I wonder to what extent the investigators took Z’s more exotic statements and references seriously. The Mikado, the possibility that his chosen moniker actually meant something, i.e. that he could have been “collecting slaves” in adherence to some sort of “celestial” scheme…and so on.
How “primitive” was their outlook? Were they looking for a “sexual deviant”? Would someone who clearly didn’t fit that profile have been dismissed? It seems that a disproportionate amount of the suspects that were looked into (as per the FBI material) were sex offenders of one kind or another – rapists, child molesters, people who had been brought in for indecent exposure, etc. I say “disproportionate” because to me, at least, it doesn’t seem obvious that Z was a convicted sex offender at all.
To us – today – many of Z’s “nuttier” statements make perfect sense in a serial killer context. The collecting of slaves? Standard stuff – practically cliché! But back then, to what extent did your stereotypical crazy killer exist? I remember reading about the Manson trial – and how utterly bizarre his “motives” seemed to the court. Today, the background for his crimes would have been viewed in a completely different light – as something which pretty much comes with the territory, given that one is dealing with a…homicidal maniac who believed himself to be some sort of spiritual leader.
To me Z’s craziness seems genuine enough, let’s put it like that. But let’s consider the possibility that it wasn’t. Let’s assume that Z was faking his craziness. He wasn’t interested in slaves, he didn’t fancy himself to be some sort of executioner – none of that. It was all a smokescreen, his agenda was a completely different one. Let’s just assume this for the sake of argument. To what extent would someone, back then, be able to fake it? What sort of person would be able to do that? Again, today pretty much anyone could have drawn on the cliché, the stereotype, the Son of Sam style nutcase who gets his orders from a dog and claims to be on a mission from Satan – or something. But back then – did the cliché even exist?
LE declared that Z was legally sane, based on the letters, since he was clearly aware of what he was doing and knew what he was doing was wrong.
Some profilers, IMHO, naively took the letters at face value. I see no compelling basis for Zodiac being schizophrenic, for example. If he did believe in "paradice slaves," that might count as a delusion (but then, so could any number of religious beliefs), but Zodiac otherwise doesn’t appear to suffer from delusions.
I suppose the sexual deviant angle comes from the attacks on couples. CJB had a definite sexual element, if the letter writer is to be believed. Allen, of course, was accused by Don Cheney, and there were circumstantial things which lined up all-too nicely. Should they have spent more time investigating serial car thieves? Perhaps. Certain things in this case make me wonder if he wasn’t a professional crook who dabbled in murder as a hobby, but again, maybe that’s part of the image he wanted to project.
As for context, there were at least three prior serial killers who bore strong similarities to Z: Jack the Ripper (the Bates letter was obviously written by a Ripper wannabe), the Texarkana Phantom (hooded couples slayer), and the Axeman of New Orleans, a self-proclaimed demon from hell who wrote over-the-top, taunting letters, and may have inspired Zodiac’s buttons:
"The Axeman" was not caught or identified at the time, and his crime spree stopped as mysteriously as it had started. The murderer’s identity remains unknown to this day, although various possible identifications of varying plausibility have been proposed. Most notoriously, on March 13, 1919, a letter purporting to be from the Axeman was published in the newspapers saying that he would kill again at 15 minutes past midnight on the night of March 19, but would spare the occupants of any place where a jazz band was playing. That night all of New Orleans’s dance halls were filled to capacity, and professional and amateur bands played jazz at parties at hundreds of houses around town. There were no murders that night.
I have always worried about this in some respect. Fact is that the Zodiac would be alot more transparent perhaps today, but at the time this was something of an unknown animal.
I have to say tho, that something about the killings and the letters shows to me someone who would have really been quite unable to garner the attention in actual life that Z did. And when I looked at the psychological/graphological meaning of the slant down to the right on many of the letters and the car door at the lake, it is said to indicate depression and a loss of faith in self. for whatever that’s worth. The sort of guy who would want to scare people by dropping letters in the mail and shooting defenseless people in the back would probably be at heart a coward, trying to prove that he isn’t. He thinks, "I’m not just this guy who can’t hold down a job or get a woman etc., i am the ZODIAC". Imagine how much power that would give some dude who has none, and wants it. Think about it- he moved his operation to SF for the last confirmed killing. He probably felt he would get more publicity there. But he doesn’t go snatch someone, or shoot someone who might put up a fight. He shoots a cabbie in the back. That’s pretty freaking gutless. He didn’t get too up close and personal with the victims really, not in the way we are accustomed to now. They weren’t tortured. They weren’t kidnapped and he didn’t spend days with them. Bryan Hartnell said that he even said "I’m nervous" and noticed his hands shaking. And the guy was wearing a mask on top of it. With probably a wig under it. He shoots a cabbie most likely from behind. He shoots kids in cars on lonely stretches of road. He makes threats about bombs and school children. He loves to terrify.
I have been reading some of the BTK letters and I dont’ see any of the sort of grandiosity that the Zodiac was fond of. Dennis Rader had children, a wife, a successful life. He was killing because of a different motivation, to be sure, but I think he might give a clue as to what happens when you can’t construct a proper societal facade and you kill then write letters about it. It stands to reason that the more grandiose, the more pathetic the real killer probably is. Which would jibe with having a sexual preference for children, in a big way. This of course brings into question the whole psychology of pedophila. Certainly there are pedophiles are those who have murdered children who have also murdered adults, like the Night Stalker or Arthur Shawcross whose first two crimes were sex slayings of two young children. And Arthur Shawcross is a very pathetic character in a way that I believe Z probably was. Just this sort of guy who nobody takes seriously, who can’t really make a go of it.
Drives me crazy how so much of that screams a certain suspect.
