Who’s to say. If you look at possibilities, as far a suspects in the "out in the country" murders, the list is endless. The RCC murder of Ms. Bates, is a Clue, type of scenario . You have a finite number of people who could be suspects at this location. A sort of, Colonel Mustard in the parlor with the candlestick. An individual who was arrested for bring naked in a phone booth, etc., is certainly a viable suspect, to say the least.
Certainly, Ross is a fine candidate to look into. But even if Cheri Jo knew her attacker, it could have been any local man i.e. a fellow student we don’t know of, or an acquaintance stalking her that day – a neighbour, a customer of the bank she worked at, the guy at the gas station, someone from church etc. etc.
The Cluedo analogy sorta represents what is problematic about online sleuthing. We have maybe 100 names or so in the various LE reports, Darlene’s address book, and some known killers of a similar type to Z… and then it’s a case of pin the tail on the "best" donkey from these 100 named persons. Odds are that Z is one of the thousands of names we are not aware of.
So, while we might say that this-or-that guy is very interesting, or the best of the available names, and take a deeper look… it is best to proceed with caution. That’s why some of us find it uncomfortable that relatives are being contacted/harassed by any number of Z forum "researchers".
Certainly, Ross is a fine candidate to look into. But even if Cheri Jo knew her attacker, it could have been any local man i.e. a fellow student we don’t know of, or an acquaintance stalking her that day – a neighbour, a customer of the bank she worked at, the guy at the gas station, someone from church etc. etc.
The Cluedo analogy sorta represents what is problematic about online sleuthing. We have maybe 100 names or so in the various LE reports, Darlene’s address book, and some known killers of a similar type to Z… and then it’s a case of pin the tail on the "best" donkey from these 100 named persons. Odds are that Z is one of the thousands of names we are not aware of.
So, while we might say that this-or-that guy is very interesting, or the best of the available names, and take a deeper look… it is best to proceed with caution. That’s why some of us find it uncomfortable that relatives are being contacted/harassed by any number of Z forum "researchers".
Very well said.
I understand the catch-22 style problem here, be it said: Ross is interesting because there is a connection there, as far as Bates goes (not as far as anything else goes, though). I personally think the killer may have known Bates far better, so to speak, than she knew him (a stalker-ish sort of acquaintance), and Ross fits that bill very well. But there’s not enough evidence – the extent of his relationship with her remains a matter of conjecture at this point, and the most obvious way to obtain more information seems to be to get something more out of his relatives.
But I am very uncomfortable with what you refer to above. If we look at this from his relatives’ perspective, Ross was a troubled individual who was questioned in connection with Bates’ murder – but who was cleared because he had an alibi. And who can’t presently be connected to the canonical Z murders at all.
It seems that some are simply assuming RPD didn’t do their job well enough, or that Ross – a very vague notion which doesn’t seem to be based on anything at all – either threatened someone into providing an alibi for him, or was shielded by his family. There’s no evidence of this, however, and the latter notion is a serious accusation which hardly – you’d think – makes his relatives more sympathetic to the cause.
We don’t know enough – and that’s a shame. But at this point I can’t fault his family for not helping out. I’m not trying discredit the efforts of honest researchers here, just trying to look at this from the family’s perspective. It may seem obvious to us that the effort to dig up more information about Ross is 100% legitimate – but that isn’t necessarily the case from their perspective.
Also, think about this idea. Would the Zodiac go 41 years without some form of correspondence? Unless he went totally insane and died, a relatively short time after the 1974 letters.
Personally, for me, I can’t see Z if he was still alive, not coming out and breaking his silence mentioning the movies and books about himself. I don’t buy that the Zodiac changed, was cured, etc. I think if he was alive,or not imprisoned, he would have broken his silence. I think he died after that last 1974 letter
Take a look at this JTR doc, at 29 min in. They talk about how serial killers don’t stop unless they are forced to by some other reason, like incarceration or death.
This is a good video. They never stop.
For me personally I agree, contacting Family Members is a last resort. For some Suspects, there’s a wealth of info out there to be found without needing to contact a Relative.
I also don’t think these Family Members should be harassed. If you reach out to them and they don’t reply, respect that and don’t bother them again.
At the same time, justice for the Victims is paramount. I’m sorry if a few feathers have to be ruffled along the way. All I know for sure is that Zodiac is linked to the RCC library. Ross was in that library(the only Suspect that can be linked there)and Ross looked identical to the sketch. We have A and Z for Ross, we just need B to Y.
Before any of us really knew Ross, many of us thought Z may have only written letters in the Bates case and not killed Cheri. That could still be the case if Ross was Z. He could still be z and not have killed Cheri
There is more than one way to lose your life to a killer
http://www.zodiackillersite.com/
http://zodiackillersite.blogspot.com/
https://twitter.com/Morf13ZKS
Family gather the wagons in a circle. Nobody gets in. That’s a natural reaction from kin to these murderers. They don’t want anybody to find out it was their father, brother, cousin, or son.
It seems that quite a few of the people involved in the Riverside case were draft dodgers. The idea of this one going to Canada, and that one going to Canada. The reason that was done was to evade the draft.
Like the sheriff in the movie, Race with the Devil, said, "First they smoke their shat, then up their noses, then in their arms". He was trying to make scapegoats out of the hippies, and blame them for the troubles.
It seems that quite a few of the people involved in the Riverside case were draft dodgers. The idea of this one going to Canada, and that one going to Canada. The reason that was done was to evade the draft.
You are making assumptions but if one were to leave the country to evade the draft one could also assume they did so because they did not want to be put in the position of having to kill a person, even in the time of war.
It seems that quite a few of the people involved in the Riverside case were draft dodgers. The idea of this one going to Canada, and that one going to Canada. The reason that was done was to evade the draft.
You are making assumptions but if one were to leave the country to evade the draft one could also assume they did so because they did not want to be put in the position of having to kill a person, even in the time of war.
I know all about it. They had an episode on All in the Family, about this subject. Archie thought his friend, who recently had his son killed in Vietnam, would hate Meethead’s friend who was a draft dodger. The opposite occurred, and Archie’s friend wished his son had gone to Canada, rather than die in Southeast Asia, for a cause that was long forgotten.
It was one of the best episodes of Archie, along with the show featuring Sammy Davis JR
I guess I can’t help being a liberal, growing up in the 1960’s and 1970’s. Yeah, I plant flowers that attract butterflies.
Nothing like being educated by Archie Bunker! 
“…they may be dealing with one or more ersatz Zodiacs–other psychotics eager to get into the act, or perhaps even other murderers eager to lay their crimes at the real Zodiac’s doorstep.“ L.A. Times, 1969
In the video by Paul, there is a police officer in the film who comments to the news reporter that the suspect was around 6’2" tall, with reddish hair and a widows peak. Why are there so many dis rioting? You know who the cop was describing.
In the video by Paul, there is a police officer in the film who comments to the news reporter that the suspect was around 6’2" tall, with reddish hair and a widows peak. Why are there so many descriptions? You know who the cop was describing.
In the video by Paul, there is a police officer in the film who comments to the news reporter that the suspect was around 6’2" tall, with reddish hair and a widows peak. Why are there so many dis rioting? You know who the cop was describing.
Who would that be? AFAIK the only police officer who actually saw the suspect in either the Bates or Z cases, was Don Fouke (well, apart from Zelms, but he was never interviewed) and he never had him as tall as that.
