He took Mr. Stine’s glasses as well, possibly wearing them as he left the scene? I think he was evolving the way he did things as he went along. The pieces of shirt, did verify it was him, when he sent them along with his letters. Or he could of took things from the others, and the police decided to withhold that info? I personally think he started taking them with Mr. Stine, but it is just an opinion.

I agree, mhoward48, with the idea of an evolution.

If you consider the Bates case as part of the whole trajectory, then there is definitely an evolution of sorts in Z’s behavior over time. The letter writing started out with similar/familiar motivations, but with less focused drama — but this evolved with time. Lake Berryessa almost seems experimental compared with previous acts, and Stine took on a larger potential audience (to the scene of the crime) in SF — along with the very deliberate act of obtaining proof with the shirt.

I just happened to wonder if maybe by the time Stine was killed and Zodiac almost got caught, someone close to him started suspecting him and asking a few too many questions that made him realize he’d better really watch it.

There was probably lots of talk about the Zodiac at the time and someone close such as an employer, family member or friends may have become suspicious after seeing the wanted posters, handwriting, and reading about him in the newspapers.

I just happened to wonder if maybe by the time Stine was killed and Zodiac almost got caught, someone close to him started suspecting him and asking a few too many questions that made him realize he’d better really watch it.

There was probably lots of talk about the Zodiac at the time and someone close such as an employer, family member or friends may have become suspicious after seeing the wanted posters, handwriting, and reading about him in the newspapers.

Good point Capricorn. At the time of Mr.Stines killing, I thought something happened that night that scared him off. Police being so close and all, and he started being more careful. Your point makes just as much sense, he started giving tells to people he knew in his manner or words.

If someone started suspecting him, they would’ve reported him. There was reward money, remember?

Personally, I doubt Zodiac ever appeared on anybody’s radar, police or otherwise.

This case has at times left me frustrated beyond reason lol.

I myself had felt ‘red with rage’ at his refusal to cooperate and tell me his name lol. See I wish I knew who he was, I would tell him exactly what a t*wt he and his games are. I mean I simply would not fear speaking my mind and I would waste no time I’d call him everything under the sun and ask "Criminal Genius? You can’t even walk properly you horoscope obsessed freak! And then once i”d had my say and told him what a idiot he was, I would simply put the phone down on him.

I have always thought that serial killers like to keep trophies. I read a book years ago about Ted Bundy, the only living witnesses, and one of his girlfriends found a bunch of car keys and stuff. Keeping personal items of the victims, lets the killer relive the moment. I bet this could have applied to Zodiac as well.

I think his trophies were the newspaper clippings.

Soze

The serial killers that keep souvenirs are sexually sadistic and they use the trinkets as a masturbation aid. In the Zodiac case, there’s no evidence that he masturbated over any of the victims and his attacks were not especially sadistic. He was in a different category.

I believe that 104 square inches of the shirt are still unaccounted for.

If I were a betting man, I would say the remaining parts of the shirt were discarded long ago

Or they are buried under a floorboard somewhere with any other trophies he might have taken or any press clippings that he accumulated. I guarantee you that Zodiac had his own press book with copies of articles, letters, crime scene photos that were published, etc.

I don’t think we’ll ever know now either because I believe he’s probably dead and if he isn’t, he’ll be into his seventies at the very least, late 80’s at most. I used to think that because of Zodiac’s huge ego that before he died he’d have given his attorney a sealed envelope with specific instructions that it only be opened after his death and inside would be Paul’s Drivers Licence with a letter of confession that starts "This is the Zodiac Speaking.."

I was talking about this last year and how Paul’s Drivers Licence could still be out there somewhere. The problem is that lets say Zodiac dies on Monday morning and a week later his relatives are removing his belongings from his home to make way or the new tenant and while they are doing this they come across a wallet in a locked drawer. They pry the drawer open and in this wallet are cards and ID, even drivers licence with photo, that all belong to someone called Paul Stine of Fell Street. What are the chances that they will recognise Stine as a victim of the Zodiac? Its coming up to half a century old now and they would probably just assume their recently departed relative must have found this wallet and hung on to it so they may as well throw it away as the issue date for the licence in the wallet is way back in the 1960s. That may have happened. And even if Z’s family member, lets say his brother, found Stine’s wallet after Z died and he knew exactly who Stine was and what this now means. Do I think that most would do the right thing and give the victims families some much deserved closure, or protect their own family’s interests (which you can’t really blame someone if for doing if that’s what they did)? I think 9 out of 10 would opt for the latter of the two choices.

I would bet good money that family members would cover it up if they found out a family member was Zodiac. Who would want that infamy? And, any surviving victims or their heirs would still have a wrongful death claim against Zodiac’s estate (CA tolls the statute of limitations for concealed crimes).

Personally speaking, I think his decision to stop killing and communicating with press each had it’s own reason. The reason he stopped killing, as well as the reason he stopped writing, are, for me, not a question of what was responsible for each, but rather, who? Zodiac’s reason for halting the killing? Don Fouke & Eric Zelms. Zodiac’s reason for not communicating telling of his latest ‘Victoms’? Chief Martin Lee.

Possible reasons for his calling time on the kill spree?
I think Zodiac was so arrogant, egocentric and narcissistic that he possibly believed he really was crack proof and could simply never be caught….Untill he walked into Don Fouke’s ‘Prowl car’s’ headlights on Jackson minutes after murdering Paul. Reality Check! I think that brought him back down to Earth somewhat and smashed his delusional belief of invincibility and he knew just how close he came to being captured and just how lucky he was that he wasn’t sitting in a prison cell.

Possible reasons for his stopping communicating?
He’d lost control and the ability to dictate what was being published about him. He met his match as far as insult slinging name calling goes in the SFPD’s top man himself, Chief of Inspectors Martin Lee who’s interview ran in The Chronicle on Oct 18, 1969… "The killer of five who calls himself "Zodiac" is a clumsy criminal, a liar and possibly a latent homosexual. That’s the opinion of homicide detectives assigned to bring in the boastful mass murderer. "He has made some mistakes," Chief of Inspectors Marvin Lee said of Zodiac. Mistakes such as:

— Possibly leaving his fingerprints in the Yellow Cab in which he shot taxi driver Paul Stine last Saturday night.

— Allowing himself to be seen by three witnesses as he fled from the Presidio Heights murder scene.

— Leaving alive two of his intended victims in the deranged attacks he made on couples in the North Bay region — two young men who may one day pick him out of a lineup.

And, says Lee, he is a liar.

"His boast of being in the area we were searching while we were searching it is a lie," Lee said. "We had the whole area flooded with lights. We had seven police dogs and a large number of patrolmen searching the area tree by tree and bush by bush. The dogs are the best in the country. A mouse couldn’t have escaped our attention."

Then the article said, speaking of Zodiac’s attack at Lake Berryessa: "It is the knife attack that leads investigators to consider that Zodiac may be a latent homosexual. His cryptic writings and hand- lettered boasts don’t indicate this — but the way in which he wielded the knife does hint of it. Psychiatrists and criminologists have told investigators that such a modus operandi could mean Zodiac is unsure of his manhood."

This is the article that caused Zodiac to respond on Nov 9th with "This is the Zodiac speaking up to the end of Oct I have killed 7 people. I have grown rather angry with the police for their telling lies about me. So I shall change the way the collecting of slaves. I shall no longer announce to anyone. When I committ my murders, they shall look like routine robberies, killings ofanger, + a few fake accidents, etc." This reaction, to me, is like that of a 5 year old who can’t get his own way. He’s essentially saying "I am not talking to you anymore you nasty horrible people, so go away!" Think Lee hurt Z’s feelings and possibly hit on something that Zodiac didn’t want to hear about.

Eh… was he really that close, though? I don’t think so. I think you’re smoking some good stuff (and I want some) if you think Fouke or Zelms would have caught Zodiac had they stopped him. All he had to do is remain calm and answer their questions. Edmund Kemper was stopped by police with two dead women in his back seat and he simply claimed that they had too much to drink and that he was taking them home. Fouke and Zelms could not have searched him simply because he was a white guy near the scene of the crime. They would have needed reasonable suspicion to pat him down. I can see Z answering a few questions and walking on by.

Here is why I think he stopped…Kathleen Johns recognized him. Now, he has someone a hundred miles from his SFPD murder and still gets recognized. Now, he probably thinks that he can’t hide anywhere. Plus, he knew he left fingerprints on the cab. I also think that is why he went silent thereafter. I think he realized that there was a definite shelf life on his anonymity. If he was an engineer, probability analysis would demonstrate that the more murders he commits, the more likely it is his mistakes catch up with him. I don’t think PH scared him that much at all. I think the fact that his sketch was published far and wide and that he was recognized in a completely different city spooked him.