Good – but the other way around, I think. What motivated the SF-area Zodiac to try and insert himself into the Bates case was the vast publicity, newspaper and wire service coverage that it got. It made him get the car out and drive down there to post his material, to try and appear local. (What use is a bogeyman if he doesn’t live nearby?)
Just my thruppence halfpenny…..

Considering, the makeup of his later letters, I would say its was the human be-in of January 14, 1967. Having been a prelude to the summer of love, I would think, it too, brought people from all over. Reports are 20-30 thousand.

Soze

Considering, the makeup of his later letters, I would say its was the human be-in of January 14, 1967. Having been a prelude to the summer of love, I would think, it too, brought people from all over. Reports are 20-30 thousand.

Soze

It was also a magnet for predators. People like Charles Manson and Z were probably in heaven with all the potential victicms that were walking around. Tons of trusting teenagers and 20 somethings naive to the world around them.

probably employment.

there are obvious gaps in his communications with the papers, and when he was in a "communication period" his letters are rapid-fire. it’s also obvious he wrote some of his letters well in advance of mailing them, as often the contents are out-dated or contradictory. all of this indicates he either was only in the area occasionally or that he was only occasionally in a position to communicate – this could be due to family, work, life – i.e. – maybe he only traveled to the area for work, maybe he lived locally and his spouse occasionally traveled for work. whatever the case it appears that he didn’t communicate freely all the time but did communicate rapidly when he was able to communicate.

I think the correct question is that if the Zodiac murdered Bates what brought him to Riverside? I don’t believe he was a Riverside local but someone outside the area who came to Riverside for a reason. Bates was murdered on the evening of Oct 30th, 1966. What was going on in Riverside on that day that would attract someone from outside the area? You must remember that I lived in Riverside at that time and can honestly say that Riverside wasn’t much of a tourist attraction. Riverside had around 50,000 people and thousands of acres of orange tree groves and not much else. Well the one thing that was going on that day was one of the biggest motoring sports car races of the year was taking place that afternoon at the world famous Riverside International Raceway just nine miles from RCC. The 1966 Times Grand Prix, an international sports car race that brought the best road racers in the world to Riverside. I was there that day and I can testify that there were over 100,000 spectators that saw the event. The number of spectators at the race easily outnumbers the population of people who lived in Riverside at that time. Could one of them been the Zodiac? I think it’s quite possible because I am convinced ( I have my own personal reasons for this) that the Zodiac murdered Bates.

Good – but the other way around, I think. What motivated the SF-area Zodiac to try and insert himself into the Bates case was the vast publicity, newspaper and wire service coverage that it got. It made him get the car out and drive down there to post his material, to try and appear local. (What use is a bogeyman if he doesn’t live nearby?)
Just my thruppence halfpenny…..

I don’t understand this post, smithy. Are you saying that he lived in SF in ’66 and drove down there to post the Bates letters? or that in ’70 after the "riverside connection" broke and Zodiac "officially" claimed Bates, he went down there to establish his connection to the case? If the later, I certainly do not remember that ever happening.

Or do you mean his letter to the LA times was his attempt to establish his connection to "down there"? I don’t think that a California resident would consider Riverside to be in the same area as LA.

Good – but the other way around, I think. What motivated the SF-area Zodiac to try and insert himself into the Bates case was the vast publicity, newspaper and wire service coverage that it got. It made him get the car out and drive down there to post his material, to try and appear local. (What use is a bogeyman if he doesn’t live nearby?)
Just my thruppence halfpenny…..

I don’t understand this post, smithy. Are you saying that he lived in SF in ’66 and drove down there to post the Bates letters? or that in ’70 after the "riverside connection" broke and Zodiac "officially" claimed Bates, he went down there to establish his connection to the case? If the later, I certainly do not remember that ever happening.

Or do you mean his letter to the LA times was his attempt to establish his connection to "down there"? I don’t think that a California resident would consider Riverside to be in the same area as LA.

Ducky – I said that in my opinion what attracted "The Evile Zodiace" to claim involvement in the Riverside case in 1966 was the widespread publicity it attracted. I think it quite likely he drove down from the SF area to Riverside and posted his material from there "to appear local".
Errrr, that’s it.
Y’know what? I bet if there had been another juicy murder "down there" in the next few months, he would have claimed that too. There wasn’t.
JMO.

but why pick out CJB if in fact you were at the riverside race that day-why her??..I just cannot come up with a logical reason Z would have targeted CJB unless the VW bug somehow attracted X..or if X had some issue with CJB father complaining about crappy service or selling his daughter a lemon from an X dealership..of all the victims CJB makes the least sense to me as a Z crime..i am of the belief (loose belief) CJB killer was at RCC and transferred up to Berkley and continued on with his bad habits after he became convinced how easy it was to accomplish (yea i agree influx of runaway wannabe hippies is a target rich environment for Z)..

TK kinda ties in with the college (CJB at RCC) aspect in my mind as well but with his smarts why would he have ever set foot in a community college..kinda well below his level..I cant think of any reason either why TK would have targeted CJB..no way she would ever fit his MO

bottom line is I just do not know..too many unknowns and I can see why RPD would be convinced CJB was a lovers quarrel gone bad,,but yea X was no doubt at riverside

i kinda like morfs research into ross sullivan..kinda makes some sense to me it would have been a local kid

i am not sure Z got pulled down to riverside by the press..kinda go back to Z moving north and having family in the riverside area or grew up there area..

just some thoughts i have..

Cheri’s attacker being local makes most sense, because she likely knew her attacker. The police think this, because the evidence suggests that. She walked off with somebody into a dark alley and spent a good deal of time there with him before being attacked. It’s highly unlikely Cheri would walk off into a dark alley with a stranger, when she could go back into the library to get help.

Amen to that.

I second that amen.

One thing I know about The Zodiac, from my own personality, is that he liked to travel. He liked to drive. He liked his car and the freedom it gave him. He liked that it was a solitary activity he can undertake that alleviated both his deep isolated boredom and his depression.

I know this because at one point in my life, I could not wait to get moving in my car to alleviate identical and quite horrible feelings I felt, and I can assure you, personality-wise, The Zodiac and I share certain strong psychological commonalities. Driving for me was therapy. And I don’t mean therapy in the LifeTime TV sense.

Trust me on this one, he liked to travel, and I can more than easily see him doing a "road trip" for a brutal Halloween murder. Such a thing would have been right up his alley, no pun intended. Remember the Halloween card? Yep. For The Zodiac, Bates’ murder would have been a "miracle" of darkness.

JMO.

Trust me on this one, he liked to travel, and I can more than easily see him doing a "road trip" for a brutal Halloween murder. Such a thing would have been right up his alley, no pun intended. Remember the Halloween card? Yep. For The Zodiac, Bates’ murder would have been a "miracle" of darkness.

I agree most serial killers are highly mobile and love to travel. Part of it is that many are clever enough to spread out their crime sprees across as many different law enforcement jurisdictions as possible. In how many different police jurisdictions did the Zodiac commit his murders? Although it’s a myth that there was a serious problem with different police agencies cooperating with each other on the Zodiac case the fact that different agencies were involved didn’t make it easier especially when all you have is a land line phone and a FAX machine. I’m sure that this was something that the Zodiac was well aware of and used it to his advantage and if he had committed all of his murders in a single area his chances of being caught would have been much higher.

ive tossed around the idea CJB was murdered elsewhere and dumped back at RCC grounds..but the crime scene photos are hard for me to clearly see..cant really make out intricate details that would indicate the murder occurred there…i just do not like the idea she just walked off with the perp..granted if she knew him that a no go..

Does that mean you are considering that she was abducted Snooter? She was there, her killer was there…if he disabled her car. It doesn’t make a lot of sense that he would take her elsewhere and then bring her back there.

It should be pretty obvious to investigators if she was killed there. I would say that we would probably know if they knew that she was dumped, but I never really know what RPD is saying and what they aren’t.