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The Zodiac Killer · 10 Minute Murder | Bingeable True Crime Stories

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  Discretion is it by him? Murder? If you know true crime, you've
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  heard of the Zodiac Killer. He's one of the world's most famous serial murderers.
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  Even though five decades have passed since his killing spree and fifty years on,
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  his case is still wide open, with law enforcement working to uncover the
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  identity of the man who killed at least five people between late nineteen sixty eight
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  and nineteen sixty nine. Why does the world still have such a fascination with
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  an unidentified killer From the nineteen sixties, the crimes carried out by the Zodiac
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  were not unusual. Five confirmed murders where two young couples and one lone cab
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  driver were shot to death. Two other victims had been wounded but survived their
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  injuries, but they weren't able to identify the assailant. The descriptions of the
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  killer provided by their survivors are vague enough that they could have been almost anyone.
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  Whites, brown headed, male, late twenties or early thirties, around
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  two hundred pounds, less than six feet tall, wearing dark clothing. There
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  was nothing about him that seemed especially memorable, apart from the fact that he
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  was killing strangers without remorse, and the one report of him wearing a black
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  execution style hood while approaching his victims. It's possible that if all he had
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  done is murder his victims and then disappear, he might have been forgotten by
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  now. But it wasn't necessarily the killings themselves that made the Zodiac so notorious.
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  It was what he did next. It was not uncommon for serial killers
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  to contact police or local media in searching themselves into the investigation, making threats
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  or taunting the cops for not being able to catch them quickly enough. The
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  Zodiac did this, even calling the police to report a murder shortly after he
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  had finished shooting his victims. He also seemed to have some knowledge of how
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  to slow down law enforcement, killing several of his victims in areas where police
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  jurisdiction overlapped, making the investigations slower. One of the reasons for the Zodiac
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  Killer's notoriety is the sheer volume of letters that he submitted to local newspapers taking
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  responsibility for the recent killings, including encrypted text puzzles called cryptograms, one of
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  which he claimed would reveal his identity if solved. He said that if the
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  letters weren't published on the front page of the newspaper. He'd kill a dozen
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  people over the weekend. It was in one of these letters that he gave
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  himself a nickname, Dear Editor. The letter began, this is the Zodiac
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  speaking. He was responding to a request by the Vallejo police chief, who
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  had asked the author of the previous letters to prove that they were the real
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  killer by revealing details that the public weren't aware of. Sure Enough, the
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  letter from the Zodiac contained details about the crimes that only the killer would know.
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  It was confirmed they had been communicating directly with the man who would quickly
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  become known by his own nickname. They were reading a letter from the Zodiac
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  Killer. One of the letters contained a list of ways in which the killer
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  had supposedly murdered his victims, including two methods which had not been seen in
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  any of the linked cases. By rope presumably meaning strangulation, and by fire.
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  In the confirmed killings, the Zodiac's weapons of choice had either been a
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  military style bladed weapon or an automatic pistol. It seemed as if he preferred
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  using guns. He'd admitted in one of his letters to taping a flashlight to
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  his pistol, allowing him to aim when shooting at night. In another letter,
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  he claimed to be responsible for thirty seven murders. The details the Zodiac
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  had provided in his letters so far had been accurate. What if he was
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  telling the truth and he had other victims that had not been connected to the
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  case. Out of all the murders that could possibly be linked to the Zodiac
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  Killer, the Santa Rosa hitchhiker murders were probably the most famous. During the
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  early nineteen seventies, at least seven women hitchhiking through California's North Bay area were
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  murdered, stripped, and found dumped in an isolated area or in creek beds.
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  The killer was never found, but the Zodiac Killer has remained near the
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  top of the list of suspects, especially after an occult symbol similar to those
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  in his letters was found by the body of one of the hitchhikers. Several
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  of the victims had been slowly strangled to death with a length of court Could
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  this have been what the Zodiac meant when referring to rope. This was the
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  kind of valuable information provided by the Zodiac Killer's communication. Hince at his m
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  o, his personality and other crimes that he may have committed. It was
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  likely that one day the Zodiac's letters would be the thing that got him caught
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  DNA advancements, getting too confident, revealing too much information. There were so
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  many traps that he could have fallen into. But in nineteen seventy four,
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  all communication from the Zodiac Killer ceased. It seemed as if he might have
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  just stopped killing, but it was hard to tell. Without the taunting messages
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  and damning letters linking the cases together and proving that the killer was the same,
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  Investigators were left trying to solve the puzzles that he'd provided, while also
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  narrowing down a hefty list of suspects. The only suspect whose name was ever
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  made public was a convicted sex offender, Arthur Lee Allen. Some of the
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  circumstantial evidence was suspicious. Arthur lived close to one of the victims. He'd
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  been in the area when at least one of the young couples were murdered,
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  and one of his friends had told the police that Arthur talked about wanting to
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  murder people and even used the name Zodiac to refer to himself. Other pieces
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  of evidence I'm using air quotes there seemed more like grasping at straws. Arthur
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  owned a wristwatch made by the brand Zodiac. He used the same typewriter that
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  one of the letters had been written on. But all the evidence against Arthur
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  Lee Allen was just that circumstantial. In two thousand and two, a decade
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  after Arthur passed away, a DNA profile was created from samples of the Zodiac
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  Killers saliva. Arthur's DNA was compared to the sample. It was not a
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  match. Lloyd Cunningham, police handwriting expert, who had worked on the case,
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  said this about the possibility of Arthur Allen being the killer quote. They
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  gave me banana boxes full of Arthur Lee's writing, and none of his writing
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  even came close to the Zodiac, Nor did DNA extract it from the envelopes
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  on the Zodiac's letters come close to Arthur Lee Allen. In total, four
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  cryptogram puzzles were sent by the Zodiac Killer. One cipher was solved shortly after
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  it was published, providing the insight that the author quote liked killing people because
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  it was so much fun. For years, investigators, codebreakers and puzzle enthusiasts
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  worked together on a common goal solving the remaining three ciphers. As time passed,
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  many people began to wonder if the ciphers were impossible to solve, it
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  would make sense for a killer who liked to taunt the police to mess with
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  them in this way, providing three cryptograms that were gibberish and one that was
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  easy to solve, making them waste their time and energy trying to solve an
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  impossible puzzle. As it turned out, this theory was not true, at
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  least not for all three remaining ciphers. In twenty twenty, amateur code breakers
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  got in contact with the FBI. They believed that they had solved one of
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  the three remaining cryptograms, nicknamed the three forty cipher because of the number of
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  characters in the puzzle. The three forty cipher had been infamously sent to the
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  newspaper alongside a ripped, bloodstained section of one of the victim's shirts, concrete
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  proof that the author was the killer. In December twenty twenty, an FBI
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  spokesperson gave a statement quote, the FBI is aware that a cipher attributed to
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  the Zodiac killer was recently solved by private citizens. The break in the case
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  was officially confirmed. Half of the Zodiac ciphers were now solved. Although the
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  three forty cipher's message referenced an incident where a man pretending to be the Zodiac
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  killer had called into a local talk show, it did not reveal his true
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  identity. Instead, it gave insight into the inner monologue of a man who
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  had murdered in cold blood and taunted the police for fun. It read quote,
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  I hope you're having lots of fun and trying to catch me. That
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  wasn't me on the TV show, which brings up a point about me.
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  I'm not afraid of the gas chamber because it will send me to paradise all
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  the sooner, because I now have enough slaves to work for me, where
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  everyone else has nothing when they reach for paradise, so they are afraid of
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  death. I am not afraid because I know my new life will be an
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  easy one in death. That is ten Minute Murder for Today Brief and Bingeible
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  True Crime. I'm Joe, I'm the host, and thank you for listening
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  And now quickly, let's get to an email if you'd like to send
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  me an email. By the way, my email address is Joe at ten
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  minute Murder dot com. Joe, are you an introvert or an extrovert?
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  That? It's from Roxy in Killeen, Texas. Roxy. I'm an introvert,
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  but it's complicated. I can be somewhere with a lot of people.
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  I'll talk, I'll move around, I'll say funny things, but it's it's
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  not my authentic self. That's not normal for me. My normal is quiet.
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  And while I'm at whatever social gathering I'm attending, when the urge hits
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  that I've had enough, my social battery is dangerously low to empty, I'm
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  out because otherwise I'll find a quiet spot, sit on the floor and pet
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  the dog of the house. So I'm an introvert with occasional extrovert tendencies.
• 11:16
  You wouldn't know unless you know that's going to do it for this episode.
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  Thank you so much for listening to ten minute Murder. Goodbye,