I’ve decided that I think Paul Stine was murdered bc he recognized the Zodiac from a composit or wanted posting somewhere. Who knows maybe the Zodiac was wanted under his actual name and his real picture was out there and Stine recognized him.

I’m thinking now of what Edward Wayne Edwards said about cab drivers during a 1975 interview:

"The thinking criminal could go a lifetime without being apprehended if he played it the right way. I spent a year on the most wanted list, something I’m not proud of, but at the time considered it a game. The FBI concentrated its efforts on me because I did things to aggravate them. Because I found out later I was in crime only for the recognition. I wouldn’t let the FBI know where I was going, but I wanted them to know I’d been there. I changed cities often and completely reversed habits to throw off what they had on my previous modus–operandi. I found cab drivers to be the most observant people, and many times was confronted by citizens who knew they knew me, but couldn’t make the final association of the top ten list.” *(*Edward Wayne Edwards, Chicago Tribune interview, August 5, 1975.) < —-Edwards mother’s death anniversary.

I just want to know, What happen to those male glove size 7
That were in the Cab?

I just want to know, What happen to those male glove size 7
That were in the Cab?

Presumably they’re still held by the SFPD. Unless someone accidentally threw them away in a fit of spring cleaning.

They’re among very few items of Stine evidence listed by the CADOJ report, so they were at least taken care of back in the 70s – and I suppose we have to assume they still are.

Makes you wonder if the gloves were part of the fake clew.

Maybe Z Figured he leaves a pair of gloves in the taxi so LE would think he forgot to use his gloves and his prints could possibly be on the cab (sending LE on a wild goose chase to recover and find the donors of the multitudes of prints). Perhaps the zodiac had planned the murder and throwing LE off with the prints and knew a public automobile like a cab could provide the myriad of fingerprints to confuse LE (and the myriad of other fingerprints would raise false POIs to muddy the chances of narrowing down on Z).

I’m convinced while he was doing this and tearing Stine’s shirt he appeared to be lingering around the cab for some moments after the murder.

If this was the case, Stine was likely targeted bc of the cab he drove. Thus the crime was not personal, but there was a reason why the zodiac targeted a cab driver and it was Bc of the cab. The murder of Stine was completely incidental. Any cab driver could have been driving him that night and Zodiac would have picked them off just the same jmo The major motivation would be that the Zodiac killed Stine so that the multitude of fingerprints from passengers on the taxicab would Increase/muddy the list of false POIs decreasing the likelihood of Zodiac being pinpointed and identified.

There were prints recovered from the cab that were left by someone who was present after a quantity of blood was sprayed or splattered.

After. As in, the prints were left "on top" of the blood. Meaning whoever left them did so after Stine started bleeding.

That was the conclusion of the forensics experts at the time.

There were numerous prints, as such, inside and outside the cab. As you would expect. But these – all and any of these – would be far less interesting than those in the former category. Which could only have been made by:

a) a random passer by

b) Stine

c) a professional connected to the case/crime

d) the killer

The professionals at the time concluded it was d).

As for the gloves, who knows. I don’t see the logic in wearing gloves – but then not actually wearing gloves – myself.

Still I wouldn’t be so set on the idea that those bloody prints even had ridges. If zodiac truly did seal his fingertips so that a print could not be left (as he claimed to do) then I wonder if the bloody "prints" would have even been viable? If there were even ridges? Yet another taunt from the Zodiac. "Oh look there’s my prints in Stine’s blood! Oh wait nm there no ridges left though. Sucks for you. Love Z."

I’m going to go with Zodiac being honest when he said he left fake clews (gloves, bloody print, strangers prints on cab to confuse LE as well). Why not believe what he said he did? It would be his way to verify that it was indeed him at the scene if his letter contained info about the crime scene that only police knew.

It would be his way to verify that it was indeed him at the scene if his letter contained info about the crime scene that only police knew.

I think the swatch of Paul Stine’s shirt pretty much covered that aspect so any extraneous stuff like the gloves, bloody prints etc would fall under ‘fake clews’ ,assuming that was their intention, as opposed to proof regarding claim.

I’m going to go with Zodiac being honest when he said he left fake clews (gloves, bloody print, strangers prints on cab to confuse LE as well). Why not believe what he said he did? It would be his way to verify that it was indeed him at the scene if his letter contained info about the crime scene that only police knew.

We can assume they are fake, but LE has to go with the possibility of them being real clues. If nothing is connecting to them, so-be-it, but they have to be considered as valid evidence.

I personally think Zodiac was smarter than to leave his real prints behind in blood and I don’t think they were his gloves, but it’s potential evidence so they go with it, ya know?

They lifted actual prints (with ridges and all) from the cab they were "confident" belonged to the killer.

Why? That’s been said now, more than once.

Were they mistaken? Sure, maybe.

Could it be that those prints didn’t actually belong to Z, but someone else who happened to leave them after the blood splatter? Sure, yes, I suppose. Anything’s possible. They didn’t bother to clear the medics, or the cops, or the kids at the scene. Maybe some pesky neighbor decided to sneak up and smudge the surface for kicks – could certainly be.

Way back when, I had a copy of the prints found on Stine’s taxi. Don’t know if they’d be complete enough to use as evidence, but they definitely had ridges.

Just to clarify (even for myself ) they wouldn’t be able to "lift" a bloody print—only photograph it.

Figure of speech.

Besides, I don’t think the prints they were confident about were "bloody" in the traditional sense. They had traces of blood "under" them rather than "over" them (hence the confidence – the prints were left subsequent to Stine being shot).

The visible smudges or whatever you want to call it, which I believe to be the "bloody prints" seen by Pelissetti on arrival, are something different. Not really prints at all – just smudges. And not the prints the SFPD were confident belonged to the killer. The latter are – I believe – proper, actual fingerprints that would not have been visibly bloody but which nevertheless had traces of blood "under" them.