Thanks for your full-blown bitch, UK! Maybe the word will get around to future producers of Zodiac documentaries that they’d be wise to consult Morf & Associates.

It is frustrating UK. Sometimes I think people create this stuff based off of how THEY think it happened. Can you image some of the documentaries we would have off some of the cockamamie theories out there? Yike!

Thanks for your full-blown bitch, UK! Maybe the word will get around to future producers of Zodiac documentaries that they’d be wise to consult Morf & Associates.

It’s that time of the month Dag, I’ve calmed down now.

It’s quite good for a first rant UK. You’ll get better at it … or angrier lol.

The ‘consultant’ thing was done Dag by David Fincher when making ‘Zodiac’ so that’s some progress at least. I think we assume that because something is a ‘documentary’ rather than a movie that it is factual. Sadly not the case. The phrases to look out for or just have in mind are "Based On" – Based on a true story, based on actual events, based on actual case files and ‘dramatization’.

It is frustrating UK. Sometimes I think people create this stuff based off of how THEY think it happened. Can you image some of the documentaries we would have off some of the cockamamie theories out there? Yike!

Yes. I can imagine it unfortunately.

Note: Maybe I should have started a new thread for this post because it contains both errors that I seen on the show and interesting and factual comments made by some of the participants, especially profiler O’Toole.

I don’t see a thread for the "Very Scary People" documentary. But I’m going through and looking at the errors in that docu. One of the things is this Dr Casey Jordan. Why did she do so much mugging for the camera? My goodness. About the Blue Rock Springs murder she says that the two similar attacks had the police worried that there might be something far more sinister going on. By the time they knew that there were two sets of related murders Zodiac had already linked the lake Herman Road and Blue Rock Springs murders together for them with the phone call, so they knew that there was something sinister was going on lol. Zodiac didn’t give them a chance to think about it LOL.

Right after that Butterfield says that these are "blitz" attacks. I worked with one of the top profilers in the world and he said that blitz attacks are the product of disorganized killers not of an organized killer like Zodiac. So Butterfield is incorrect. Were they surprise attacks? Were they unexpected and sudden attacks? Yes. But they do not fit the definition of blitz attacks because Zodiac was not a disorganized criminal, according to Richard Walter.

Just prior to that profiler Mary Ellen O’Toole says that what is so interesting to her is that the Zodiac crimes are devoid of emotion and that you don’t see any expression of anger, like battering to the victim. This is an observation that Richard Walter made to me years ago, as well. He said the sexual crimes would be characterized by a beating, recreational cutting (i.e., piquerism) or percussive injuries. In other words, a similar display to what Ms O’Toole does NOT see either. The absence of this anger and percussion proves that these are power murders not anger based or sexual murders. Richard Walter profiled Zodiac as a power-assertive killer and I believe he’s 100% correct in that.

Anyone who believes that these were sexual crimes or that Zodiac was a sexual sadist is therefore way out in left field.

Here is another telling quote from profiler O’Toole. "Why was he willing to take such risks that could have resulted in an arrest made of him? Taking high risks is important to this offender and it increases the thrill and excitement of his murders." I dedicate that quote to every person on every message board who has ever said that Qvale would not have killed in his own neighborhood because it would be "too risky." This is why amateurs should leave the analysis of behavior and behavioral profiling to professionals.

I’ve heard many times from many people that Qvale is a terrible suspect but it always seems that when new information comes out I’m always proven right about something. Zodiac was not risk averse. Rather he LIVED for risk.

Here’s another bit of misinformation, this time by Mark Hewitt. He described Zodiac as "Somebody who in their own life feels very powerless and only feels important and significant if they can go out and kill somebody." According to Richard Walter this is the exact OPPOSITE of what the Zodiac felt about himself. Zodiac was a person who was imbued with a lot of power and who killed for more power, power that was constrained only by the limits of his own imagination. The picture of Zodiac as a "powerless loser" is just part of the mythology that blinds us to the truth about the case. Leave the profiling to the profilers.

When I hear all this stuff it’s no wonder that Zodiac wasn’t identified in the early days of the investigation. As Mr. Walter said to me once, "You can’t find something if you don’t know what you’re looking for." Instead of looking for Zodiac in the Tenderloin, Nob Hill would have been a better place…or PH.

Some more things: Hewitt says that had Hartnell not survived we would not have known about the hood. That’s not true because Cecilia described the hood to Dave Collins, as he discusses on the DVD accompanying the movie Zodiac in 2008.

Butterfield then inexplicably says that the kids in Presidio Heights heard some kind of *commotion* outside and looked out the window. I guess he never read my book or ever read what Lindsey Robbins told my colleague Jim Dean about the night of the murder way back in 2003. Clearly they didn’t hear anything, as we now know from Lindsey Robbins.

Butterfield compounds his error by saying that the SFPD sketches were done by the kids with a contribution from Fouke and Zelms. Lindsey Robbins made it crystal clear that the two sketches were the product only of the observations of the kids and not anything that was seen by the police. Fouke confirmed this to me in about 2006 when he said that he had nothing to do with the police sketches. On the DVD accompanying the movie Zodiac he said that the only thing he contributed was to say that the man was "older and heavier."

They also stated as gospel that Fouke and Zelms stopped and spoke to Zodiac. Graysmith then says that the Zodiac told them that he saw a guy with a gun and he went that way and he sent them off basically on a wild goose chase. It doesn’t make any sense that zodiac would have told them to turn the corner and go back towards the cab because the guy with the gun obviously would have been running AWAY FROM the cab. But that’s where Fouke and Zelms went: South on Cherry towards the cab. I doubt the Zodiac would have tried to send them in that direction.

We need experts who know the small details of the case better…and who may have fresh perspectives.

I think my biggest peeve is the repeated notion that Zodiac was sexually motivated. There is no evidence in his crimes he was a sexual deviant or sadist along the lines of BTK, Green River Killer, GSK, Bundy, etc. But so many people refuse to see him through any lens other than sexual killer.

But yes, I listen to A LOT of podcasts. I’ve heard so much myth and misinformation on the Zodiac case that I’ve basically stopped listening.

Hi,

Just some odds and ends. Towards the end of the show, Hewitt once again reinforces the notion that Zodiac killed to exorcise some anger issues. Again, as Profiler O’Toole says, and Richard Walter said to me years ago, there is no evidence of the features of an anger killing in the Zodiac crimes. These are NOT anger or sexual murders.