Good argument. Zodiac read the newspaper and took credit for crimes that he didn’t commit. He also copied and borrowed words and phrases from books, movies, operas and comic books, etc. Zodiac could have just been taking credit for Riverside or copying emulating CJB. And why didn’t he just stick with using a typewriter instead of handwriting his letters after allegedly moving from Riverside to the Bay Area?

I don’t know. But what about the timeline? Didn’t Zodiac mail the Little List letter before Avery discovered the Riverside connection? Your argument requires that Zodiac would have had to make the Riverside connection before Avery did. I guess it is possible…

Why didn’t he just use the same typewriter to type the address on the envelope instead of using such weird looking handwriting? I honestly cannot remember if addresses were ever typed or not.

And so we have some doubt. Is it reasonable? Maybe it is.

According to the site, "twitch" is the 15,284th most frequently used word, and count is only 1,305 for every 1 billion words.

"Twitching" is actually more common, and is the 11,989th most frequently used word, and count is 2,505 for every 1 billion words.

I have to work now, but somebody needs to count how many words are in The Confession Letter and all of the confirmed Zodiac Letters, and consider the statistical probability of this word appearing in both, and then misspelled the exact same way in both.
.

I like this approach, very logical. I agree that the similar features between the two letters are not likely coincidence — math is not my forte, but maybe I can take a general stab it it.

Now I love a good math question, but I don’t think this is one of them.

Frequency of word usage is kind of hard to mathematically break down. For instance "socket-wrench" would be a rare word in a letter, but the rarity depends on the subject matter. In a letter about hardware, that word would be more statistically prone than a letter about dogs. A word such as twitching, I would imagine, would be more prone in a medical letter, or even a dark letter describing a death, than another seemingly innocuous letter.

The misspelling angle does make it interesting to look at, but there are plenty of other misspelled words, too. I think this is an instance of a mathematical coincidence, given that it isn’t hard to believe a crazy person misspelled a word, and another crazy person misspelled the same word.

In the "Little List" letter, Z says: "I hope you do not think I was the one who wiped out that blue meannie with a bomb at the cop station. Even though I talked about killing school children with one. It just wouldn’t doo to move in on someone elses territory…"

So, we know he was aware of the exploits of other murderers, and "territory" refers to method, not region. Isn’t it quite possible Z was aware of the CJB case, and the attention the confession letter received?

If we find it easy to see the similarity between the Tim Holt reference to "By Knife," and that same phrase used on the LB car door and Halloween card (while not assuming Z must’ve been the writer of the TH comic book,) then wouldn’t it make sense that similarities between Riverside and Z could be explained by Z’s awareness of that case and its writings?

One other thing, somewhat random. Think of the time required to produce the 408 and 340 ciphers. Meticulous, painstaking work. If the objective was to produce the codes in neat, perfectly aligned rows and columns of symbols, while also disguising handwriting… why not use a typewriter? With upper and lower case letters, and the numbers and punctuation keys, there are plenty of symbols available on a typewriter. The guy who wrote the Riverside confession letter was familiar with typewriters and how to use them (how to disguise the type that is.) Since we know Z was able to get a different gun for each of his crimes, one would think obtaining a typewriter (or access to one) would not have been difficult.

I think I follow what you are saying, correct me I am wrong, so you think Zodiac, picked an obscure crime at the RCC Library 3 years before his crimes, and 6 hours south to copy? If so, why didn’t Z take credit for the RCC crime immediately and seize on all the attention once Avery published the connection? Instead, he waited months before responding. If he wanted to take credit for it, he would have taken advantage of it while it was fresh in the papers,not months later, which I think is what somebody would do who’s nervous that a big clue to their identity & background has been discovered,and waits months before he takes credit after he feels that his arrest is not imminent

Good argument. Zodiac read the newspaper and took credit for crimes that he didn’t commit. He also copied and borrowed words and phrases from books, movies, operas and comic books, etc. Zodiac could have just been taking credit for Riverside or copying emulating CJB. And why didn’t he just stick with using a typewriter instead of handwriting his letters after allegedly moving from Riverside to the Bay Area?

I don’t know. But what about the timeline? Didn’t Zodiac mail the Little List letter before Avery discovered the Riverside connection? Your argument requires that Zodiac would have had to make the Riverside connection before Avery did. I guess it is possible…

Why didn’t he just use the same typewriter to type the address on the envelope instead of using such weird looking handwriting? I honestly cannot remember if addresses were ever typed or not.

And so we have some doubt. Is it reasonable? Maybe it is.

Correction to my previous, it was the "My Name Is" letter where he says: "I hope you do not think I was the one who wiped out that blue meannie with a bomb at the cop station. Even though I talked about killing school children with one. It just wouldn’t doo to move in on someone elses territory…"

But, yes, I’m thinking he was aware of the CJB case when it happened. And, as you say, he copied quotes and phrases from several sources, so why not the chilling confession letter too?

By the way, I also think his above quote about not thinking it right to "move in on someone elses territory" could be a reference to LB. I don’t think LB was the work of Z; almost everything about that crime is different, including the descriptions of him. When he, shortly following LB, kills Paul, sends in a piece of shirt for absolute proof, and then distances himself from LB by reminding LE that he (Zodiac) is the same guy responsible for the killings in the north bay area, the possible implication is that he was spurred to action in PH because someone had moved in on his territory and he needed to regain control, and re-identify himself.

If LB was his doing, no need for him to mention the bay area (excluding Napa)… LE already knew who Zodiac was.

I think I follow what you are saying, correct me I am wrong, so you think Zodiac, picked an obscure crime at the RCC Library 3 years before his crimes, and 6 hours south to copy? If so, why didn’t Z take credit for the RCC crime immediately and seize on all the attention once Avery published the connection? Instead, he waited months before responding. If he wanted to take credit for it, he would have taken advantage of it while it was fresh in the papers,not months later, which I think is what somebody would do who’s nervous that a big clue to their identity & background has been discovered,and waits months before he takes credit after he feels that his arrest is not imminent

I’m not following you. The guy reads the papers, he reads about CJB, Manson, and other murder cases, and the sick nature of the confession letter happens to catch his eye. Something about the idea of killing someone and claiming credit publicly must’ve appealed to him, as that was what the whole Z persona was about.

I don’t think the CJB case, and its grisly confession letter, would be considered obscure to a person like Z. To the contrary I think that kind of thing is exactly what would’ve caught his attention, in a big way.

To your point, I don’t see what that has to do with taking credit/ not taking credit for Riverside. He quoted from The Mikado too, for instance, because it must’ve appealed to him.

As far as we know, PH is his grand finale, possibly because of the very close call, and the witness descriptions and sketch. Only after that, when he’s presumably too afraid to actually commit another Z murder, does he take credit for Kathleen Johns and "Riverside Activity," and it could very well be that his reason for doing so was to throw LE onto the wrong track.

But, yes, I’m thinking he was aware of the CJB case when it happened. And, as you say, he copied quotes and phrases from several sources, so why not the chilling confession letter too?

This is where the copycat theory falls apart in a big way.

Theories regarding a possible link between the Zodiac and Bates crimes did not appear in news reports until three month after the Zodiac had misspelled the same word in the same manner as the author of the “Confession.”

The Confession had not been published, even for years after the Riverside connection was made. As Smokie points out, he used similar wording and phrasing.

But, yes, I’m thinking he was aware of the CJB case when it happened. And, as you say, he copied quotes and phrases from several sources, so why not the chilling confession letter too?

This is where the copycat theory falls apart in a big way.

Theories regarding a possible link between the Zodiac and Bates crimes did not appear in news reports until three month after the Zodiac had misspelled the same word in the same manner as the author of the “Confession.”

The Confession had not been published, even for years after the Riverside connection was made. As Smokie points out, he used similar wording and phrasing.

From another thread:
viewtopic.php?f=79&t=511

Hi-

Don’t forget chickens and eggs. The Confession was published in the papers long before Z wrote his letters, so if Z was so influenced by the case he could have simply paid homage to that case by copying the writing style. "Squirm and twich" were already in the public record. In general, anything that was in the Confession letter was known by the public by 1969.

Mike

Not true. Only a photo of the confession was published. But it was pretty much unreadable.

No matter how you look at it, the idea that a Bay Area murder copied misspellings and wording from an obscure murder in Riverside 3 years after, but before the source was published, yet didn’t copy the typewriter – just in case someone made the connection? Do you really believe this is even possible and logical?

…I’m afraid to ask. Let the twisted logic begin!

Not true. Only a photo of the confession was published. But it was pretty much unreadable.

No matter how you look at it, the idea that a Bay Area murder copied misspellings and wording from an obscure murder in Riverside 3 years after, but before the source was published, yet didn’t copy the typewriter – just in case someone made the connection? Do you really believe this is even possible and logical?

…I’m afraid to ask. Let the twisted logic begin!

A reproduction was published in 1968.

You can view the article here:

http://www.zodiackiller.com/InsideDetective3.html

When the reporter re-wrote it, the correct spellings were used, but noted there were several misspelled words. I cannot speak for the one reproduced as it is blurry, but I think I know someone who can.

Frequency of word usage is kind of hard to mathematically break down. For instance "socket-wrench" would be a rare word in a letter, but the rarity depends on the subject matter. In a letter about hardware, that word would be more statistically prone than a letter about dogs. A word such as twitching, I would imagine, would be more prone in a medical letter, or even a dark letter describing a death, than another seemingly innocuous letter.

The misspelling angle does make it interesting to look at, but there are plenty of other misspelled words, too. I think this is an instance of a mathematical coincidence, given that it isn’t hard to believe a crazy person misspelled a word, and another crazy person misspelled the same word.

I agree to some extent. Let’s say we have a huge 450 billion English word corpus to work with, a massive library of books, magazines, etc. And we randomly pick sections with as many words as the Confession Letter, and sections with as many words as all of Zodiac’s "confirmed" letters. We would have to pick quite a large number of sample pairs to find ones that each have the word "twitch" in them. I agree that this is not a perfect way to describe this situation. You comments about context are valuable. If we were to take random selections from books about murder, then our odds of picking ones that both include the word "twitch" may go up! And that’s not exactly analogous to what we are talking about either. It’s not a perfect math problem, but it is definitely a probability issue.

However, people also have their own individual writing styles and vocabularies. And those styles and vocabularies change over time as we get more and more educated, or possibly in some cases more and more delusional from mental health issues. So take that into account when deciding whether it is more likely than not that Zodiac wrote the Confession Letter.

Doctor1 argues coincidence, and Marshall argues copycat. I argue that it was probably the same dude. That’s where I am putting the goalpost for my argument: Probably.

And given that we have two situations where an unknown person brutally kills college age women, sometimes with gun and sometimes with knife, and send anonymous letters to newspapers, in the same State, within a few years of each other, describing the murders and including fantasies about human mutilation, making threats and demanding that the letter be published, that isn’t quite enough to get to probably. We have dissimilarities, like typewriter versus pen. Big knife versus little knife. And different handwriting on the envelopes.

But you have this:

BUT I SHALL CUT OFF HER FEMALE PARTS AND DEPOSIT THEM FOR THE WHOLE CITY TO SEE. SO DON’T MAKE IT TO EASY FOR ME. KEEP YOUR SISTERS, DAUGHTERS, AND WIVES OFF THE STREETS AND ALLEYS. MISS BATES WAS STUPID. SHE WENT TO THE SLAUGHTER LIKE A LAMB. SHE DID NOT PUT UP A STRUGGLE. BUT I DID. IT WAS A BALL. . . . SHE WENT VERY WILLINGLY. HER BREAST FELT VERY WARM AND FIRM UNDER MY HANDS, BUT ONLY ONE THING WAS ON MY MIND. MAKING HER PAY FOR THE BRUSH OFFS THAT SHE HAD GIVEN ME DURING THE YEARS PRIOR. SHE DIED HARD. SHE SQUIRMED AND SHOOK AS I CHOAKED HER, AND HER LIPS TWICHED. . . . BUT THAT WILL NOT STOP THE GAME. THIS LETTER SHOULD BE PUBLISHED FOR ALL TO READ IT.

And you have this:

Some I shall tie over ant hills and watch them scream + twich and squirm. Others shall have pine splinters driven under their nails + then burned. Others shall be placed in cages + fed salt beef untill they are gorged then I shall listen to their pleass for water and I shall laugh at them. Others will hang by their thumbs + burn in the sun then I will rub them down with deep heat to warm them up. Others I shall skin them alive + let them run around screaming. And all billiard players I shall have them play in a darkened dungen cell with crooked cues + Twisted Shoes. Yes I shall have great fun inflicting the most delicious of pain to my slaves

Coincidence I argue probably not. Same as Zodiac writing the Confession Letter and other CJB letters but not having killed her. Probably not. Copycat? Only if Zodiac had access to the text and was reading Southern California newspapers and remembered and copied that after a period of three years.

It was probably the same dude, and we know that because of the writing style. Using these words together in the same sentence, and with the misspelling, that would be unlikely. You might be able to get to reasonable doubt, but the facts do not support an argument that Zodiac probably did not kill Cheri Jo and write the Confession Letter. I am saying that to support an argument of why we should pursue someone with ties to Riverside, we don’t have to win the argument of beyond a reasonable doubt. We just have to win the argument that the facts weigh in favor of probably instead of probably not.

A reproduction was published in 1968.

You can view the article here:

http://www.zodiackiller.com/InsideDetective3.html

When the reporter re-wrote it, the correct spellings were used, but noted there were several misspelled words. I cannot speak for the one reproduced as it is blurry, but I think I know someone who can.

Thanks!

I find it very interesting that the newspaper corrected the spelling errors.

O.k., so it is possible that Zodiac, living in the Bay Area, read this article, saved it, killed some people a couple of years later, and then, after writing about a dozen letters, includes some of the same words because he liked to copy stuff, and coincidentally, misspelled with "twich" the exact same way that the author of the Confession Letter misspelled with "twich," even though the newpaper corrected the spelling! But it is highly improbable.

It is far more likely that it was the same dude.

This is a copy of the actual confession letter from the FBI files. FWIW, in addition to already noted spelling errors, I think it says "VICTOM". We discussed this a while back somewhere in a confession letter thread.

A reproduction was published in 1968.

You can view the article here:

http://www.zodiackiller.com/InsideDetective3.html

When the reporter re-wrote it, the correct spellings were used, but noted there were several misspelled words. I cannot speak for the one reproduced as it is blurry, but I think I know someone who can.

Thanks!

I find it very interesting that the newspaper corrected the spelling errors.

O.k., so it is possible that Zodiac, living in the Bay Area, read this article, saved it, killed some people a couple of years later, and then, after writing about a dozen letters, includes some of the same words because he liked to copy stuff, and coincidentally, misspelled with "twich" the exact same way that the author of the Confession Letter misspelled with "twich," even though the newpaper corrected the spelling! But it is highly improbable.

It is far more likely that it was the same dude.

I don’t know…

If Zodiac was into quoting and/or using other writings, etc., it would not surprise me if he copied the tone of the Confession letter.

This was in a magazine. True Detective. Sick stuff in those magazines and could be something Zodiac looked at regularly.

Also, if you take other things into consideration, there is a lot more that is NOT like Zodiac. Talking about her breast feeling warm? Focused on girls. Why did this not continue, but the similar tone did?

Psychos admire other psychos.

I find it very interesting that the newspaper corrected the spelling errors.

O.k., so it is possible that Zodiac, living in the Bay Area, read this article, saved it, killed some people a couple of years later, and then, after writing about a dozen letters, includes some of the same words because he liked to copy stuff, and coincidentally, misspelled with "twich" the exact same way that the author of the Confession Letter misspelled with "twich," even though the newpaper corrected the spelling! But it is highly improbable.

It is far more likely that it was the same dude.

Here is a much clearer version (thanks to Seagull having the actual magazine) and you can see in the reproduction letter, it is spelled "twiched".

I stand corrected above. It was not True Detective, but Inside Detective. It is also mentioned in this article, the Confession letter was re-printed in the "Riverside Enterprise"…which was obviously prior to this magazine article printed in November of 1968.

Since this thread is very active I just wanted to post that I just drove to Washington & Cherry Street for the very first time and it’s much smaller than any movie or picture perception. Those kids who saw the crime were up extremely close, it’s basically like looking out your front window and seeing what’s happening on your own sidewalk.

Have Those kids ever seen pictures of the known suspects ?