I read in the RO report on Lake Herman Rd that the "activity interrupted" was necking and also (I believe also in that report) that the seats were found to be in the reclined position. When I googled 1961 Rambler station wagon the ads that came up high-lighted the fact that the back seats could fold down flat into a bed (thus saving on a hotel bill for the family vacation) and the picture showed the front passenger seat reclined quite a ways back, altho not flat. My questions are 1. Does anyone know if the driver’s seat also reclined, and if so, was it as far back as the front passenger? 2. How far back was the seat reclined when the RO came to scene? There are several reasons I’m curious about this–obviously if both front seats reclined to "almost" flat, the teenagers would not have been visible from the road. Also, I think the seat being down would especially impede David F’s exit from the vehicle–make it more awkward. And I have wondered if their position impeded Zodiac’s shot–he may have wanted to shoot them in the car but missed. If there’s a thread that addresses this I’d appreciate the direction! 
Thanx.
Don’t know about the exact angle of the seats, but they were visible from the road by Zodiac as minutes earlier they had been spotted by the Your’s. Peggy Your would recollect in the police report: "As they were driving west on Lake Herman Road at the turn off to the Benicia Water Pumping Station, she observed a Rambler station wagon parked with front end heading east, there were two Caucasians in the front seat, male and female, when the lights from the car came upon the station wagon, the male sat up in the seat.
Yes, thank you UKS–I had read Mrs. Your saw them–but wasn’t that their initial pass-by? Didn’t the Yours go further down the road to where they encountered the hunters, then turn around? (The Lake Herman timeline is so confusing and I’ve never been there.) In my mind, David sat up and put his hands on the steeringwheel because the lights hit their station wagon and–being good kids of that era—he wanted to show there was no hanky-panky. And, since there was so much traffic that night on the "secluded" lovers lane, I wonder if he and Betty didn’t (unfortunately) decide to recline the front seat(s), maybe just minutes before the attack? I know the backseats were up, because Betty’s coat was found there. Also, I’m not implying anything beyond normal teenage making-out/petting. Like so many others, I find the Lake Herman timeline puzzling. And I wonder if–since David had reportedly planned to ask Betty to go steady that night and hadn’t yet (or at least still had possession of his ring) the two kids decided with all the lights coming/going to recline the front seats after the Yours passed.
I found the reference I was looking for–on page 16 of the Solano County report that Morf has posted at the beginning of the David F and Betty Lou thread–one of the officers notes that in interviewing the hunters, they saw the Rambler but no one in it. The officer stated that was probably because the victims had reclined the seats and thats how the car was found. I tried to copy and paste an ad for the 1961 Rambler station wagon that I found online by googling 1961 Rambler station wagon reclining seats, and looking under images (I couldn’t successfully post it–maybe because of a copyright? IDK–I’m new at this–I appreciate anyone’s patience 
) The reason I find this so interesting is that, from the photos in the ad, the front passenger seat reclines close to flat. I can’t find any info on how far or if the driver’s seat reclines. And if the Yours saw David and Betty Lou sitting up 15 minutes before the attack, the kids must have just reclined the seats minutes before z arrived on scene. It would have been awkward for David to exit the car. And, as I posted earlier, I wonder if z had to angle his shot down, or shot and missed initially, because they were reclined. (I don’t know much about ballistics–but I remember z wrote that Mike M jerked back and ruined his shot.)
I’ve been away for a while and while catching up on things, I saw this and thought I’d add a picture of the seats. These are from a 1964, but I doubt the ’61 seats were different.
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Formerly Clovis.
