Personally, I think the Door writing is the MOST real, and legitimate, undisguised writing we have from Z. He wrote it,presumably, after thinking he just murdered two people a short distance away, he had to be somewhat nervous or anxious of a passing car witnessing him, or his car, and therefore, I think he likely wrote that note on the door quickly, and without taking a lot of time to disguise it. After all, he could have put a disguised,handwritten note that he had pre-written, under the wiper blade or something.

Morf, I beg to differ – and that’s why I posted the reference to handwriting disguise.
The most real and legitimate undisguised writing available is undoubtedly the Badlands letter. That’s a no-brainer, if you’ll forgive me.
The door contains at least one character which would not be part of "his" usual lexicon – the colon. It’s disguised, at least in part.

I’m not presuming as you seem to be, either, that the person who wrote on the door attacked Bryan and Cecilia.
Or that he would have necessarily been nervous or anxious. Nope.

But your point about putting a note under the windshield wiper? That’s an excellent insight.
This was an impact statement, done Jack-the-Ripper style, just as after Mitre Square, to provide comment and immediate proof.
If it was a copycat, it would have most probably been a note, wouldn’t it, which he would have plenty of time to prepare. Yes.
Where’s Bill?

Morf, I beg to differ – and that’s why I posted the reference to handwriting disguise.
The most real and legitimate undisguised writing available is undoubtedly the Badlands letter. That’s a no-brainer, if you’ll forgive me.
The door contains at least one character which would not be part of "his" usual lexicon – the colon. It’s disguised, at least in part.

I’m not presuming as you seem to be, either, that the person who wrote on the door attacked Bryan and Cecilia.
Or that he would have necessarily been nervous or anxious. Nope.

But your point about putting a note under the windshield wiper? That’s an excellent insight.
This was an impact statement, done Jack-the-Ripper style, just as after Mitre Square, to provide comment and immediate proof.
If it was a copycat, it would have most probably been a note, wouldn’t it, which he would have plenty of time to prepare. Yes.
Where’s Bill?

The Badlands letter, is also a good sample too. We do disagree, I think the attacker/writer at Berryessa, was the same person that did all the other attacks, and letters

Yep–different mind-sets and that is ok! If it were so cut & dry this case would have been solved along time ago. There simply are no cold-hard facts as far as evidence goes, and as the years go by folklore sets in.

If law enforcement was to start fresh today, not knowing all the stories and drama of this case, only using current techniques, I’d say a lot of what we discuss in regards to this case wouldn’t even be considered.

Amen!

If the LB killer was not Z, he doesn’t really come across a typical copycat, does he?

Z, as he was known at the time, attacked couples in cars at night. He shot his victims. He wrote letters taking credit for his actions. He did not, as far as we know (and as far as the copycat would have known) wear an elaborate costume. And he did not write messages on car doors.

If the copycat’s motivation was to copy Z, he did a remarkably poor job, one might say.

Another explanation, based on the known facts and still retaining the idea of a "copycat" of sorts, is that the killer knew his victims (or one of them) and targeted them (or her, or him) specifically. He wrote on the car door in order to incriminate Z, who was known to him from the papers. (Why didn’t he send a missive to the papers, though? The latter was Z’s style, as known at the time – not this door writing business.)

Possible, I suppose. But this too begs plenty of questions. Why the elaborate costume? Again, Z was not known to wear anything of the sort. To avoid identification, all he had to do was don a ski mask. And besides, if you’re not keen on being identified, you don’t talk to your victims at length and serve them a yarn about being headed for Mexico, etc. That makes very little sense – so little, in fact, that it almost excludes this possibility altogether for me.

As far as I know the thrill for a copycat is about…copying the known methods and signatures and whatnot of whoever it is the killer is…copying. The potential LB copycat only did this partly – and completely failed to do so as far as the most obvious Z traits go. He invented more (daytime, knife, costume, car door writing) than he copied (couple, phone call).

And a killer who isn’t a copycat in a, let’s say pathological sense, but someone who wants to pin his crime on someone else, would also (per common sense) try to include as many of the other person’s known traits as possible. And he would invent as little himself as possible. And if he knew his victims AND didn’t want them to identify him (he wore a hood, whoever he was and whatever his motive was), he wouldn’t chat with them at length.

Well.
What are the possibilities here?
1) It’s the same murderer with a new "MO"; talking to people and stabbing them while wearing a party outfit, instead of shooting them in the dark.
2) It’s a different murderer "copycatting" the earlier one(s) badly, who has remarkable handwriting emulation skills.
3) It’s a different murderer who knew the original murderer would turn up to write on the door for him.
4) It’s someone with inside knowledge (of crime details and handwriting "disguise") stitching unrelated crime scenes together, who actually visited this one.
Is that about it?

Yep. That’s about it.

I would add, though, that number four – who has inside knowledge about the case – displays a similar lack of copycatting ability to that which characterizes number two. He, number four, too opts not to send a letter – which would have been the most obvious way to link the crime to the others, and less risky too (one might argue) than writing on the car door.

Number one uses a different MO, yes. He is somewhat unpredictable in that regard. Some weeks later he shows up in Frisco and kills a lone male victim, using a completely different approach than the one he used at LB AND at both LHR and BRS. Is this inexplicable without introducing a) a partner b) a whole team or c) a hoax of some sort?

No – I don’t think so. His inconsistency isn’t – in itself – an argument against his existence, so to speak. He WAS inconsistent. He was partly cautious, partly reckless. Part of his approach seems carefully planned, part of it seems almost random. That goes for every crime in the series – and is, actually, a constant. His inconsistency, then, is quite consistent.

If LB was not Zodiac, all this person had to do to make it appear to be a Zodiac crime was to write on the car door and make a phone call. Done deal.

Certainly. And that is precisely what he did – if he wasn’t Z. It’s also what Z did if he was…Z.

Er, yes.

My question is this, though: Why did the copycat opt to write on the car door (in a fashion which undoubtedly bears some resemblance, arguably a strong one, to Z’s known writing) rather than sending a letter. The former wasn’t known as a Z trait. The latter was.

Z could have decided to write on the car door for all sorts of reasons. He was a crazy and somewhat inconsistent fellow. A copycat, however, is more likely to actually copy what is known about the killer he seeks to…copy, rather than invent a brand new thing.

Not just a strong resemblance In My Honest Opinion. That doors got a colon with open dots in it – like the 2nd letter which hadn’t been published. Pretty damned prescient, if it wasn’t the same guy who wrote that letter who wrote on the door. (And also right in line with the textbook I posted about on "How to Discise yer Handwritting" by some guy that LE would have have been reading. I rote that on anuther thread.)

$64k yes. Why not write a note and bring it with you?
Why not write a letter afterward? Why write on the door? Unanswerable, of course.

BTW I love your "he was consistently inconsistent" logic – it reminds me of the quote in the newspaper of the time from that police officer…. "His pattern is – there is no pattern!" I always find that entertaining.

He was consistently inconstently tall then short then fat then thin. And brown/blond/dark haired (when not gray rust coloured at the back – but could that have been blood?) – but definitely curly. He used different MO’s and different weapons each time, damn him.
And I’m still trying to figure out how his feet were a couple of sizes smaller in Riverside than in Berryessa, damnit.

Last one’s no mystery, Smithy.

He…didn’t do it.

Height and weight? Well. I don’t know. If the witness descriptions are spot on we may have a problem. If they’re not…

Hartnell actually goes from 5 ‘8 to over six feet in one and the same statement, if memory serves. Both MM and the Stine witnesses have him at 5 ‘8. They all agree he wasn’t thin – seemingly. I read somewhere that most people are better at estimating weight than height. It has something to do with comparing the subject to yourself. Both Hartnell and MM were very tall. Generally this tends to influence your perception negatively – so they say. The teens in PH were young (not good – the ability to judge height tends to get better with experience). If Hartnell’s max assessment is off (he was a poor judge of height according to himself and he viewed the subject from a position on the ground, looking up at him) the discrepancies aren’t terrible. Fouke at 5 ’10, the kids and MM at 5 ‘8, Hartnell all over the place.

He wasn’t terribly tall and he certainly doesn’t appear to have been skinny. That’s the gist of it.

Hair color? He was seen at night and Hartnell only, sort of, glimpsed his hair behind the hood and suggested his hair was greasy (could have been sweaty – would have been hot under that hood).

Brownish, possibly with a red tint – could have been dark blonde with a reddish tint…something along those lines. Nobody stands out in the crowd and claims he had a pink mohawk, after all.

Certainly. And that is precisely what he did – if he wasn’t Z. It’s also what Z did if he was…Z.

Er, yes.

My question is this, though: Why did the copycat opt to write on the car door (in a fashion which undoubtedly bears some resemblance, arguably a strong one, to Z’s known writing) rather than sending a letter. The former wasn’t known as a Z trait. The latter was.

Z could have decided to write on the car door for all sorts of reasons. He was a crazy and somewhat inconsistent fellow. A copycat, however, is more likely to actually copy what is known about the killer he seeks to…copy, rather than invent a brand new thing.

I guess what I am saying is maybe this person wasn’t trying to be a "copy-cat"…just trying to pin this one attack of his on Zodiac. Writing letters is a whole other ballgame. He didn’t need to continue–he thought he pretty much covered it.

I don’t think Zodiac was that inconsistent. The witnesses maybe, but not his crimes–LB aside. He shot and bailed.

I guess what I am saying is maybe this person wasn’t trying to be a "copy-cat"…just trying to pin this one attack of his on Zodiac. Writing letters is a whole other ballgame. He didn’t need to continue–he thought he pretty much covered it.

I don’t think Zodiac was that inconsistent. The witnesses maybe, but not his crimes–LB aside. He shot and bailed.

Yes, that’s possible. It raises plenty of questions and problems, though. What was his motive? Did he know the victims? Why the costume? Isn’t the whole approach very outlandish for someone who "just" wanted to get rid of either BH or CS or both?

I’m not dismissing it. LB is odd whichever way you look at it – and I’m not 100% convinced about anything.

Maybe the guy was just a nut.

In the LB police reports one of the doctors at Napa State mentioned one of their patients having been given a weekend pass. He mentions this person was capable of committing such a crime. –Nice of them to give him an outside pass.

While certainly they looked at this person, my point is that sometimes people are just insane.

I only post this stuff to show there is probable cause that someone else COULD be responsible. Food for thought.