I believe any composite formulated from eyewitnesses, not directly face on to the killer with poor visibility from 60 feet, from a top / down perspective probably means the composite is probably a poor resemblance to the real killer, with hair colour and facial roundness extremely difficult to determine even along the dull sidestreet. If the said killer was spotted by Foukes/Zelms possibly height was the only true indicator. In the Berryessa attack the 10.5 wing walker footprints could be used as a correlation to height. Although not foolproof, a correlation exists and 10.5 feet corresponds to 5’9" to 5’10", which is about the general consensus of his height from most witnesses.
In dark light hair shade deepens, so his true colour is more than likely two or three shades lighter than described by the witnesses that night.
He stated in the Bus Bomb letter ‘I look like the description passed out only when I do my thing, the rest of the time I look entirle different. I shall not tell you what my descise consists of when I kill’.
We know he lied in much correspondence to the papers and certainly would not admit to a looking like the description, unless it served a purpose,ie he didn’t look like it.
He also probably lied about hiding in the Julius Khan Park as stated by Marvin Lee, who 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."
Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/entertainment/art … z2RAu3EdqC
http://depletedcranium.com/how-useful-a … -sketches/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x6fRH5MLBIU

Hi-

LOL, all my hard research being tossed out the window! In my friend Jim Dean’s 2003 interviews with these witnesses, we learned that the dome light from the cab cast a brilliant light around its immediate area, so that was not a problem. The older witness went downstairs to the first floor, so not everyone was "looking down" on Z. And, of course, there was no fog that night.

Mike

I wrote a diatribe about this somewhere Tahoe, not sure where though so I’ll paraphrase drastically.

The Clark Kent comparison came up very early in my mind, I think it does with quite a few people and some have posted such. The idea that his disguise at the Stine killing might have consisted of a different hairstyle and glasses certainly echoes a reverse Clark Kent thing, The other things that tie in with the whole superhero / supervillain theme are of course the costume and or disguise and the issue of an ‘identity’ that he wants to keep secret.

As for the composite. On one hand I totally agree. It might as well be a description and not an image given it’s generic aspects. On the other hand the composite was amended to give a better approximation of facial features and from Mike R’s work we see that the kids did infact have a better view of Zodiac than many first think. To be fair all you have to do is go on google earth and look at the angle and distance from the window to the opposite kerb, it’s not that far. Actually, it’s closer than that because Zodiac came round to the driver’s side and the cab wasn’t parked to the kerb so you can remove a car width and a bit from that distance.

Then there’s also KJ. She reacted to something in that sketch and it may just have been a combination of things, it may even have been the generic hair cut and glasses but I would think at least something else. Maybe the eyes and nose, or the eyes and mouth etc. That within the facial features represented in the composite, something, somewhere, some part of it or combination of parts that are enough for someone to say, yes that’s the person I saw.

Now this of course is only relevant if it was Zodiac.

We suspect it was because KJ identified the composite of Zodiac as being the man that kidnapped her and her baby. We further suspect it was because Zodiac refers to the incident in it’s own note/letter concerning her and her baby prefaced by his buttons issue and list obsession.

If it WAS Zodiac: We have a correct identification affected by the composite. This greatly increases the usefulness of the composite as an identification tool.

If it WASN’T Zodiac: We have an incorrect identification affected by the composite. This strongly suggests the generic nature of the composite and therefore it’s potential uselessness as an identification tool.

Simples! … God I wish it was that simple lol.

The problem or at least murky area of this is that Zodiac writes to confirm or claim this one, whichever you prefer. Why?

He did it, lol that would make sense.
He saw it was being possibly connected to him and thought why not.
He’s made claims in the past that may not be true.

etc, etc.

Those aren’t the issue I have here, it’s the composite. He’s responding to an incident that has the issue of the composite as a prominent part of it. What is his purpose in this. You might argue that the composite element didn’t factor into his reason for writing, he didn’t think about it. Fair enough but I think it unlikely, not impossible but unlikely and besides we have prior evidence that he does consider these things or at least has.

"I look like the description passed out only when I do my thing, the rest of the time I look entirle different. I shall not tell you what my discise consists of when I kill."

So, what are the potential implications regarding the composite from the point of view of KJ identifying someone as Zodiac from it and then Zodiac himself responding to that.

1. If it WAS him then he’s possibly confirming that he was telling the truth about looking ‘entirle’ different. The reasoning here being that since he was identified as looking like the composite which, according to him, is a disguise then what KJ has possibly done is to confirm that the composite is a disguise. Not only that but an effective one, for Zodiac’s purposes anyway. It really is like the Clark Kent thing and in that context Zodiac felt safe enough to respond because his true ‘identity’ hadn’t been compromised. "Yes it was me and it doesn’t matter that you know it was me because all you have done is prove that I look like, what I look like only when I ‘do my thing’ ….but the rest of the time"

It actually suits Zodiac to respond to this in this context because it adds credence to his previous claims about the composite.

2. If it WASN’T Zodiac then he’s possibly leaping on the opportunity to say "This is gold-dust, not only have you not caught me with the description but now any nut-job with glasses could be identified as me from it."

Unfortunately this also suits Zodiac in this context because whether he intended it or not, he’s managed a bit of a masterstroke by ensuring that the only official composite of himself depicts him with a disguise so pathetically simple that it has somehow managed to become potentially super-generic. It really is the Clark Kent Effect or CKE but in composite form.

Within the context of the composite I lean towards No 1. It’s less complicated and does contain that nice and simple reference back to his previous comments about the composite. I do find No 2 more interesting in respect that if he had thought through specific purposes for his disguise/s and this CKE was considered then that would certainly fit nicely into one of my bugbears about the "I have been too clever …". The bugbear being that I haven’t seen anything particularly clever, on the surface at least, and have always felt that there might be something less obvious about the things he did that was actually quite clever.

So those are some of my thoughts on the composite.

Just listning to Officer Fouke describing the events of Oct 11, 69 and the comment he made regarding the Composite Drawing I find quite interesting.

Fouke states "One Month Later, when the composite drawing came out at Richmond Station and was posted on the wall, he looked similar to the man that I had seen on October 11th"

The Sketch was only ‘Similar’ to the man he had observed, and the way in which he says this comment, would suggest further that the Composite wasn’t really an accurate depiction of the man he saw. The way Fouke said the statement you would expect him to say ‘He looked similar to the man I had seen onOctober 11t, But……’

Fouke didn’t sound at all convinced with the sketch, that is now the most well circulated and known image of the infamous Zodiac.

I know a lot of people disagree with me on this point, but of all the people/victims/witnesses that ever saw Zodiac, I believe Don Fouke is the man who got the best, unobstructed and clear view of Zodiac, and looked right into the killers eyes from a few feet away under street lighting. All the other witnesses/victims saw Zodiac either while he wore a hood over his face(Hartnell), or in a dark, unlit car park while Zodiac himself attempted to blind the victim (Mageau) by shining a light into his eyes before emptying his gun into Mageau and Ferrin so that Mike Mageau has only ever been able to describe his attacker as youngish looking, stocky build, and dark curly hair. The three teen witnesses who were responsible for creating the composite sketch were watching from a third story room elevated high above the street level, and therefor looikng down, and this distance from their window to the Cab outside was 50 ft in what some reports say were ‘Foggy’ connditions.

I mean it always does make me kinda laugh at how easily people, myself included, sometimes just automatically assume that because Zodiac was seen wearing Hron Rimmed Glasses in Presidio Heights, that he must obviously wear glasses in his daily life, and hence we get flodded with pictures like the one posted here of Darlene Ferrin and the ‘mystery man’, who seems to have got everyone suspicious because he wears these same type of glasses, lol. Zodiac could have been talking rubbish when he said ‘I look like the description passed out only when I do my thing, the rest of the time I look entirle different. I shall not tell you what my descise consists of when I kill’ but I doubt that he was lying based on Zodiac always being described by others at previous attacks as having short, brown wavy or curly hair, untill he appears in Presidio Heights with his ‘Blonde/redish crew cut’. It’s also logical that Zodiac would have dramatically altered his appearence for the Presidio event because he was fully aware he’d be walking down a public street, under the lights, with a ‘above average’ chance of being spotted by residents from their homes, or walking the streets. I think Zodiac natural look was as he was described by Hartnell and Mageau, Brown wany/curly hair, and not the ‘Blonde/reddish tint crew cut that he was sporting on Jackson Street. It’s actually far more likely that the glasses were a part of the disguise. Zodiac may have decided that if it works for Superman, it will work for him lol.

I don’t know what the requirements were for thoes who wished to join the Army/Navy back in the 40’s, 50’s & 60’s, but if it was the same or similar back than as it is now, poor eyesight would disqualify you from being able to join up. We can be faily confident that Zodiac had some military background due to the WingWalker boot print, the use of Ciphers and the proximity of the murder in Presidio Heights to the Letterman Army Medical Center (Which just happens to be located the other side of Julius Kahn play grounds)

Anyway, having become aware that I am seemingly doing my best to construct an essay, I will end it here.