Zodiackillersite.com

traveller1st wrote:I think he'd possibly reached a stage where he didn't need to press the issue as he did with the earlier crimes and the details because he'd already established himself and why give more details than you need to.

Trav - and yet he carried on frantically "proving himself" with references to the "electric gun sight" again, and with pieces of shirt!
Say, possibly also with the 340, eh? (I hope glurk gets finished with it soon.)

No, I still feel we need a reason why he never mentions BRS again. In my humble opinion.
Now, if the Chronicle produces another letter from a bottom drawer.....

You mean LB obviously. I nearly put BRS sometimes, must be the 'B'.

Do we need a reason though? Well, yes we do but I don't think it would be anything too important. Then again who knows. In the absence of anything solid I prefer to try and keep speculation to something mind-numbingly simple like he just didn't or no reason. Maybe the answer lies with the press - did they write anything regarding this attack that would have illicited a response from him?

The other thing is that the next attack is PH, the big time, the big smoke, proper LE to do battle with and celebrities getting involved and bus bombs etc. Lots to keep him busy. It may have seemed pointless to refer directly back to LB unless he had been specifically challenged on something.

I believe there were a few things written at the time (I'll try to dig them out again) but the big issue was that the male survived again, with the how's and why's being questioned. It's one of the reasons I believe Stine followed so closely ater.

Wier wrote:I believe there were a few things written at the time (I'll try to dig them out again) but the big issue was that the male survived again, with the how's and why's being questioned. It's one of the reasons I believe Stine followed so closely ater.

Stine following so closely after is one of the reasons I question his involvement with LB.

He didn't kill Mike, yet he waited.

He didn't kill Bryan, yet 13 days or so and he goes after a cabbie with the need to PROVE it was him. Why? It does not appear LE doubted it was him @ LB.

***
(Seagull has provided many links to newspapers in regards to LB)

It has been a while since I've studied the newspaper stories but as I recall, the fact that he left a second male victim alive became an issue then. In context...Mageau was lucky to have survived being shot so many times, there wasn't a "failure" on Z's part. While Hartnell too could count himself lucky, the fact that he did survive began to raise questions and speculation about Z. Was it hatred of women/ was he a latent homosexual and the usual psychoanalysis began to make the papers. For all intents and purposes the second male surviving almost became the failure, that he needed to react to ( as opposed to needing to do so because Mageau survived)
My thinking was that Z said, we'll see about that and reacted, hence Stine so soon and so clinical. I think if you look at his actions, there is a pattern of sorts.
Z is being questioned about the male surviving , he kills Stine in a clinical manner. He's spotted by Kids and then he's making threats about school kids. Avery is writing stories and then he reacts to him. I wonder if we were to rewind the tape, would we find something specific that made Z turn on couples and police in the first place. Anyway, just thoughts.

All that said, ( especially given the description and method of murder at LB) I would have some doubts too, but then. How do we account for the car door?

There's always a pattern, isn't there?

Even in this case. Is that pattern though just one of random choices? Isn't that the simplest source and purpose - disguise through noise. Kill couples, wear a disguise, doesn't wear a disguise, kills a person on his own. Even this isn't outside of the pattern as he stated in his first threat that he would kill couples or lone people.

Given this I don't think that there's anything specific about the LB costume that has to mean anything. It was just another mix. A costume, a gun, a knife, clothesline. It's easy to assume that there was a purpose here but if we look at the prior patterns then this is just a variation - as opposed to some huge, clew giving hint to reasons for departure to prior attacks.

So I guess that what I'm asking is - why should we pick something as significant because it appears different when it appears different in the midst of an approach that seems based on different? Or...is it different? or is it based on variation.

If I kill with a rottweiler, then kill again with a poodle - the pattern is dogs.

So he wears a disguise at LB but, according to Z he also was disguised at PH. So the pattern could be disguises. He said he would not say what his disguise consisted of when he killed but since we know he wore different disguises it suggests to me that the use of the singular 'disguise' implies that it was a variable thing applied at the time. So in a weird way he couldn't say what it consisted of because it changed or it might be employed on more than one occasion. Point is that it is a disposable and adaptive tool.

So with that in mind, is the LB disguise that important, or just one more whimsical choice in an MO based on such choices.

Trav, I meant LB of course. I hate the diminutives. I should have just written "Berryessa".

Re: Patterns within no patterns (I refuse to believe you can kill with a Poodle, Grasshopper) - well, since the noise comes from the letters, how about we ignore the noise? The letters do a magnificent job.... (responding to newspaper reports and to the red-faced Lee with "discise" excuses and "glue on the fingertips" (Dear God!) and a perceived response to the accusations of "latent homesxuality" and so on).... of producing that noise.
Quiet!

There doesn't HAVE to be a pattern, but there has to be some kind of progression, or some kind of related MO. That's how crimes are linked now, and that's how resource is assigned. The letters don't give us that, only looking at the crime scenes do - and I'm hard-pushed to come up with connections, me, because at its simplest it goes something like, "and then he went from shooting couples up close at night time to stabbing them in broad daylight while wearing a ritual hood".
That's just a little bit odd.

In the letters, the closest thing to a Berryessa mention might be incidental throw-away "I am the same man who did in the people in the north bay area".
Other than that, nada. Damnit.
Also a little bit odd.

Trav wrote:-

So I guess that what I'm asking is - why should we pick something as significant because it appears different when it appears different in the midst of an approach that seems based on different? Or...is it different? or is it based on variation.

Smithy wrote:-

There doesn't HAVE to be a pattern, but there has to be some kind of progression, or some kind of related MO.

I'll get back to "pattern" in a minute and what I meant.....all just opinion of course. I'm with Smithy here because I believe the more important definition to begin with is "progression". For me the simplest explanation relies on a progression. While not married to it ,I'm most inclined to believe Z first killed at LHR
( a couple, for reasons I do not know) because he was familiar with it. He passed on a regular basis, he seen couples there on a regular basis, he lived and/or worked in the area. Vallejo/Benicia. I don't know whether he killed or not before (CJB best argument), however regardless, I believe this was his first murder as Z /Z plan. I have two reasons why we didn't hear from him after LHR.... either he was close enough to be considered a suspect and/or in the greater plan, he wanted a second set before he announced himself. Second murders BRS, same methodology...he was familiar with the area. Once he announced himself and police knew what they were dealing with, Vallejo became a no go area for him for obvious reasons. He moved further afield to LB, again because he was familiar with it. I wouldn't disagree with anything already opined upon with regard to the costume, I expect he expected to be recognised and he needed something to disguise himself in daylight. The only pattern that is broken at this stage, is the move from night time to Daytime, we are still dealing with couples in remote areas and the switch to knife, is understandable in the circumstances. Stine still fits part of the pattern in that he can isolate a vunerable target. But now it's a single person as opposed to a couple. However when I spoke of "pattern", I was referring to it in the context of his behaviour, in that he reacted to stories and claims in the media. When the second male survived, it was questioned and we begin to see the psychoanalysis. I think he reacted to that, went and proved he could kill a male and done so clinically and brutally and in the heart of San francisco. When he learned of young witnesses, he threatened to first shoot them as they exited a bus and then took it further to using explosives. When Avery took him to task, he followed that up.
For me at least, that is the progression. Pattern is relative. My overall point, if he reacted in the manner I think he did, perhaps there were past specific incidents that made him target couples and the police to begin with. All just thoughts!!!

Wier wrote:Trav wrote:-

So I guess that what I'm asking is - why should we pick something as significant because it appears different when it appears different in the midst of an approach that seems based on different? Or...is it different? or is it based on variation.

Smithy wrote:-

There doesn't HAVE to be a pattern, but there has to be some kind of progression, or some kind of related MO.

I'll get back to "pattern" in a minute and what I meant.....all just opinion of course. I'm with Smithy here because I believe the more important definition to begin with is "progression". For me the simplest explanation relies on a progression. While not married to it ,I'm most inclined to believe Z first killed at LHR
( a couple, for reasons I do not know) because he was familiar with it. He passed on a regular basis, he seen couples there on a regular basis, he lived and/or worked in the area. Vallejo/Benicia. I don't know whether he killed or not before (CJB best argument), however regardless, I believe this was his first murder as Z /Z plan. I have two reasons why we didn't hear from him after LHR.... either he was close enough to be considered a suspect and/or in the greater plan, he wanted a second set before he announced himself. Second murders BRS, same methodology...he was familiar with the area. Once he announced himself and police knew what they were dealing with, Vallejo became a no go area for him for obvious reasons. He moved further afield to LB, again because he was familiar with it. I wouldn't disagree with anything already opined upon with regard to the costume, I expect he expected to be recognised and he needed something to disguise himself in daylight. The only pattern that is broken at this stage, is the move from night time to Daytime, we are still dealing with couples in remote areas and the switch to knife, is understandable in the circumstances. Stine still fits part of the pattern in that he can isolate a vunerable target. But now it's a single person as opposed to a couple. However when I spoke of "pattern", I was referring to it in the context of his behaviour, in that he reacted to stories and claims in the media. When the second male survived, it was questioned and we begin to see the psychoanalysis. I think he reacted to that, went and proved he could kill a male and done so clinically and brutally and in the heart of San francisco. When he learned of young witnesses, he threatened to first shoot them as they exited a bus and then took it further to using explosives. When Avery took him to task, he followed that up.
For me at least, that is the progression. Pattern is relative. My overall point, if he reacted in the manner I think he did, perhaps there were past specific incidents that made him target couples and the police to begin with. All just thoughts!!!

I also think Z waited so long to strike again and announce his LHR murders because he was likely talked to by police after the LHR attacks.(See James Owen thread)

But...WAS he progressing?

LHR....successful...and with a .22. Two dead
BRS, same scenerio...a gun...in and out, no communication. A 9mm. One lives.
LB...a knife too this time, a gun (just in case), daytime, ties them up, has discussion. One lives.
SF...back to nighttime, a gun....and a cabbie? Is that supposed to be a big deal? (No disrespect to Paul Stine), but.....nothing shocking about that.

Sounds like Zodiac needed an easy sure thing.

He wasn't concerned about being seen at Lake Berryessa (imo) or he wouldn't have gone to SF so soon.