Really?

I think the only thing that truly draws us (in general) to the Zodiac case are his cryptic letters, ciphers and taunts.

He was intimately a coward killer who killed/attacked young adults in the simplest way possible (LB not withstanding). I mean….a cabbie? Defenseless couples?

He came and he went. Much worse sickos out there…he just knew how to get (and keep) the attention. Had he not written the letters, I’d don’t think we’d have bat an eye.

Hey Tahoe,

Just want be absolutely clear that I’m not a zodiac groupie. I think my post almost made it sound as if im condoning his vile acts. But you have to admit there is something obsessively fascinating about him. Why else are you on this forum trying to solve the case? Jack the Ripper supposedly wrote taunting letters too, but Zodiac took it to a whole other level. As sloppy as he was as a killer, he was a mastermind at writing teasing, enigmatic letters that just left people mind-boggled. Add to that the unsolved ciphers, the executioner’s getup, the crosshair symbol, the fact that his victims appear random, yet they have commonalities, the extreme changes in MO, the fact that the murders seemed to be nothing more than a means to an end (that end being collecting slaves or the secret thrill of his private infamy). Is he a psychopath with narcissistic personality disorder or was he a psychotic madman caught up in his delusion? I could go on. There is no end to this mystery. That his why I ache to know his name, to see his face (behind bars or in an electric chair, preferably).

Without meaning to devalue the lives they took, Zodiac and Jackie were tiny blips in the serial killer world. Their mystique stems from their elusive, taunting nature; the fact that they went uncaught despite the many cryptic (Zodiac) or gruesome clues (Jack) they deliberately left in their wake.

Both mysteries are infuriatingly fascinating, but if you put a gun to my head and asked me which one I found more so, I would say Zodiac. Nowhere else in the serial killer world do you get such an unrivalled look at a psychopath’s mindset, poured out onto paper, and yet still know so little about him.

Couldn’t have put it better myself, Nachtsider. Those letters, especially the later ones, are an incredibly haunting look inside the mind of a serial killer. I don’t think Thomas Harris himself could create a story as amazing and terrifying as the true story of this case.

Nowhere else in the serial killer world do you get such an unrivalled look at a psychopath’s mindset, poured out onto paper, and yet still know so little about him.

If most of it is bs though, you aren’t learning anything about him and ultimately that could be why we still know nothing.

The letters weren’t helpful in aiding in his apprehension. I’m sure they were designed to do the exact opposite. But I think they do offer insight into the mind of a serial killer. His allusions to Badlands, The Exoricist, Mikado, Dangerous Game, and a few old films that only a film buff with a taste for a very specific niche, hint at an intelligent man with an artistic, albeit slightly sadistic, sensibility. It makes you wonder if he was some kind of culture snob when he wasnt being a cold, sick savage. It’s stuff like that that fasinates me.

I’m not sure is a fair comparison. Then again I can see why it is one.

In many ways Zodiac is almost a progression from Jack the ripper in media terms. I think that comp would always have been made to any subsequent serial killer who communicated with the press. JTR was certainly the more gruesome of the two but then Z made up for that on the media side of things using that vehicle (no pun intended) to spread fear. JTR seemed to start going down that route but then nothing, Z on the other hand took a while to build up to it and it wasn’t until the Stine murder that he sent proof from one of the crime scenes.

I was interested in the JTR mystery before Zodiac but when I discovered Zodiac was real (watching the Exorcist 3 and wondering if there had been a real Gemini Killer, led me to Zodiac). The fact that he was real was interesting enough but once I had seen the scope of this guy’s communications including ciphers I was amazed that I’d actually never heard of him before. In retrospect of course I had seen his partial-legacy, Dirty Harry but it never occurred to me then to check, I was just a youngster then.

It is perhaps ironic that given Zodiac’s proclivity for self advertisement he probably is well less known globally than Jack the Ripper. I can’t say for sure but I think that in his time JTR stood out. Zodiac did too but at the cusp of the information age and I don’t think he had quite the impact that JTR had because there was always something on his heels to replace him (The Manson Family for ex.).

Zodiac made up for that in other ways though I feel so it’s pretty much swings and roundabouts between those two. Top of the pile certainly in the annals of serial killers and unfortunately the inspiration for other’s who followed their path.

As for the other varying comments regarding Z, his letter and their content, realistic or not, I still think back to when I made those graphics showing all the letters. He communicated a hell of a lot and it’s something that can be forgotten sometimes, certainly compared to other serial killers before him and it wasn’t just that, it was the variation as well. Irregardless of the accuracy of the content, the actions themselves say something, tell us something/s about him. Whether we accurately interpret that is another thing but I think we have a good go at it.

What some people may or may not know is that most and possibly all, especially the titular, Jack The Ripper letters most likely were not from the killer.

We tend to think the opposite with Z, but if you look at the total volume of Zodiac related material, that is probably true as well that most of it was not from the killer.

I personally tend to see it as more along the lines of coincidence than inspiration. Son of Sam had a lot more in common with the method and mindset of Zodiac than Jack, but as far as I know he has never made mention that he was even aware of the Zodiac case, much less inspired by it.

What some people may or may not know is that most and possibly all, especially the titular, Jack The Ripper letters most likely were not from the killer.

We tend to think the opposite with Z, but if you look at the total volume of Zodiac related material, that is probably true as well that most of it was not from the killer.

While there were plenty of hoax letters, I don’t doubt that any of the confirmed Zodiac letters was Zodiac’s work.

It’s not just the taunting letters and the ciphers for me. It’s everything about the case. True, if not for the letters and ciphers, we probably wouldn’t even have forums to discuss the case, but it’s amazing at how much information there is out there. The theories, the amount of suspects/POIs and all of the circumstancial things surrounding them. All the thing, big or small, that tie to one another. A person who knows absolutely nothing about the Zodiac could come to this board or another board, and spend months reading and every day read and learn about things they did not know beforehand. For me, I knew a little about the case but wasn’t all that interested. I work over night and sometimes the job gets boring. I was running out of things to watch on youtube, and not many people are on facebook to chat with at this hour of the day. So one night I google "Zodiac Killer" and that brought me to a couple of the message boards. I read for quite a few months before finally deciding to post. Now I find myself reading things on here 3-4 times a week, and still learn new things. It’s amazing. It may or may not have been a good way to kill time at work in the beginning, but now it is something I am very passionate about. I haven’t done nearly as much research and/or digging up new material as most on here. I am happy just reading the fine work that all of you folks have done. For those who are completely caught up in it, I’m not even sure if you realize the amazing things that you have done. Because of all of you, there are hundreds or maybe thousands of different ways you could view this case, and I thank you all for that! Please keep doing what you have been doing for so long.

I guess I could have made that shorter and just said that this is like reading a really good book or watching a great movie with more twists and turns than any other movie in history, but I’m dumb so deal with it!!

Another thing is that you can learn everything there is to learn about the JTR case in about an hour. I mean, there are never any new developing things going on with it. And like I said, I have been reading things about the Zodiac case for over a year now, and still find out things I did not know. There are still new pieces of information coming in. I think if the identities of both men were revealed at some point, they would be two completely types of people. But as far as the title of the thread, "zodiac vs jack the ripper," I have to say that Zodiac case is much more fascinating to me.

While there were plenty of hoax letters, I don’t doubt that any of the confirmed Zodiac letters was Zodiac’s work.

Most likely so. What I meant is that in the public perception of the JTR case the 23, or however many, letters are just seen as "The Jack The Ripper letters" and it doesn’t really matter that some of them are surely hoaxes, or even if all of them are. The fact that it’s possible the killer never even called himself Jack doesn’t effect the story for most people.

With the Zodiac on the other hand only the confirmed letters are part of the story and the public is not even aware that there were many hoax letters sent, because the the idea was to not publicize that and encourage it, contrary to JTR. It’s only through the dedicated work of researchers like Morf and Wilks that even we have seen some of them and they are generally dismissed as merely a side note in the case.

Yet the fact remains that people morbidly playing along with "the game" are part of both cases. That’s what I mean.

Nowhere else in the serial killer world do you get such an unrivalled look at a psychopath’s mindset, poured out onto paper, and yet still know so little about him.

If most of it is bs though, you aren’t learning anything about him and ultimately that could be why we still know nothing.

If Z is ever apprehended, or more realistically, posthumously identified, then the letters would really give us unrivalled insight into a psychopath’s mind. Right now, as it stands, we can’t decipher his bs from the truth, so they don’t teach us much, just, more or less leave us in a state of wonderment.