https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carroll_Cole
"As a teen, Cole committed petty crimes. He was often arrested for drunkenness and minor thefts. After high school, he joined the army but was discharged soon after for stealing pistols.[3] In 1960, he attacked two couples parked in cars on a lover’s lane. Soon afterwards, he called the police in Richmond, California, where he was living, and told them that he was plagued by violent fantasies involving strangling women.[4]
Cole was in and out of various mental hospitals over the next three years. At the last of them, Stockton State Hospital, a Dr. Weiss wrote: "He seems to be afraid of the female figure and cannot have intercourse with her first but must kill her before he can do it."[5] This apparently wasn’t a red flag to the doctor as Weiss approved his release in April 1963."
Could the similarity in the lovers lane aspect give us a clue as to what the Zodiac’s motivations were?
He ended up focusing his crimes on strangling and drowning women, but lovers lanes did interest him.
His very first crime was when he was young and drowned a 10 year old in a lake.
Cole has always interested me in relation to Zodiac. Not that he was Zodiac, but there seems to be a similar mentality there. Also he had ties to San Diego, Nevada, and TX where others have questioned whether or not Zodiac may have had involvement.
btw sorry about the incomplete title of this thread. Don’t know what happened. Couldn’t find a thread yet on this guy alone so here it is for anyone wanting to discuss him and some psychopathic parallels to Z. I think he is very interesting. You know the whole attacking a couple at a lovers lane and calling the police after thing… And how his first victim was drowned in a lake (lake connections?) And the whole being in San Diego and mental institutions and stealing pistols when he was young (Sandy?), and his connections to NV and NV mental hospitals around the time we start seeing possible Zodiac movement around the CA/NV state line.
Again not saying he is Zodiac, but he might be a very similar animals and could be "Sandy" IMHO. Sandy and Carroll are both girly sounding names. Sorry if I offended any guys here named either with my statement.
Ok I have other cases to brush up on and help out with other than the Zodiac (yes I actually do that).
But maybe someone can inform me about Carroll and how close he has been look into, if at all. Bc I don’t have time to research a of that alone ….which is why I come here.
"In adolescence, Cole accumulated numerous arrests for drunkenness and petty theft. He joined the Navy after dropping out of high school, but was discharged for the theft of pistols, which he used to fire at cars along the San Diego highways. Back at home in Richmond, California, during 1960, he attacked two couples with a hammer as they parked along a darkened lover’s lane. Increasingly, he cherished fantasies of strangling girls and women who reminded him of his adulterous mother."
I looked Cole up at the Radford Serial Killer Study site. They give a detailed timeline of his activities, when and where he was in prison or mental institutions and when he was out. It does not look like he could have committed the Zodiac crimes as he was in prison in Missouri at the key times.
May 1967 age 29
Invaded the bedroom of an eleven year old girl in Lake Ozark, Missouri and tried to strangle her in her sleep; plead guilty to a reduced charge and received a five year prison term.
05-01-1970 age 31
Paroled and drifted back to San Diego, then to Reno, Nevada where he twice attempted to strangle women in bars but both potential victims escaped.
This is a link to the timeline page at the Radford site. You’ll need to scroll down and click on his name to read the pdf. I was unable to link directly to the pdf for him.
http://maamodt.asp.radford.edu/Psyc%204 … elines.htm
His MO is not like Zodiac’s, he killed by strangulation and on the whole his victims were much older than the Zodiac victims. He was considered a "missionary" killer which also doesn’t seem to fit Zodiac, of course Zodiac having never been caught makes it hard to discern his motive. The letters that Zodiac wrote, in addition to the murders, makes him stand out as being in a class of killer that has a very small percentage so I find it hard to compare him to other serial killers with an eye to figuring out who he is.
Where would he have been at the time of the Swindle’s murder??
I am not super certain about where he was Feb. 1964. He married Neville "Billy" Whitworth in Texas, Nov. 1963. She was from Texas and that is where they lived during the time they were married. He was sent to prison there in Aug. 1965 after he set a motel on fire because he thought that his wife was sleeping with other men at the motel. That doesn’t mean that he couldn’t have come back to California for a visit or something during the time he lived in Texas.
Where would he have been at the time of the Swindle’s murder??
Thanks for asking this question. I was wondering the same thing. Couldn’t remember the name of the couple.
