The Murder Room by Michael Capuzzo

[mike_r]

Hi-

BTW, there are two big articles in the NY Daily News today about Cosby and the way he allegedly operated. A guy who says he helped him cover up his deeds is now coming out of the shadows.

Wealthy power assertives cloak themselves in respectability. You are labeled as crazy if you say anything about them. YOU are put in the defensive. THEY are above suspicion. Even when KQ invited me to SF to have a discussion with me, he had the audacity to look me in the eye and say that it was not he to whom Pelissetti spoke that night! Whether you believe that he is Z or not, I think you have to agree based on AP's statements that this is a known fact. A given. And yet he denied it. He looked me in the eye and said he had never touched a gun in his life. That is almost certainly not true based on info I have about his military training. I can't place a gun in his hand but I can say it was part of the normal training people like him received. After all, few people go to war in any capacity without ever touching a gun in training.

The jury is out as to whether or not KQ had crypto training in the military. Someone once told me that a pilot can't fly a plane and do crypto at the same time. So I let that notion slide for years. But a very good friend of mine, whom I've known for sixteen years, and who had military training in crypto, surprised me recently by saying that he had also been a commercial pilot for a huge airline. I had no idea he was a pilot. I asked him this came about. He explained that in the Vietnam days, he was so good at crypto that the cross trained him as a pilot. He and his crew used to fly in the area of the Straits of Malacca looking to intercept coded messages from the Vietnamese, which he could then try to decode.

So apparently you can be a pilot and a crypto guy. Of course, as a transport pilot, you are flying close to the front lines to deliver consumables. So the analogy with what my friend did in Vietnam, that of using a plane to be close enough to the front lines to intercept messages, is there.

Mike

[glurk]

How does one have a good friend that they have known for 16 years and not know that they had been a pilot? Just never came up I guess.

But hey, a good friend of mine told me that he drives to work daily with the gas pedal glued down and uses his left foot to steer whilst working the NY Times crossword with a pencil.
He's a really honest guy, too. So I have no doubt at all that he really does that.

-glurk

[mike_r]

Hi-

I don't know what you are getting at but if you are implying he is lying to me I can tell you that is an absurd notion. He is retired and it never came up because there was no reason for it to come up. He told me he flew a small plane nowadays but had never mentioned that he was ever a commercial pilot. Unlike Z, he is not a braggart, I guess. When I got to know him through the case in 1998, he was one of the top IT guys around and I mean he KNOWS IT like few people do. He is just more talented than I ever thought. And BTW, he also knows many capable people in cryptography.

But enough about me and my friend...

Mike

[jroberson]

I'm still trying to figure out how Bill Cosby and The Zodiac have anything in common at all, given that Cosby was probably always inclined towards rape and only began allegedly committing them when he had the power to silence his victims, whereas The Zodiac killed isolated people at or near dark and then bragged about his wonderful exploits in the newspaper. Doesn't seem to make much sense at all to compare the two.

Cosby, whatever the ad hoc criminalistic classification, simply used his power to blatantly escape punishment for crimes he committed while hiding in the light. The Zodiac? He committed his crimes in the dark and then hid in total anonymity.

Seems to me Cosby and Zodiac are more like inverses than similars.

As for the whole "power assertive" thing...Cosby, as I said, was probably always inclined towards rape, assuming he's guilty, and acted out on his drive only after he had acquired the power to pay off and silence those he attacked. The Zodiac attacked random people at night and then publicly boasted of his crimes. Power-assertive? Not really sure what that means, but I think for it to apply to the Zodiac, he'd have to have some actual power to assert. The idea that he's some well-heeled businessman running about killing people because he thinks his status renders him invulnerable is demolished by the fact The Zodiac took exacting pains to remain not only anonymous, but virtually non-existent outside the murky realm of his infrequent, slipshod crimes and letters.

Yeah, I don't get it. But then I don't get the idea The Zodiac was a San Fran businessman either. There should be some really hard evidence to make such a case. Connecting the dots in a game of Six Degrees of The Zodiac just doesn't work. Any old guy running about in the 1960s could be construed as the killer. Goofy glasses? Check. Receding hairline? Check? Read a comic book and once saw a Gilbert and Sullivan play? Check. OMG, it's the frigging Zodiac, man!

Yeah, you can indict a ham sandwich in the US, that's true, but to rationally convince the scientifically-minded citizen, and not just Joe and Jane SixPack, you need some evidence, like matching DNA, matching fingerprints, matching (and I mean REALLY matching) handwriting. Something. Plus a ton of circs that slam together like The Flash assembling a 200-piece jigsaw puzzle.

See what I just did there with that comic book reference? Give me some ugly glasses, shave my head and maybe I'm The Zodiac.

Oh, and saying some guy endorses your theory is nothing more than an appeal to authority, which is a textbook logical fallacy. Just because Joe Blow claims your theory, i.e. The Zodiac was this or that guy, appears to be the correct solution means nothing without corroborating physical evidence combined with substantial circs. Nothing else matters.

I also doubt this "real-life Sherlock Holmes" is anything of the sort as merely providing expert knowledge to dumb*** hick cops on how to tie their own shoelaces is hardly extraordinary. Sherlock, on the other hand, is fictional, and as such could supernaturally deduce the perpetrator of the given crime just by twinkling his nose, which is fine for fiction, but in real life being good or even exceptional at your job doesn't qualify you to claim you possess powers beyond that of actual human beings. More than likely Mr. Real-Life Sherlock has more misses than hits, and if he were so apt to solve cold cases with so little effort, he'd be in demand everywhere throughout the globe and nary a killer would go uncaught.

Silly stuff. But psychics often make the same empty, grand, hyperbolic claims. Look for a body near a rock next to some water. Or not. And three out of ten times maybe that's where and how the body is found.

I recall seeing a show recently. Think it was 48 Hours Mystery. The episode involved a man accused of killing his wife or girlfriend. Something like that. He claimed at the time of the crime he was in such and such location, and sure enough, video surveillance placed his white truck somewhere else at the alleged moment the victim was taking her last mortal breath. Then the cops brought in Mr. Superstar Criminalist. Dude broke the case. How? Brilliant logic? Superhuman deductions? Unimaginable mental gymnastics? No. Nothing of the sort. He merely took a really good look at those surveillance images of that white truck. Turns out the truck in question had BLACK rear-view mirrors whereas the suspect had white ones, which obliterated his rather already-thin alibi.

Ooooh. Someone actually look a look at the images instead of glancing at them, and for his credit the narrator of 48 Hours Mystery claimed the guy was a crack detective worthy of a statue at Scotland Yard and a parade down Fifth Avenue. Must be a really low bar to join the upper investigatory echelons of criminal detection. Like have a beating heart.


Anyway, I seriously doubt The Zodiac was a successful anything because, from his letters, one gets the immediate, distinct impression the man was mentally ill. He wasn't some sane guy tripping on the free crime spree his personal power could buy; he was a lonely, erratic, ill, disturbed and perhaps even deranged individual with more than one "personality disorder". How one could read the man's psychopathic, semi-literate ramblings and think he was a pillar of any community outside that of the local asylum, I do not know, but there are, to this day, people, and by people I mean idiots, who swear, SWEAR, Jack the Ripper was either a storied member of the Royal Family or a world-famous artist. Someone even wrote a book, and I use that word loosely and lightly, claiming she had proven the latter scenario, providing the reader with a blaring, arrogant CASE CLOSED sub-caption on the front of her silly little paperbag-rag volume.

Anyway redux, everyone and their grandmother and dog has "a theory" these days. I think they even sell them down at Wal-Mart next to the nickle bubblegum and Chinese-import vending machine soda drinks.

What people don't have is actual "proof". Something more than "my guy lived in the area, resembled the wanted flyer composite, and was weird". Until they do, they might want to leave law enforcement and criminal detection to the professionals, if they can find one.

[Tahoe27]

Keep writing jroberson....I enjoyed reading your post.

[jroberson]

Thank you with sincerity, tahoe.

[duckking2001]

Come on now, JRRoberson... Walter Sickert a world famous artist? Sorry to go off topic, I just thought that was funny.

[Barry S.]

Here's some info on power-assertive killers.

PowerAssertive1r1.jpg

PowerAssertive2r2.jpg

Correspondence with the Z-crimes:
1) Evolution of methods.
2) Victim selection focused on strangers who are taken by surprise when opportunity allows.
3) Victims foundin the street.
4) Clothing is torn off the victim (in 1 murder).
5) Weapons brought to the scene, specifically guns and a knife.
6) No mutilation.
7) Seeks credit for the crimes from police and the public.
8) Bodybuilder? (possibly a wrestler or laborer with a barrel-chest but not blubbery fat)
9) Aggressive, arrogant and condescending (from letters).

Dissimilarity with the Z-crimes:
1) No rape.
2) Debatable improvement, given the apparent errors in the Stine murder.
3) Bodies not dumped elsewhere from where victims killed.
4) No beating or pummeling.
5) No ejaculate.
6) Crime scenes not necessarily cleaned of forensic evidence (shell casings left behind, shoe impressions, etc., fingerprints?)
7) Crimes not quickly repeated?
8) Not early twenties.

Unknowns
1) Increasing aggression for purpose of controlling victim.
2) Motive is assertion of masculine power.
3) Killer's self-image is beyond suspicion in this type of crime.
4) Hinted at his role to friends, co-workers or cellmates.
5) Projected a masculine image.
6) Insecure in his masculinity.
7) Had tattoos.
8) Powerful well-maintained vehicles (LB crime scene points to poorly maintained vehicle).
9) Carried a weapon (other than in commission of crime).
10) Participated in martial arts.
11) Confident body posture and form (Fouke says head down; shuffling lope).
12) Borderline loner.
13) Failed marriages and relationships.
14) Control freak.
15) High school dropout.
16) Into soft-core pornography.
17) Poor military record.
18) Not a team player.
19) Previous criminal record for robbery, theft, burglary.

For the experts out there, are any of the "unknowns" actually "knowns"? Is the power-assertive killer a good model for Z?

[themysterymachine]

I recall seeing a show recently. Think it was 48 Hours Mystery. The episode involved a man accused of killing his wife or girlfriend. Something like that. He claimed at the time of the crime he was in such and such location, and sure enough, video surveillance placed his white truck somewhere else at the alleged moment the victim was taking her last mortal breath. Then the cops brought in Mr. Superstar Criminalist. Dude broke the case. How? Brilliant logic? Superhuman deductions? Unimaginable mental gymnastics? No. Nothing of the sort. He merely took a really good look at those surveillance images of that white truck. Turns out the truck in question had BLACK rear-view mirrors whereas the suspect had white ones, which obliterated his rather already-thin alibi.

Ooooh. Someone actually look a look at the images instead of glancing at them, and for his credit the narrator of 48 Hours Mystery claimed the guy was a crack detective worthy of a statue at Scotland Yard and a parade down Fifth Avenue. Must be a really low bar to join the upper investigatory echelons of criminal detection. Like have a beating heart.


Anyway, I seriously doubt The Zodiac was a successful anything because, from his letters, one gets the immediate, distinct impression the man was mentally ill. He wasn't some sane guy tripping on the free crime spree his personal power could buy; he was a lonely, erratic, ill, disturbed and perhaps even deranged individual with more than one "personality disorder". How one could read the man's psychopathic, semi-literate ramblings and think he was a pillar of any community outside that of the local asylum, I do not know, but there are, to this day, people, and by people I mean idiots, who swear, SWEAR, Jack the Ripper was either a storied member of the Royal Family or a world-famous artist. Someone even wrote a book, and I use that word loosely and lightly, claiming she had proven the latter scenario, providing the reader with a blaring, arrogant CASE CLOSED sub-caption on the front of her silly little paperbag-rag volume.

I can't STAND that woman. The pomposity, her Lear jet, the cutting figure in swirling fog she attempts to pull off. Argh. She is the Leona Helmsley of crime fiction. She needs to keep writing fiction. Or maybe just stop writing.

I think that the power assertive classification makes the most sense, but merely in terms of statistics it would seem that this guy is probably not a successful dude. In any case, we all define success by what we want the most. He wanted power. One would think that you would sublimate that need in just being a power broker. It seems to work for endless financiers and bankers. High number of sociopaths among that set. But it seems that the sort of crimes those guys commit are generally propelled by greed. Or jealousy. Z didn't make any money off his exploits, he didn't kidnap for ransom, he wanted something else. And I guess he got that, and by that definition he was successful. But I just find it hard to square a cold, calculating businessman with the Z letters, The way he seemed to fall apart at times, then turn and be cunning as in his letter to Melvin Belli-"something inside won't let me". He wasn't desperate at all in that letter. It was so precisely written. But you can get a sense of him being a moody guy, and that doesn't seem like he would be able to hold all these things together.

Then again, you have Dennis Rader. But then again, there was that explicit sexual component there that was missing in Z.
All I am saying is that I like the power assertive idea, that that was his primary motivation, and it seems counterintuitive that he would be a rousing success in the real world and be skulking around killing coeds. And yeah, that's speculation, to be fair. But its like watching a terrible detective flick where the murderer is just acting in such a way that doesn't accord to real life. And then you go round again- thinking, well, Z, he's a black swan, he doesn't fit in anywhere, he could be anyone. But people believing in their suspects means that they will keep digging, hopefully, and convince those who are on the fence and maybe, the cops.

[themysterymachine]

Here's some info on power-assertive killers.

PowerAssertive1r1.jpg

PowerAssertive2r2.jpg

Correspondence with the Z-crimes:
1) Evolution of methods.
2) Victim selection focused on strangers who are taken by surprise when opportunity allows.
3) Victims foundin the street.
4) Clothing is torn off the victim (in 1 murder).
5) Weapons brought to the scene, specifically guns and a knife.
6) No mutilation.
7) Seeks credit for the crimes from police and the public.
8) Bodybuilder? (possibly a wrestler or laborer with a barrel-chest but not blubbery fat)
9) Aggressive, arrogant and condescending (from letters).

Dissimilarity with the Z-crimes:
1) No rape.
2) Debatable improvement, given the apparent errors in the Stine murder.
3) Bodies not dumped elsewhere from where victims killed.
4) No beating or pummeling.
5) No ejaculate.
6) Crime scenes not necessarily cleaned of forensic evidence (shell casings left behind, shoe impressions, etc., fingerprints?)
7) Crimes not quickly repeated?
8) Not early twenties.

Unknowns
1) Increasing aggression for purpose of controlling victim.
2) Motive is assertion of masculine power.
3) Killer's self-image is beyond suspicion in this type of crime.
4) Hinted at his role to friends, co-workers or cellmates.
5) Projected a masculine image.
6) Insecure in his masculinity.
7) Had tattoos.
8) Powerful well-maintained vehicles (LB crime scene points to poorly maintained vehicle).
9) Carried a weapon (other than in commission of crime).
10) Participated in martial arts.
11) Confident body posture and form (Fouke says head down; shuffling lope).
12) Borderline loner.
13) Failed marriages and relationships.
14) Control freak.
15) High school dropout.
16) Into soft-core pornography.
17) Poor military record.
18) Not a team player.
19) Previous criminal record for robbery, theft, burglary.

For the experts out there, are any of the "unknowns" actually "knowns"? Is the power-assertive killer a good model for Z?

It seems like the correspondences would apply to any series of serial crimes, like the evolution of method. And the strangers being the victims.