However he might have feeled ashamed about the fact that he had let Z get away.

But there wasn’t very much to be ashamed of. He was on the lookout for a black man, so goes the story. The dispatcher is the culprit, not Fouke. We can debate whether Fouke should have stopped the man regardless of the description (treating him as a witness, if you will), but that’s little more than nitpicking: Nobody will doubt, presumably, that Fouke would have tried to apprehend the guy if he had been given the correct description to begin with.

I sincerely doubt anybody asked Fouke to write the memo. SFPD was a big, bureaucratic organization; I don’t think it would have worked that efficiently.

I guess that depends on who knew what. Given that Fouke talked to Pelissetti, the fact that he had encountered someone that night who later turned out to be Z, would have been known. I find it extremely odd, to say the least, that Toschi and Armstrong apparently never bothered to talk to Fouke about the night in question, but even if they didn’t, it seems like a bit of a stretch that nobody beyond Fouke himself, Zelms and Pelisetti were aware of the fact that a patrol had rolled past Z that night.

Point being: If it was generally known that Fouke had rolled past Z, it seems likely enough that the department reacted when Z’s letter was published, and requested a memo from Fouke in order to have it on record that Z was never stopped or talked to.

If it was NOT generally known, however, your take on it is certainly plausible.

Fouke was the more senior officer. I suspect once Fouke realized what happened, he may have asked Zelms not to mention it.

But why? If the dispatcher mix-up is real, there is no great shame attached to what Fouke/Zelms did, or failed to do. Firstly, nobody knew it was Z until the letter arrived, several days later. There and then it was a standard cabbie mugging turned ugly, a routine case. Secondly, Fouke/Zelms couldn’t possibly know the guy in question was any kind of perpetrator, because as far as they knew the latter was a black man. Why not simply tell it exactly like it was?

1. What really happened: Fouke pulls over and asks Z whether he has seen anyone suspicious in the area.

2. What Fouke claims happened: Fouke drives past Z but does not pull over, having registered that the subject does not match the description.

Why would 2) be so much more preferable to 1) – for Fouke? Because it’s hugely embarrassing having talked to Z without apprehending him? Well, that would be hugely embarrassing if Fouke was actually looking for Z at the time. But he wasn’t. He wasn’t even looking for a white cabbie killer. He couldn’t be, because the description he had been given was faulty. That’s the – very plausible – story in the background here. And everyone has largely accepted this story over the years. So, where is the huge embarrassment?

"You could have caught me that night." That’s what Z says. And that’s embarrassing for the SFPD. But it is NOT particularly embarrassing for Don Fouke, personally. He acted on the info provided to him – it’s not his fault that the dispatcher sent out the wrong description. This would have been as obvious then as it is now.

It always seems strange to me Norse about the claim of the ‘black male’ description. Many people have said to me that when the kids gave their description the radio dispatcher may not have relayed the whole description, this being used to explain away why none of the responding police officers questioned a black male in 1969 having a reddish-blond crew cut. There appears little point in taking the whole description and then just saying "be on the lookout for a black male", it doesn’t cost the dispatcher anything to state the proper description to officers, that is what you would expect from a competent police department. But also if they had and Fouke had passed this suspect, ok his color is incorrect, but this unidentified male by Fouke’s scratch matched in every other way, correct hair color, correct weight, correct height, correct dark clothing, correct hair style, correct glasses description, but hey that doesn’t ring any alarm bells and any initiative on his part. I believe the black male description was concocted to alleviate the blame apportioned to the officers, but what they didn’t realize was that questions such as these would pour huge scorn on their claims.

Yes Norse, you get exactly what I’m saying.

A coverup AFTER the Zodiac letter makes some sense. One being perpetrated on the very same night makes none, as far as I can see.

UKSPY, now you are adding another element to fit you theory, and since it requires even more conspiratorial elements, I don’t think that is a good sign.

If there was in fact NO NMA dispatch, then you’d have Fouke with the correct suspect description stopping the Zodiac and STILL letting him go and not saying anything about it to anyone on the scene. I think that just bumps it into the realm of impossible to believe.

Well, as we’ve discussed before we don’t know precisely what sort of description the witness provided at first (when the call was made). The details, hair color and so forth, was taken down by Pelissetti – but that was later.

It’s clear enough that IF the witness provided ALL the details we now know when making the call, it seems peculiar that the dispatcher would misinterpret the information and send out the NMA description. But we don’t know that this happened. All we know is that the witness called in something alarming taking place outside in the street, a guy in a taxi, what looked like a murder taking place – precisely what details he gave isn’t known to us, so it remains a matter of speculation how the NMA description originated.

More importantly, though, I fully agree with duck: If there was no mix-up, if the dispatcher sent out a description identical to the one Pelissetti later took down, then Fouke’s actions are utterly inexplicable: He pulls over and talks to a man who looks exactly like the description, but somehow fails to realize that this must be the perpetrator? That makes very little sense.

From my own messy notes: A comment by Mike Rodelli posted on one of the old message boards (as some will know, Mike interviewed Fouke on several occasions):

Mike R:

In this context, Fouke’s account of how Zelms learned that Fouke had seen a white male is interesting. Fouke did not have some elaborate construct ready for us as to how he informed Zelms that he had spotted someone. If they had gotten out of the car, spoken to Z, and then conspired to hush it all up, one might expect that he’d simply say that he saw the guy and then told Zelms a few seconds later. What Fouke actually said to us when Jim and I questioned him on this point (and without missing a beat) is that he never told Zelms what he had seen because Zelms was sitting in the car next to him and could hear his conversation with Pelissetti about how he had spotted a white male as easily as Pelissetti did! Pretty off-handed for a guy who is hiding something.

Also, in his memo, he doesn’t even say that "Zelms saw nothing", as one might expect with Fouke as the ringleader and the rookie keeping his mouth shut and playing along. Why expose Zelms to the heat of an interrogation over what he had seen, instead of both of them agreeing that Zelms had sene nothing, zilch, nada? Fouke left the question open and in doing so pointed the investigators in Zelms’ direction! This is either pretty crafty or a sign of innocence of conspiracy.

Reading through the notes mentioned above, I came across something else which might be of interest here, in particular with regard to the timeline discussed above: Could Z have done what Fouke claims he did, i.e. head up to the entrance of 3712, wait for Fouke to drive off, head back down to Jackson, then on to the corner, then on to Maple?

Let’s keep one thing in mind: Fouke doesn’t actually claim that Z did this. He thought that this is what he did, it was – as he says – his reasoning that Z did this.

Ed Neil once offered a theory about what Z did that night which is very interesting in this context:

* Z is heading downhill as F/Z approach. He slows down, then pretends to enter 3712.
* As soon as it’s safe to move, he heads towards Spruce – where his car is parked.
* With F/Z somewhere on W Pacific (searching for Z, thinking he has headed for the park), Zodiac drives safely away (out on Jackson, out of the area, losing himself in traffic).

I find this plausible enough. It also explains why Z turns east on Jackson (rather than heading straight north on Cherry): He has no intention of reaching the park – his intention is to reach his car. It becomes even more plausible if we go with the idea that his original intention was to kill Stine at Wash/Maple, but that he was forced to go a block further west for whatever reason.

^^I guess it depends on which account you want to go by. No mention of a house on Jackson in his scratch…only the man turning onto Maple towards the park.

^^I guess it depends on which account you want to go by. No mention of a house on Jackson in his scratch…only the man turning onto Maple towards the park.

Fouke has explained this satisfactorily, though – at least for my money. When he received the amended description he realized that the man was attempting to fool him, i.e. pretending to enter the residence. Once it became clear to him that the guy was, in fact, the perpetrator he never consider the possibility of him actually entering said residence – it was an obvious ruse on his part, and his true intention was to escape into the park (going up Maple). There is no actual contradiction here, it’s just a matter of Fouke jumping straight to the park/Maple part without mentioning the ruse part.

One final point (for now) worth bringing up in this discussion: Pelissetti’s report.

Let’s assume that F/Z really did pull over and talk to Zodiac. What happens next? Well, there are different versions (which is a huge part of the problem here, in general, needless to say) but at some point Fouke does mention an encounter to Pelissetti, that seems clear enough. Does Pelissetti consider this encounter important? Clearly not, as it is not mentioned in his report – at all.

If F/Z had actually called the subject over (which is what Z later claims happened) and driven off in pursuit of a phantom NMA on his directions, I find it not only unlikely but impossible that this incident would have gone unmentioned in the report.

Which leaves us with some sort of conspiracy angle: Either Fouke decides, more or less on the spot, to lie about the true nature of the incident (making Zelms his accomplice) to Pelissetti – or Pelissetti for reasons unknown decides to join in and suppress the incident when writing up his report. Does that make sense? It may make some sense if everyone knows they’re dealing with Zodiac – but they don’t. It’s a routine murder, a cabbie mugging with a fatal outcome, nothing more. It is in that context this inexplicable conspiracy is born – not in the context of the Zodiac case.

^^I guess it depends on which account you want to go by. No mention of a house on Jackson in his scratch…only the man turning onto Maple towards the park.

Fouke has explained this satisfactorily, though – at least for my money. When he received the amended description he realized that the man was attempting to fool him, i.e. pretending to enter the residence. Once it became clear to him that the guy was, in fact, the perpetrator he never consider the possibility of him actually entering said residence – it was an obvious ruse on his part, and his true intention was to escape into the park (going up Maple). There is no actual contradiction here, it’s just a matter of Fouke jumping straight to the park/Maple part without mentioning the ruse part.

Still seems like something important he should have addressed…especially that night. There could have been some sort of clue left there. One never knows! With Fouke’s statement when referring to the investigators–"let them figure it out"…I can’t help but wonder why the animosity and apparent unwillingness to help in some respect.

With Fouke’s statement when referring to the investigators–"let them figure it out"…I can’t help but wonder why the animosity and apparent unwillingness to help in some respect.

Could be that he was – rightfully so – annoyed that they never even talked to him. The investigators, that is.

Let’s look at the know timeline in relation to this stuff:

Stine Killed 10/11
Zodiac mails Stine letter 10/13
Fouke dates his memo 11/12/69

When did they announce Z was Stine’s Killer? I can’t think of any good reason for Fouke to sit on this memo for a month,none at all

The only thing that makes sense is Zodiac’s letter about the 2 cops. For whatever reason, the scratch/memo was addressed apparently because of that letter. I can find no other explanation.