypher, which was solved. He basically says killing is better than sex for him and while there was no actual sexual assaults committed, I do think a sexual frustration of some sort was a driving force behind is rage. It was the manner in which he chose to express it, is what is unusual about him and his crimes. I think he was probably at least sexually functional.
Yeah but I always thought that "getting your rocks off with a girl" phrase was, like I said, perfunctory. Or an affectation. Just didn't ring true somehow.
And isn't it weird that the ONLY sexual reference he made was in a cipher?
Yeah but I always thought that "getting your rocks off with a girl" phrase was, like I said, perfunctory. Or an affectation. Just didn't ring true somehow.
And isn't it weird that the ONLY sexual reference he made was in a cipher?
It is odd. This brings to mind another Zodiac communication: Z apparently sent a Halloween-themed greeting card to one of the editors of the SF Chronicle in October, 1970. This card has a white skeleton on the front (and another inside I think)...anyway, Z had modified this card in a number of ways, but most notably, he affixed a paper pumpkin to the front of the card, covering the pelvis area of the skeleton. Some have taken this to mean sexual oppression...otherwise, the card is clearly a veiled threat against Herb Caen, who it was addressed to.
I have some new info I will add soon and if anyone else wants to chime in, contribute, great!
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