It could be that when the newspaper opened their letters to the editor they did not keep the letters and envelopes straight and ended up putting that typed letter into Patricia Hautz’ envelope by mistake.

Other way round Seagull but I got what you meant. Interesting idea although we have seen PH’s writing and I think it matches the envelope. Although I must have another look but I remember being pretty satisfied when I saw it. Your suggestion is more exciting though lol as it would mean there’s an unseen Zodiac letter floating around down there.

EDIT: Just to ask, is there still confusion over this because PH apparently doesn’t recall writing the letter? If it is I was just musing on how it would be quite easy to forget and it occurred to me that letters were the email of the day, sorta and people would have written a lot more. PH had a typewriter (I assume) so if she was a prolific writer and letter writer it could be quite reasonable for her to forget writing something despite it’s subject nature.

Thanks for keeping me honest, Trav! I did get mixed up.

Hautz claimed that she did often write letters to the editor,but didnt recall writing this particular one. I just personally am bothered by that,how many letters about murdered Riverside students could you have written in your life? I would guess, maybe only one,I know I would not forget that. Also odd was that the letter was typed, the addressing on the envleope was in cursive, and the ‘EDITOR’ part is printed. Also, I seem to recall that an enhanced graphic outline of the envelope seemed to indicate that the ‘editor’ part likely would not have fit in the envelope,and may actually be part of the same sample, but was later added, or was photocopied incorrectly(anybody remember where the enhanced photo of the envelope is?)

By the way, Ricardo has a really nice writeup about the Hautz letter on his site:
http://mk-zodiac.com/ThePatriciaHautzMystery.html

By the way, Ricardo has a really nice writeup about the Hautz letter on his site:
http://mk-zodiac.com/ThePatriciaHautzMystery.html

Very good write up. A MUST read.

I didn’t know that the envelope and the note aren’t confirmed as being connected. I’ve seen the postmark work that was done but I didn’t realize it was being done to confirm that the envelope belonged to the note I thought it was just to confirm what it was.

Funny thing about the date discrepancy issue is that it might explain why PH can’t remember writing it. Maybe her memory really sucks lol.

As for the ATT bit fitting on the envelope. Not sure, I’m assuming that was something worked out by actual sizes? If your talking about just the image enhancements ones where you can see what looks like the bottom edge of the envelope with the ATT bit below it then I’ll try and get it because it is relevant not only because you asked lol but also because of another enhancement I posted earlier.

I posted some stuff on the ATT handwriting somewhere regarding how the A was very similar in construction to the A on, I think it was, the reproductions of the ATKID letter and envelope that was clearly written by the FBI identifying it as connected to the Atlanta Kidnappings case. So whilst a lot of people look ATT:Editor as Zodiacesque I was showing an example of it also closely matched an LE note shown with an accompanying piece of evidence but not written on it. This I felt lent credence to the idea that ATT:Editor wasn’t part of the envelope and was an accompanying note from LE. Not an FBI code because it clearly isn’t but something more rudimentary like the ‘ATT:Editor’ letters etc.

I felt that the ATT:Editor bit wasn’t part of the envelope and it’s a combination of the stuff I mentioned above but having done the enhancement from a few pages back I’m slightly less trustful of what we think we see in any enhancement now. My gut tells me that the original enhancement that someone produced to show the potential bottom edge may well be accurate and that is what we are seeing but there are some discrepancies now in my mind about what we’re actually seeing there.

I’ll need to illustrate and I’ll try and do that later.

Ok Here’s morf post quoting TF’s measuring of the envelope.

Interesting points Howard. We had done some discussion & images of the Envelope on ZKfacts.com a while back.

The letter was dated 11/1/67 as seen here:

The writer mentions the OCT1 human interest story. Of course, we verified that there was NO human interest story from 10/1/67, so the writer either made an error with the date, or purposely lied,but either way the writer was wrong.

Next, Bentley enhanced the image of the envelope thought to have contained the Hautz letter. Seen here:

The date on the envelope matches up with the date of the Hautz letter.

Next, Foreigner did an image enhancement for the aprox size of the envelope to see if it could actually have housed all the words & writing properly.

Foreigner wrote: "Here I have made an "envelope" (blue lines) in the size Howard Davis stated that the envelope was; "The envelope is 63/4 inches in length and the width is 4 1/4 inches And then I have placed it within a copy of the envelople the size it have been posted on Z.com, which seems to that it have been enhanced a bit. The result seems that the "ATTN: Editor" indeed was placed on the front of the envelope, due to that the proportions seems to fit."

Bentley followed up with this post:
"TF, I think you are correct here, nice work. Upon enhancing the image what looks like a rectangle starting above Editor appears to be some scanning anomaly. It still doesn’t measure right on my screen but that may be due to the size of the screen. So it looks like the ATTN: Editor does indeed belong on the front of the envelope and I was in error."

and this scan:

The results of all this seem to indicate that the letter & envelope share the same date. And that ALL of the writing, cursive and printed, could have fit on the envelope. Still leaves some questions, but answers some also.

I have to say that I think it now looks as if it is part of the envelope and of possibly the same pen.

EDIt: Just to add that my initial thoughts on the other weird patterns that my earlier, alternative enhancement shows might be residue and reflection. From some thing like a photo album type affair, you know with the lightly tacky back page and transparent, plastic over sheet. Placing items in a album for long enough created a shape in the glue which can transfer to the oversheet if the page is then left without any new occupants for too long. The reflectiveness of this material may account for the less hidden patterning we are used to seeing on it, which you can see from the scan above does extend into the words ATT:Editor.

If Patricia did not remember writing that note then I say she didn’t write it. When you look closely at her signature , you will see that her i’s are the same height as the rest of her letters, but not on the note/envelope. The "Note/ envelope is written differently even the r’s are not like in her in signature. The only thing that is like hers is the P, which I have seen done by other people. Notice the crossed out Ent for Enterprise, something the Z has done before. He will forget how to spell a word, then it comes back to him and he remembers how it is spelled. ( I think that is due to some brain damage)
Just because he wasn’t known to sign other names, doesn’t mean he couldn’t have done it for that note. I think he wrote the Citizen note and the Count Marco letter,that is using different signatures. He could have copied her P, but the rest looks Zodiac to me, even the wording seems Z like. We know he is capable of changing his writing style, maybe he sees someones style of writing and decides to copy it ? He didn’t do a very good job in trying to copy Patricia’s through.
I think Zodiac wrote that note feeling sorry for himself ,telling how he grew up to become a killer, putting the blame on his home life. He enjoys confusing everyone, so he signed it using a female name.
Maybe he had hoped that LE would have found Patricia, asking about the note to then frighten her ? Patricia was born in May 1947 so she was in the correct age group as his victims.

Wright or wrong ,that is what I believe.

This stuff is so so interesting and also so frustrating too. It makes your head spin

I agree (partially) with Sandy. Z has art talent– look at his Halloween card. Some of what he wrote (or should I say "lettered"?) looks like it was printed there by the graphic artist who designed the card. He obviously hung around RCC and got to know some of the girls who frequented the library. He could present himself as soft-spoken (according to some who spoke with him on the phone), mannerly (his letters say "please"), and handsome (according to the girls who saw him at Lake Berryessa).

I think Z may have PH’s distinctive "P" and may have easily copied it to write the letter that focuses on him. However, he did not cross out "Ente" because of brain damage. He is very intelligent, but haughty. He doesn’t think we little people deserve that he should make the effort to spell according to standard rules. That is why he misspells. He thinks that however he spells a word is the way it should be spelled. Or, of course, (which is more likely) he retrieved her letter from the wastebasket after she wrote "Press Ent" and crossed out "Ent." Young ladies of that era were taught to value a perfect presentation. (Look at their photos: never a hair out of place.)

If he didn’t already know her name, he could easily have found it by a simple ruse.

If you check the samples morf13 found of PH’s handwriting, you will notice that it slants to the right. The handwriting that purports to be hers on the envelope is nearly vertical. Also, check the ends of PH’s handwriting: her words end in an upward curving line, on the line of writing. Now check the "e" at the end of the word "Riverside" on the envelope that is allegedly from her. See how that "e" in Riverside dips below the line of writing and ends in a dragged down line. I don’t have the image in front of me as I’m writing this, but that is what I recall. Z’s "e’s" often do that at the end of his words. (See, for instance, his 7-31-69 letter to the Vallejo Times-Herald.) Although he printed his letters, and graphologists say printing cannot be compared to cursive, I think a pattern, such as this final "e" that dips below the line of writing, may hold from printing to cursive.

The "ATTN: Editor" is uncannily Z’s. Does PH recall printing that on the envelope, (in Z’s handwriting?) Z often makes his "r’s" the smallest of letters, and open, like the "r" in "Editor" on the Hautz letter.

I recall wondering about the samples of handwriting from PH’s notebooks that had been previously posted, (I think on Butterfield’s blog). One sample of her "R" showed that she traced over and over it. I wondered if she were not, perhaps, trying to "get it right," so that she could "prove" ‘she wrote a letter she could not recall. Why would she do this? In fear of Z, so that Z would not come after her for implicating him as being the writer of the phony Hautz letter. If the police could not locate her, and she was not found for almost 50 years, that seems to prove that she did not want to be found.

To Travellor1st,

The link you posted to Butterfield’s blog opens a window that says "This account has been suspended."

Believing that Patricia Hautz had written this letter, there still do remain some questions:

– Why did she write in such a justifying way about the ‘boy’ who had killed CJB?
– How she wanna know it was a ‘boy’ rather than one or more men or even a woman?
– Why did she go public with such a statement?
– What typewriter was the letter written on? What kind of paper was used?
– If she had written the blacked-out ‘Enter’ of the word Enterprise: Who wrote the word ‘Editor’ then? The handwriting, especially regarding the ‘E’, is 100% different. Was that the reason why ‘Enter..’ had been blacked-out?
– How many letters did she write, after all?
– If she knew the boy, possibly Z, was it her who conspired against CJB? Motivating Z to let her die? Is that the reason why she prefers her privacy to be protected?
– Did she write the ‘Bates had to die’ letters?
– Did she know CJB?
– Was she in the library that evening?
– Why did she comment on CJB at all?

Some of these points make me really worry about her integrity, meaning that I do not agree that she should be protected against being interviewed regarding the letter.

QT

Believing that Patricia Hautz had written this letter, there still do remain some questions:

– Why did she write in such a justifying way about the ‘boy’ who had killed CJB?
– How she wanna know it was a ‘boy’ rather than one or more men or even a woman?
– Why did she go public with such a statement?
– What typewriter was the letter written on? What kind of paper was used?
– If she had written the blacked-out ‘Enter’ of the word Enterprise: Who wrote the word ‘Editor’ then? The handwriting, especially regarding the ‘E’, is 100% different. Was that the reason why ‘Enter..’ had been blacked-out?
– How many letters did she write, after all?
– If she knew the boy, possibly Z, was it her who conspired against CJB? Motivating Z to let her die? Is that the reason why she prefers her privacy to be protected?
– Did she write the ‘Bates had to die’ letters?
– Did she know CJB?
– Was she in the library that evening?
– Why did she comment on CJB at all?

Some of these points make me really worry about her integrity, meaning that I do not agree that she should be protected against being interviewed regarding the letter.

QT

Not sure the answers to any of these questions, but I am sure the envelope we have seen was definitely written by her.

What Patricia Hautz says in her letter is pretty standard fare: If we pay some attention to our boys before they’re allowed to develop into vicious killers, then we will be better off for it.

Similar opinions have been expressed numerous times before – and it’s very common that members of the public express them in the aftermath of an episode which has been covered by the media.

Just look at Twitter or Facebook today – the same thing happens all the time. It’s the idea that we – society – are only interested in tragedies when they’re presented to us as a form of diversion or entertainment by the media.

There’s nothing sinister about Hautz’ letter – and she doesn’t condone or justify the event itself at all. She merely expresses a very common view, nothing more.

Besides (for the umpteenth time) what is the significance of this letter? Is there ANY reason to think that Patricia Hautz (who has been tracked down and pretty much confirmed that she did indeed write the thing) had anything to do with Bates’ death?

It’s possible to interpret anything and everything in any sort of way – but this letter is by the looks of it completely irrelevant, it has no bearing on either Bates or Z.

Just to clarify: I have nothing against speculation – but it seems to me that the time for speculating about this particular letter is now well and truly over.

At one time nobody knew whether Patricia Hautz was a real person or not. Back then it was legitimate to speculate. But now that it has been established that Patricia Hautz is very much a real person – and furthermore a person who was indeed a Riverside student at the time, and who has confirmed that she was indeed in the habit of writing letters to the editor…well, it seems pretty pointless to keep beating what looks like an utterly dead horse.

Do people think Patricia Hautz is Z? Do they think she somehow corroborated with Z? Do they think Z engaged in a bit of identity theft – and that he remarkably opted for a student who might have written precisely the same letter herself? What is the underlying assumption here, if any?

It doesn’t matter if there are possible unanswered questions pertaining to the Hautz letter if Hautz herself has nothing to do with the case. I can pick out any number of letters to the editor mailed at the same time and ask why this or why that – but it’s senseless unless there is an actual reason to suspect the letter writer of being involved with the case somehow.

Just my two cents and I don’t mean to discourage anyone from speculating about the case – that’s pretty much what we’re all doing in one way or another. But lines must be drawn somewhere. In my opinion the Hautz business is a dead end which has now been confirmed to be just that.