I have never subscribed to the fact Zodiac was unlucky with women or love, hence he took his rage out on couples and saved his greatest resentment for women.

Oh, I don’t know about that, Spy.

The fact that he identified with the Lord High Executioner, whose job it was to execute adulterous or fornicating couples, is quite telling, I feel.

That is an interesting and noteworthy observation, that deserves analysis, but it is not a fact, none of us can truly state his mind and thoughts, we can only conjecture.

This is a copy I posted on Zodiackillerfacts.com back in Nov 2010, the threads topic was "Zodiac’s Psychology", so there are several other people giving their take on the topic

http://www.zodiackillerfacts.com/forum/ … ?f=9&t=956

Here is a list, in random order, of personality traits that I believe probably fit the Zodiac killer.

Most of all; a contradictory personality

psychopathic
polite
ironic
sarcastic
self-absorbed
self pity
bold
theatrical
inventive
fantasy junky
cold hearted
cordial
careful
sadistic
intelligent
sly
intellectual
educated apperance
humorous
cool
calm
controled
exstream, but surpressed, anger
hypersensitive
revengeful
depressive
arrogant
Narcissistic
patient
felt belittled
intriquant
thrill seaking
nervous
competitive
imaginative
love/hate feelings towards woman, probably towards people in general.
artistic
feeling lonely & detached

And here is a copy of a post I posted in August 2009 over at zodiackiller.com, it was a thread concerning;
"what is the one thing about Zodiac that you feel most confident about"

My contribution was:

I am convinced that Zodiac had a rule nr 1.

To be a big time PARADOX.
To mix and change every move he made as the Zodiac Killer, in order to confuse people and of course LE and their investigation:

Here are some examples I have noticed:

Changed modus operandi

Changed type of victims

Changed weapons (even change his guns/calibers)

Changed murder locations , LE Counties

Bad spelling/good spelling

Bad gramma/good gramma

Sloppy unmature handwriting/organized mature handwriting

On one hand give impression of low education/ on other hand indicate/refere to probable extensive knowledge in arts/intellectual/religious issues

Refere to several contradicting religious beliefs like Christianity/ hedonistic beliefs

Evil & scary attitude/polite, cheerful & nice attitude

Powerful and coldhearted attitude/ express weakness like lonelyness & unhappyness

Very informative & communicative about his actions / succeded in being exstremly enigmatic

Name himself Zodiac and sign with crosshair symbol/ add new symbol (HC card) as his signature, and at other letters sign himself as "A Citizen" and "The Red Phantom"

Victims and murder location ect. are not connected to celebrity community / refere to (even directly address) several celebrities in his communications (indicating possible connection to celeb comuntiy)

And…

I have no doubt, whatsoever, that Zodiac did NOT suffer from any kind of insanity, and that include that I beleive that he was NOT psychotic in any way.

I have never subscribed to the fact Zodiac was unlucky with women or love, hence he took his rage out on couples and saved his greatest resentment for women. In his first letter to the San Francisco Chronicle he stated ‘ I will cruse around all weekend killing lone people in the night then move on to kill again, until I end up with a dozen people over the weekend’. Here was an early suggestion that he was quite prepared to target anyone, as it transpired with the murder of Paul stine,

UK If you read the first letter Zodiac sent to the Vallejo times he wrote ‘I will go on a kill rampage fry night that will last the whole weekend.i will cruse around and pick off all stray people or coupples that are alone’ He took out the word couples in his other two versions of the first three letters.

My take is if you are inclined to kill people, you probably don’t have any special place in your heart for love and compassion. Whatever set him off set him off and he went after easy targets.

That’s my take on it too. He went after targets he could attack with relative ease, in locations that allowed him to escape with relative ease.This is a – if not THE – common denominator in all his known crimes.

I’m not much for psychology – I’ll leave that to others more qualified to comment. But for my money he didn’t necessarily deeply resent his victims either individually or as types. He hardly seems interested in them, based on what he writes about his crimes. Very detached, matter-of-fact – as though they meant nothing to him beyond being extras in whatever script he was following. Which indicates that he was a deeply disturbed individual devoid of empathy – what people often call a psychopath. And such individuals aren’t easy to recognize right away in daily life. My guess – based on nothing solid – is that he wouldn’t have appeared positively suspect in any way to most people who knew him. That said, I doubt many people really knew him. He wouldn’t have been someone with a bunch of close friends.

I really think that the letters indicate someone who is probably quite pathetic in real life. Someone who needed to feel the power he lacked in his daily life. A man who had a family or an ongoing relationship or had some sort of satisfactory employment wouldn’t make such grandiose claims, IMO. He is trying to fill a void in his life. And that rightward slanting print on the door and the early letters- depression. He tried to so hard to scare yet all his crimes were low-risk. Shooting on a dark lonely road, after people are tied up, shooting a cabbie in the back. He wasn’t some brazen Ted Bundy type, charming people into his car. He didn’t have that kind of charm. His crimes were really quite pathetic if you look at them closely. Just terribly cowardly, and then the letters amping up the fear from a distance- he was a "from a distance" sort because he didn’t have the guts or the necessary drive to do anything but the most cowardly of crimes. If he had murdered all his victims with a knife I wouldn’t be saying this. He wasn’t even trying to scare Hartnell and Sheppard. It seemed he was trying to set them at ease. His hands were shaking. He was pathologically unsure of himself, had to prop himself up with letters and code.

He could have easily worked as a surveyor and was definitely an outdoorsman to some degree.

Since Tahoe discovered that Tim Holt comic cover that really got my mind going on his psychology. He seems quite adolescent in some ways, quite locked into some super-villan archetype. I think he used all the occult symbols and such just to make himself appear scarier. There is some very immature element in his personality that quite fits with, say, a child molester. I have spent alot of time reading over these documents prepared by the National Center for Missing and Murdered Children about the psychology of the child molester and this arrested development, preferring to be around younger people, and submersion in adolescent fantasy certainly fits the pathetic picture of Z. Of course the grooming aspect might be missing, or not- the charm necessary to have children trust you. Like when the cops come visit you at your trailer in Santa Rosa and you wave them in with a phalanx of schoolkids on their bikes.
I think the sort of person who couldn’t hold a relationship with an adult and preferred the easier prey of children seems in keeping with the idea of Z as an ineffectual loser. Not pushing my own suspect theory here, but it makes sense from a psych standpoint.

To be a big time PARADOX.
To mix and change every move he made as the Zodiac Killer, in order to confuse people and of course LE and their investigation:

Here are some examples I have noticed:

Changed modus operandi

Changed type of victims

Changed weapons (even change his guns/calibers)

Changed murder locations , LE Counties

Bad spelling/good spelling

Bad gramma/good gramma

Sloppy unmature handwriting/organized mature handwriting

On one hand give impression of low education/ on other hand indicate/refere to probable extensive knowledge in arts/intellectual/religious issues

Refere to several contradicting religious beliefs like Christianity/ hedonistic beliefs

Evil & scary attitude/polite, cheerful & nice attitude

Powerful and coldhearted attitude/ express weakness like lonelyness & unhappyness

Very informative & communicative about his actions / succeded in being exstremly enigmatic

Name himself Zodiac and sign with crosshair symbol/ add new symbol (HC card) as his signature, and at other letters sign himself as "A Citizen" and "The Red Phantom"

Victims and murder location ect. are not connected to celebrity community / refere to (even directly address) several celebrities in his communications (indicating possible connection to celeb comuntiy)

And…

I have no doubt, whatsoever, that Zodiac did NOT suffer from any kind of insanity, and that include that I beleive that he was NOT psychotic in any way.

Really thoughtful post, and dead on the money I bet. The most intriguing and tantalizing aspects of the case are his evolution and his seemingly paradoxical personality. Just to add, there’s the "help me im drowning" letter to Belli vs. the "I am in total control" letter. I would also go out on a limb and bet that in his everyday life he was very vocal against violent crime.

To be a big time PARADOX.
To mix and change every move he made as the Zodiac Killer, in order to confuse people and of course LE and their investigation:

Here are some examples I have noticed:

Changed modus operandi

Changed type of victims

Changed weapons (even change his guns/calibers)

Changed murder locations , LE Counties

Bad spelling/good spelling

Bad gramma/good gramma

Sloppy unmature handwriting/organized mature handwriting

On one hand give impression of low education/ on other hand indicate/refere to probable extensive knowledge in arts/intellectual/religious issues

Refere to several contradicting religious beliefs like Christianity/ hedonistic beliefs

Evil & scary attitude/polite, cheerful & nice attitude

Powerful and coldhearted attitude/ express weakness like lonelyness & unhappyness

Very informative & communicative about his actions / succeded in being exstremly enigmatic

Name himself Zodiac and sign with crosshair symbol/ add new symbol (HC card) as his signature, and at other letters sign himself as "A Citizen" and "The Red Phantom"

Victims and murder location ect. are not connected to celebrity community / refere to (even directly address) several celebrities in his communications (indicating possible connection to celeb comuntiy)

And…

I have no doubt, whatsoever, that Zodiac did NOT suffer from any kind of insanity, and that include that I beleive that he was NOT psychotic in any way.

Really thoughtful post, and dead on the money I bet. The most intriguing and tantalizing aspects of the case are his evolution and his seemingly paradoxical personality. Just to add, there’s the "help me im drowning" letter to Belli vs. the "I am in total control" letter. I would also go out on a limb and bet that in his everyday life he was very vocal against violent crime.

VERY interesting observation, joe. I’d be willing to stand out on that limb too. And I am leaning heavily myself towards Foreigner’s thought about Z NOT being a psychopath, nor insane. Too organized to be schizophrenic, too eager to discourse about his crimes to be a psychopath.

Don’t you think its funny that the Melvin Belli letter is SO NEATLY WRITTEN? Not his natural hand that I think he presented in the first few letters. But the MB letter is terribly neat. And this belies the content. He’s saying he’s out of control, yet is managing to write in the most concise way- certainly more concise than previously. I don’t think he was out of control at all, which means he was just playing up to MB, knowing that MB was presenting as a very empathetic person towards the killer and being that Belli was a born peacock, he would NOT be shutting up any time soon. MB was practically offering to shine Z’s shoes for him on the "Jim Dunbar Show". I bet something like that would never happen today- but I digress.
He just knew that Belli was somebody he could wring alot more press out of. I think the emotion is totally fake in that letter. If it were bonafide, his writing would reflect that. It makes no sense on any level that a person who is spiraling out of control would take such care. Funny thing is- Belli had the same motivation to get involved with Z. They were BOTH in it for the press, and the glory.

I have really been trying to work out in my mind where Z fits and I have to say that I have as yet stumbled upon any case like this. I have been looking at sniper profiles, psychopath profiles, all sorts of subsects and he simply doesn’t have a peer. Look at guys like Dahmer- Bundy- Gacy- the Night Stalker- those guys are actually easier to pin down, psychologically. They have sexual mutilation, lack of control, sadistic compulsion, things that are really quite typical of killers these days. Z, where does he fit? The closest case I can find is Son of Sam, and while they both killed from afar, killed couples, and wrote letters, they couldn’t be more different. SoS was all about the APPROVAL. He wanted to be noticed. Look at how happy he appears when they arrest him. He really felt like he struck the big time, that people would want to talk to him, he would finally be important. I bet if Z were around at that time to watch the news he would have spit at the TV. He is far more canny, controlled, and far more intelligent than Berkowitz.
The Texarkana Moonlight Murders are another peer. And he was ALSO never caught.
Jack the Ripper is someone that I often forget as being someone Z was DEFINITELY interested in, its the biggest influence in terms of his writing the press. And there is that same jovial cunning that Jack displayed in his letters- some of which are arguably fake, mind you, but Jack was at least literate, able to write a letter, and was certainly taunting the police by letter and even mailed in a kidney to the police. Its telling that z didn’t have the guts for such ghoulishness, and instead tore off a shirt-of a dead cabbie he had shot in the back on a dark street.
Z is, as foreigner said, made up of so many disparate qualities that it drives you nuts. He is by turns meticulous, then disorganized.
Bundy, guys like him, as much as people make a ton out of his "supposed" good looks and great charm, is NOT a rare bird. Sexual mutilations and the like are as common as dirt. Z stands alone. Look at the fools that copied him- that guy in New York was just a space cake. None of the cunning that Z displayed.
The frightening thing about guys that do it for the thrills is that they are FAR more likely to stop killing, have longer cooling off periods than guys who are driven by a compulsion like Dahmer. Since Z’s motivation was not sexual (despite his rather pathetic "its better than getting your rocks off with a girl" which sounds contrived to me, like he’s trying to man up- and he wrote it in CODE) he isn’t as compelled. He can stop killing, he can have a family, he can seem somewhat normal. This is well known now about thrill killers. Which means he could have stopped killing, and never started back, and simply wrote letters to get the power he had firmly established- the fear net had been cast and now everyone was on tinterhooks and probably would stay that way for a great while. He had accomplished the Fear. And then he retreated. And he could right now be chilling out on his balcony with his grandkids. This is a distinct possibility, from a psychological perspective.

I had always suspected he would be someone who voiced strong concern about violent crime. That is why I became so intrigued by Kjell Qvale’s letter to the Chronicle in which he scapegoats that very publication’s murder glorification for the rise in violent crime. He even uses the words "concerned" and "citizen" in the first paragraph. Sound Familiar? The Badlands’ letter comes across as more tongue in cheek, but it’s the same theme.

This is a guy who went out of his way not to be pinned down, that is why I too have a hard time believing he was psychotic.

He has been compared to BTK, and to some degree I can buy that, but the thing that is missing with Z is the sadistic component. He killed, he binded, but no torturing. He resembles SoS a little, on the surface, but I find DB to be somewhat insane. Moreover, his letters have none of the droll wit and clever tone of Z’s correspondence.

Thanks, mysterymachine. I sometimes wonder if I’m adding anything to the discussion or if I’m even on the same page as most other posters.

I had always suspected he would be someone who voiced strong concern about violent crime. That is why I became so intrigued by Kjell Qvale’s letter to the Chronicle in which he scapegoats that very publication’s murder glorification for the rise in violent crime. He even uses the words "concerned" and "citizen" in the first paragraph. Sound Familiar? The Badlands’ letter comes across as more tongue in cheek, but it’s the same theme.

This is a guy who went out of his way not to be pinned down, that is why I too have a hard time believing he was psychotic.

He has been compared to BTK, and to some degree I can buy that, but the thing that is missing with Z is the sadistic component. He killed, he binded, but no torturing. He resembles SoS a little, on the surface, but I find DB to be somewhat insane. Moreover, his letters have none of the droll wit and clever tone of Z’s correspondence.

Thanks, mysterymachine. I sometimes wonder if I’m adding anything to the discussion or if I’m even on the same page as most other posters.

Honestly if you examine other cases trying to find something like Z you get nowhere. I find this really, really unusual. He’s a thrill killer and of course sadism isn’t often a component of that- he’s far smarter than most killers- he’s probably on the level of Ed Kemper or Ian Brady. Yet he is probably nothing like those guys. Z probably really wouldn’t have killed children- it was the FEAR he wanted. He didn’t mutilate- in fact, compared to some, his killings are pretty banal in and of themselves. No sexual component, unless he had a thing for guns and his sexual pathology played into weaponry- the more I look through the history of murder the more bizarre he seems, and the most inscrutable. He seems to hover just out of the reach of our understanding.
no problem joe- i think the mulling over of these things is essential to the case.

I have a different take on Z. I think it was actually two people. One "writer", one "killer". They were probably gay and a couple. The writer was definitely in charge, persuasive, possibly a narcissist, definitely egotistical. He was very domineering in the relationship and had total control over his partner. I think he was a journalist or writer in his vocational life. He worked for a newspaper or possibly a magazine but held a very lowly position and never quite succeeded in getting his work into print. I believe the writing he did as zodiac was contrived and intentionally dumbed down. All spelling mistakes were intentional and possibly bad spelling was a pet peeve of his. I think he was of average intelligence. He was driven by ego but due to his lack of success and recognition, he thrived on the control of his partner and eventually, media and law enforcement. The killing was never the motivation, only a means to an end. Namely his byline in the paper.
I think they probably travelled to the murder scenes together. The killer side of this relationship was probably very meek and timid with below average intelligence. Possibly a drug addict. Definitely under the control of the writer and only received the attention of his partner after he carried out his wishes. I think the killer side of this pair probably died in the early 70s or was commited to incarceration of some sort due to either mental problems or criminal activities.

Talon, I think you’re on your own with that theory. While there is evidence to support more than one person being involved, the rest of what you say is just wild speculation. Maybe your homophobia is clouding your judgement. Moreover, when it comes to serial killers, they usually kill their own kind.

I have a different take on Z. I think it was actually two people. One "writer", one "killer". They were probably gay and a couple. The writer was definitely in charge, persuasive, possibly a narcissist, definitely egotistical. He was very domineering in the relationship and had total control over his partner. I think he was a journalist or writer in his vocational life. He worked for a newspaper or possibly a magazine but held a very lowly position and never quite succeeded in getting his work into print. I believe the writing he did as zodiac was contrived and intentionally dumbed down. All spelling mistakes were intentional and possibly bad spelling was a pet peeve of his. I think he was of average intelligence. He was driven by ego but due to his lack of success and recognition, he thrived on the control of his partner and eventually, media and law enforcement. The killing was never the motivation, only a means to an end. Namely his byline in the paper.
I think they probably travelled to the murder scenes together. The killer side of this relationship was probably very meek and timid with below average intelligence. Possibly a drug addict. Definitely under the control of the writer and only received the attention of his partner after he carried out his wishes. I think the killer side of this pair probably died in the early 70s or was commited to incarceration of some sort due to either mental problems or criminal activities.

Seems that with such a passive and weak participant he would have betrayed himself in some way. I don’t rule it out entirely, but it seems there is ample evidence this was a one man show.

Talon, I think you’re on your own with that theory. While there is evidence to support more than one person being involved, the rest of what you say is just wild speculation. Maybe your homophobia is clouding your judgement. Moreover, when it comes to serial killers, they usually kill their own kind.

Joedetective, I’m not convinced your "homophobic" accusation is warranted, here. I don’t know what would make a gay couple any less likely than a straight one (or platonic friends, for that matter) to murder in collusion — unlikely under any circumstance, of course.

I wonder if Talon is referring loosely to a certain couple of SF characters who were the subject of some taping that was done..