There is no handy rule of thumb, no blanket explanation for why a crime goes unsolved. Sometimes the sheer multiplicity
287 68 23MB
English Pages [200] Year 1993
Unsolved Crimes
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TRUE CRIME
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Unsolved Crimes
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III
BY THE EDITORS OF TIME-LIFE iiiiii
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BOOKS
Alexandria, Virginia
Unsolved Crimes
1 Zodiac 4
2 Verdict 48
Beyond Solution 79
3 The Director 104
4 Without a Trace 144
Acknowledgments 184 Bibliography 184 Index 188 Picture Credits 191
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1
Zodiac The While
killer
of Cheri Jo Bates
his 18-year-old
knew something about cars. was studying in the library
prey
knife into her
of Eliverside City College on Halloween night, 1966, the killer
approached her green Volkswagen Beetle and opened
the engine
compartment
Reaching down, he
at the rear.
pulled out the electrical distributor coil
and condenser and
disconneaed the middle wire of the distributor. Then he walked back into the library and waited. When Cheri Jo Bates
left
the building, he followed her out into the soft
California night.
From
a distance he watched the pretty blonde unlock her
Volkswagen door,
and crank the
get in,
four-cylinder engine turned over, again
fused to catch, just as the
man knew
utes passed. Cheri Jo Bates got
it
ignition.
The
little
and again, but rewould. A few min-
more exasperated. The
car's
left
his car, started
it,
and drove
Joseph Bates waited
come home.
Then he
shoulder blade.
5:43 a.m., he telephoned the Riv-
erside police to report her missing. Less than
the parking lot path. in
change. Ten
spattered
Timex
Her purse
away
feet
still
lay the killer's cheap, paint-
wrist watch,
its
black strap partially torn
away. The churned-up ground where Cheri Jo Bates had fought her executioner, police officers said later, "looked like a freshly
plowed
field."
book on The 352-481 remains open never closes
murder, and case
tors
man
suddenly said,
"It's
lot.
unlit gravel
They chatted
until the
about time."
"About time for what?" asked Bates. "About time for you to die." Lunging at her, the killer slapped one hand over her mouth and with his other hand plunged a short knife into her chest. Cheri Jo Bates was small — five feet three inches and 110 pounds — but she was strong, an athlete, a freshman cheerleader at Riverside. She fought back fiercely, clawing at her assailant's arms and face — at one point ripping the watch from his wrist. But she had no chance. With brutality born of rage the killer kept stabbing. He slammed his victim to the ground. Bates screamed in pain and terror. He kicked her in the head to silence her, then knelt and slashed at her face and throat, cutting through her jugular vein and her voice box and almost severing her head from her body. As she lay face down on the ground, her life draining away, he thrust the
This
artist's
file
to this day. But police
been stymied. Within a week of the
man down an
later
body beside held her ID and 56 cents
The moment had come. The killer approached the car and offered the young woman a lift home in his own car parked nearby. Maybe she hesitated, maybe not. In the end, however, she walked with the
an hour
the college groundskeeper found the student's
battery got weaker.
path leading out of the parking
walked to
night for his only daughter to
all
Finally, at
rose,
off into the blackness.
No. have
killing, state investiga-
and Riverside detectives succeeded in checking out all but two of the people known to be in the librar> that night and had taken testimony from a man and a woman who separately heard Cheri Jo Bates scream. Police minutely regirl's life and last days in the small city 60 miles east of Los Angeles; they interviewed scores of friends and fellow students, and when a footprint from a shoe sold only in military outlets was found at the scene,
constructed the dead
they started talking to possible suspects at
Base near Riverside.
The
ious to find a bearded rensic tests turned
under Bates's
authorities
man
March Air Force
were particularly anx-
with scratches on his face; fo-
up fragments of human skin and
h.iir
fingernails.
At one point detectives thought they had a promising case against a local youth who had known Cheri Jo Bates. But the evidence infinitely
was too
worse, the
thin to take to court. killer
To make
matters
decided to have some fun by
openly ridiculing the Riverside police for their failure to
apprehend him — and he raised the
chilling
prospea of more
murders to come.
One month
after Cheri
Jo Bates's death, identical r\pe-
wrirtcn letters arrived at police headquarters
and
at the ed-
sketch was as close as the San Francisco Police Department ever came to putting a face to the elusive Zodiac The drawing appeared on an October 18, 1969, wanted poster distributed widely throughout the city.
killer.
UNSOLVTO CRIMES
The enough to type, in all capital letters, through a dozen carbons and send just the last copies. They were so smudged that, although the make and model of the typewriter could be identified, they were useless for tracing the particular machine on which the notes were typed. The first word was "BY" — followed not by a name but by a teasing blank space. The message began: itorial offices
was
writer
of the daily Riverside Press-Enterprise.
crafty
SHE WAS YOUNG AND BEAUTIFUL BUT NOW SHE IS BATTERED AND DEAD. SHE IS NOT THE FIRST AND SHE WILL NOT BE THE LAST. I LAY AWAKE NIGHTS THINKING ABOUT
MY
NEXT VICTIM. The
killer
went on
to consider that prospect:
MAYBE SHE WILL BE THE BEAUTIFUL BLOND THAT BABYSITS NEAR THE LITTLE STORE AND WALKS DOWN THE DARK ALLEY EACH EVENING ABOUT SEVEN. OR MAYBE SHE WILL BE THE SFL\PELY BLUE EYED BRUNETTE THAT SAID NO WHEN ASKED HER FOR A DATE IN HIGH SCHOOL. BUT MAYBE IT WILL NOT BE EITHER. BUT SHALL CUT OFF HER FEMALE PARTS AND DEPOSIT THEM FOR THE WHOLE CFFY TO SEE. I
I
The
letter
writer described in detail
how
he'd murdered
Cheri Jo Bates. He told how he'd disabled her car, offered her a ride, informed her of her fate — and then choked, kicked,
and stabbed her
known
his victim, stating bitterly:
to death.
He
claimed that he had
ONLY ONE THING WAS ON MY MIND. MAKING HER PAY FOR THE
BRUSH
OFFS
THAT SHE HAD GIVEN ME DURING THE YEARS PRIOR. The I I
killer
went on:
AM NOT SICK. AM INSANE. BUT THAT WILL NOT STOP
CHERI JO BATES
L'
-lAC
THE GAME. THIS LETTER SHOULD BE PUBLISHED FOR ALL TO READ O". IT MIGHT JUST SAVE THAT GIRL IN THE ALLEY. The
writer issued a warning:
"BEWARE
...
I
AM
STALKING YOUR GIRLS NOW." The in
had no doubt that the anonymous writer was
police
faa the
killer.
Various details
out
laid
in the letter, in-
cluding the ripped-out distributor wire, hadn't been released
and would be known only to the murderer. Yet no real clues to the man's identity, nor was there any evidence that he and Bates had known each to the press
the letter contained
other, despite the letter writer's claim.
The
investigation
continued to go nowhere. Police waited apprehensively over the next if
the killer
would make good
his threats.
assaults that resembled the Bates slaying. ever, a brief flurr)' of
months
communication.
months
to see
But there were no
There was, how-
On
April 30, 1967,
Jo Bates's murder, the Riverside Press-Enterprise printed another story on the case. exactly six
The following day
after Cheri
the newspaper, the police,
and the
vic-
tim's father received crudely hand-addressed envelopes,
each postmarked locally and mailed with double postage — a pair of four-cent Lincoln stamps. Inside each envelope
a
slip
BATES
TO
was
of paper with the penciled message:
HAD
DIE
THERE WILL BE
MORE
This time the notes were signed — with a single symbol so sloppily scrawled that
was a "2" or
police didn't put
and the of Chen Jo Bates were
Pencil-written letters sent to Joseph Bates
Riverside police by the killer
mailed locally on April 30, 1967, with the double postage that was to become a Zodiac trademark.
Each envelope contained a ring-binder paper
(left)
single sheet of three-
with a message scrawled
down toward the were signed simply, "Z."
large block letters that tilted right.
The
letters
in
they agreed,
no one could be certain whether it it did not seem to matter, since the
a "Z." But
it
much
was
the
Most likely, was filed away
stock in the message.
work
of a crank.
It
with no more ado.
The notes were not the only written communiques that seemed possibly linked to the case. About five months after was sortwhen he came
the murder, a custodian at Riverside City College
ing through a storage area at the librani
across a desktop defaced by a curious ballpoint pen:
Sick of living'unwilling to die
poem
written in blue
a
UNSOLVED
CR1\4ES
was so outraged by
the crimes that he spent eight
cut.
Chronicle
clean.
years investigating every scrap of information relating to the
if
He
killer.
red/
then committed his findings to a remarkable vol-
clean.
ume
Blood spurting,
maniac's apprehension. This account owes
consensus,
oh well, it was red
dered
draining into an
die.
wait
11
The
find her
of
them concluded
that
Zodiac had mur-
in Riverside
Bay
and
five oth-
region.
of the San Francisco area killings took place on
December 20, 1968, in Vallejo, 25 miles from The Vietnam War was raging, and many of Vallejo's 73,000 residents worked at the huge Mare Island naval complex nearby. Like any rough-and-tumble shipyard the city.
At the end of the verse the author had inscribed the two
boom
"r" and "h."
The custodian notified police and informed them that the desk had been on the library floor in October when Cheri Jo Bates was murdered. The cops photographed the inscripand added
first
Friday,
till
next time.
And
many
people — Cheri Jo Bates
time
Someone
tion
ac-
young women, and the true total of his victims may have reached 50. The killer never was caught — at least not that anyone ever knew.
she won't
letters
its
Zodiac himself took credit for many more. Before the madness seemed to run its course, he would claim to have slaughtered at least 37 people, mainly
uncertain death,
just
six
ers in the
anyway.
this
of
dearth of conclusive evidence, probably could not — reach a
dress,
life
aid in the
much
Although authorities did not — and, given the frustrating
spilling;
new
over her
book he hoped might
curacy and detail to Graysmith's research.
dripping,
all
entitled Zodiac, a
it
to the Bates
file.
there matters rested for almost four years. Then, in
town, the place had
its
share of brawls and shootings,
with an occasional death. But this time was different—
double murder, the victims apparently selected at random
and executed without provocation. There were no witnesses and no suspeas — until the Zodiac casually claimed credit in the course of announcing another slaughter almost sev-
a startling development, an
en months
ing a series of bewildering murders
Jensen, 16, and David Arthur Faraday, 17, were as nice a couple of teenagers as parents could wish for. Both were in high school; she was a serious, hardworking student and he was a top scholar, a varsity wrestler, and
in
anonymous letter written dur400 miles to the north, and aroimd San Francisco, led investigators to make a
connection with the equally puzzling Cheri Jo Bates It
appeared to
many
sleuths that Bates might be
victim, perhaps even the
first,
of a serial
killer
killing.
an
who
early
called
himself Zodiac.
exceedingly cunning and savage. He aphad been prowling the San Francisco Bay Area since late 1968. Or so he said in mid- 1969 when he introduced himself to the media and the police, launching a dialogue as insane as the one Jack the Ripper carried on with the London police and newspapers in 1888. So fascinated did journalists become with the doings and sayings of this psychopath that they found themselves involved in the circus beyond just the mere reporting of it. Indeed, editorial page cartoonist Robert Graysmith of the San Francisco
This
man was
parently
Betty
later.
Lou
an Eagle Scout.
On the
December evening of their
first
date,
Faraday picked up Jensen in his mother's 1961 beigeand-brown four-door Rambler station wagon and off they went, Betty Lou assuring her father that she'd be home
by
1 1
o'clock.
two stopped at a local drive-in Coke, then around 10:15 drove up Lake Herman Road to a remote parking area where young lovers could be After visiting a friend, the
for a
Though the place itself was homes and small ranches lined the
alone.
number of
isolated, a
road,
and
in the
next
hour, people in four different cars drove past the spot and
saw
the Rambler, parked about 15 feet
from the
side of the
ZODIAC
poem
This
scratched into the
surface of a library desk at
,^|^: Vf^4/V^
^ r
Chevrolet Impala sedan seen
parked at the Lake Herman site earlier in
the evening. In
his reconstruction of the
road. his
The
last motoinst,
a
way home, went by
Humble
at
1
Oil
1:10; he
by side, the Rambler and another and color didn't register on him. side
I^ite that
saw two
cars parked
vehicle,
whose make
left her house a few miles toward town to pick up her son,
evening, Stella Borges
up the road and
who had
Company worker on
started
spent the evening in town.
It
took her about
five
minutes to reach the spot where Faraday and Jensen were parked.
As she came around
nated a startling scene:
a curve, her headlights illumi-
A man
was
lying beside the
open
door of the Rambler. Borges first thought the fellow must have fallen out of his car. But then she
crime, Robert Graysmith had arrived shortly after 1 and had drawn up alongside the Rambler. He got out and probably spoke to the teenagers, ordermg them out of the car. They must have refused, so the man simply drove them out. Stalking to the back of the Rambler, he fired a shot through the right side of the rear window, then moved to his left and put
conjectures that Zodiac
a bullet into the
The
terrified
left
1
rear wheel housing.
youngsters apparently bolted from the front
passenger-side door, as the killer dashed around to meet
them. Betty Lou Jensen was out of the car by the time he got
David Faraday was
front passenger
there.
that
jammed
just
emerging when the gunman head behind the left ear and
his pistol into the boy's
UNSOLVED CRIMES
dropped enough hints to make some of her friends worry that she had gotten involved in the drug trade. The marriage didn't last long, and
pulled the trigger; the slug tore through
Faraday's brain. Jensen her
life,
ran for
literally
but the gunman sprinted
her, quickly gaining
on her and
after firing
soon Darlene was married again,
rapidly; five bullets hit the upper right
Dean
such a right pattern
time to
were amazed at the marksmanship. Betty Lou Jensen tumbled
seem to
side of her
back
in
headlong into the gravel
from the
The
less
than 30
less
Rambler
let his
wife do
more or baby
as she pleased even after their
was born. Darlene
for fin-
didn't
Darlene Ferrin down, and
easygoing Dean
feet
car.
police dusted the
settle
this
at a local
Motherhood
Italian restaurant.
that police
cook
Ferrin, a
men
Ferrin
had always
at-
with her perky looks and
gerprints but found nothing unusual.
tracted
They recovered 10 brass shell casings from the scene and seven slugs from the Rambler and from the victims' bodies. The ammunition was Super X copper-
engaging banter, but in January 1969, a
coated .22-caliber long
rifle;
between five feet eight inches and five feet ten inches, heavyset, with horn-rimmed glasses and short, brown, curly hair. lab did
a babysitter noticed this
specific
in front of the Ferrins'
man
One evening in late sitting in a
February,
white car parked
ground-floor apartment; at one match and she could see that he had a remarkably round head with wavy dark hair. When the babysitter told Ferrin about the suspicious-looking man, Darlene replied: "I guess he's checking up on me. I heard he was back from out of state." She paused and then blurted out: "He doesn't want anyone to know what I saw him do. I saw him point, he struck a
and David Faraday were random have known the young people
he next attacked in Vallejo.
At 22 and the married mother of an
was
around —
thirties,
Betty Lou Jensen If prey. Zodiac may well
infant daughter, Darlene Ferrin
started hanging
older, apparently in his early to mid-
the rifling
marks on the slugs pointed to a J. C. Higgins model 80 or a High Standard model 101 semiautomatic pistol. But the ballistics not hold out much hope of narrowing it down to a weapon, even if one were recovered.
man
strange
still
murder someone."
a Barbie-doll teenager at heart. She was
The
bouncy, blond, blue-eyed, and every-
stranger appeared a
number
of
of her friends
times at Terry's Waffle Shop, sitting at
advised her not to be so open, so indis-
the counter, asking questions about
criminately trusting. Apparently, she
Darlene Ferrin. Three times that Ferrin's
body's best buddy.
Some
family
didn't listen.
and
friends
knew about,
the
man
had met
delivered packages to her apartment.
up with some shady characters years
She identified the contents as presents: a
It's
possible Darlene Ferrin
earlier, prior to
her job at Terry's Waffle
belt
and a purse from Mexico and a
length of blue-flowered cloth.
Shop. She'd been married once before,
January 1966, she and her husband had
In May the Ferrins bought a house, and the stranger arrived uninvited at a
bummed around
painting part>' Darlene
as a teenager,
sleeping
on
and on her honeymoon,
the Virgin Islands,
the beach
the local scene.
in
and soaking up
When
she returned
He was
well dressed
of place
among
was throwing. and obviously out
the younger, jeans-clad
guests. Ferrin appeared
home, she was vague about exactly what had gone on in the islands, but she
stranger
10
terrified of the
and forbade two of her
sis-
ZODIAC
Two
photos combine to show the gravel-road entrance to a water pumping station along Lake Herman Road where VaUejo teenagers Betty Lou Jensen and David Faraday were shot on December 20, 1968. The double murder was the first of a series of Bay Area killings later attributed to Zodiac.
into the parking lot at Terry's, ters to
10 minutes with an older
speak
with him. "Darlene begged
Christina did not hear
younger
sister
Pam
And when
started chatting with the
what
in a
the
for
about
white car. Although
two were
saying, she
thought that Darlene was troubled and sensed what she
me, 'Linda, don't go near him. Just don't talk to him,' " recalled the older sister.
where she spoke
man
Ferrin's
later called
man, Darlene
Soon
"a tension
after, Ferrin
in the air."
took her
sister
home, checked in with went off to pick driven away from his
flew into a rage.
her babysitter, and, around
no one could recall the man's name. It was common: Bob or Joe or Lee, something like that. There were other men in Darlene Ferrin's life as well. She became more than casually friendly with a number of
up Mike Mageau. They had just house when Mageau said, "We're being followed." Hard on their tail was a light-colored car. Ferrin increased her speed and started dodging down side streets. But the other car stayed with them as Ferrin raced around, finally coming to the Blue Rock Springs Golf Course, four miles from downtown Vallejo. She whipped into the parking lot so fast that she hit one of the logs used to mark out the lot.
Curiously,
short and
Vallejo cops
men
who were
regular customers at Terry's. But the
she dated most often were the
Mageau
twins,
Mike
and David, tall, thin 19-year-olds with such terrific crushes on Ferrin that they would argue for the privilege of driving her to work. It was Mike Mageau she decided to go out with on Friday, the Fourth of July. Dean Ferrin had to work that evening but planned for a late-night part)'
when he
The Corvair
sister,
to a fireworks display together.
10:30, Darlene,
behind them;
its
later,
the pursuing car pulled
lights
black-and-yellow California plates.
He
Christina Suennen, went
Around
Moments
1:45, finally
were out but Mageau could see that the driver was a man and that the car had old-style, in
got home. Early in the evening
Darlene and her 15 -year-old
stalled.
1
asked Ferrin
who
she supposed
it
was. "Oh, never
mind," she snapped. "Don't worn, about
still
it."
Suddenly, the car behind them started up again and sped
accompanied by Christina, drove her bronze 1963 Corvair
11
UNSOLVED CRIMES
off
toward
had
Vallejo. Five minutes later, before Ferrin
again, the strange car reappeared.
on, behind and to the
left
It
eased to a
of the Corvair.
and when
in his car
halt, lights
get
his bedroom a few hundred yards away, the son of the In Blue Rock groundskeeper was having trouble falling
of his car, stepped around to the pas-
ed
in
were gunshots, a
in-
The
bul-
kinda
tongue before
Mageau absorbed
in
two more in the
shots into the
Darlene Ferrin.
them racing
police radio crackled with
Mike Mageau was seriously wounded, but it was Dar-
cruiser
and
to a telephone.
more fireworks, "so we on it," one of the of-
It
was already on
for a friend
What
and went
saw sent was 12:10 a.m. and now the they
an urgent dispatch to Blue Rock.
By the time the detectives got
there,
the scene.
another Vallejo police
The
officers recognized
Darlene Ferrin.
She was
still
alive
and
tried to say
something but could
took the brunt of
Mike Mageau could mumble a few words through his smashed mouth and managed to give the police officers a rough description of the killer before an am-
the attack: nine
bulance arrived.
rounds, two in
Darlene Ferrin was pronounced DOA — dead on arrival—at Kaiser Foundation Hospital. Mike Mageau was in critical condition, but the doctors thought that he would
not get
who
it
out.
probably make
started
out an agonized cry.
it.
The time was recorded
as 12:38 a.m.,
July 5, 1969.
Two minutes later, at station
12:40, a heavyset
man entered a gas
phone booth across from the Vallejo sheriffs
office
and dialed the police. When the switchboard operator came on the line, the man calmly stated: "I want to report a double murder." He said it so slowly and deliberately that
a flash as the killer turned
the operator later thought that he might have been reading
window and pumped
the message or had rehearsed it. "If you will go one mile east on Columbus Parkway to the public park, you will find kids in a brown car," the man continued. The operator attempt-
in the
wounded young man,
hitting
him
shoulder and the knee. Mageau's back arched con-
vulsively,
just
didn't roll
Rock parking lot looking
The killer kept pumping bullets
and turned back. Despite his pain, Mike Mageau could see that their assailant was beefy — maybe 200 pounds— and a head taller than the Corvair, which made him about five feet eight. His face looked large, and his curly, light brown hair was worn short, military-style. All this
was probably
admitted.
into the Blue
halted
back to the Corvair. He leaned
it
over to check out the bronze Corvair.
two in the left arm, and five in the back. Without a word, the gunman stepped back and
The man
immediately dialed the po-
A few minutes after the first report, three teenagers pulled
the right arm.
let
He
his cheek and slamming into
lene Ferrin
Then, Mageau
of them, and a car taking off at what
moped around and
ficers later
into the car.
car.
now
nearest cops, a couple of plain-clothes detective ser-
geants, thought
shattered his
passing through
walking to his
But what he
or penny salutes; the sounds
However, the Vallejo Police Department had been chasing around all night from one complaint to another.
jaw and shredded his
lot
bombs
lice.
a blaze of light and a deafening roar.
The heavy
stomach looking out the window
his
he thought was high speed.
eyes.
let
was lying on
listening to fireworks in the distance.
heard weren't cherry
Mageau heard something clink against window frame — and at that moment his world explod-
Mageau's
the
asleep; he
and
senger side of the Corvair, and aimed the light directly to
I
"Here come the cops. Better
your ID."
The man got out
Ferrin, then got
Mageau thought
the driver shone a powerful flashlight
at them, he said to Ferrin:
two more shots into Darlene and drove calmly out of the lot.
assailant fired
that the position resembled a police highway-stop tech-
nique,
back of the Corvair. For good measure, the
seat into the
time to regain her composure and get her Corvair started
his thrashing legs propelled
him over the
ed to break
front
12
in for details,
but the caller simply raised his
ZODIAC
voice, overriding hers.
"They were shot with a 9-mm.
Luger," he said, and added, "I also killed those kids year." Then, adopting a low, sneering tone, he said,
er printed his
message
cramped, tiny
letters. It
began:
writer then proceeded to specify exaaly the
ammu-
in
last
"Good-
Dear Editor is the murderer of the
bye," and hung up.
This
The man was still standing in the lighted telephone booth when a passerby glanced in his direction. The caller averted his face, swung open the booth's folding door, and walked
2 teenagers last Christmass at Lake Herman the girl
&
on the 4th of July near
quickly away.
Meanwhile,
the golf course in Vallejo at the Blue
Rock parking
lot,
To
were
detectives
murder under the floodlights of Where Mageau had been lying, they found
collecling the detritus of
three fire trucks.
a copper-jacketed slug. .38-caliber. rin
had
It
over the steering wheel;
all told,
"Winchester Western." The
truthful lice
only
The
the police
recovered seven slugs and nine shell casings marked for
"W-W"
had been used. At 8:25 a.m., Mike Mageau was wheeled into surgery for repairs to his jaw, left leg, and right arm. He would make a full recovery and eventually go to live with his mother in Los Angeles. Mageau would add nothing further to the tol
All of
writer
though she
persisted in pursuing Darlene Ferrin even
had been
at
home with
his
new wife
He was
had parted on
a small, wiry type, not at
scription of the killer. Considering the
admittedly scant evidence,
man
less
they were hunting
it
all like
call
of 17 characters, taken
neatly hand-printed as
if
on a
grid.
The
is
my
you do not print this cipher by the afternoon of Fry. 1st of
dis-
If
Aug
first
69,
I
will
Page— Fry. around
the de-
if
lines
identity.
and the
increasingly looked as
them were demanded:
paper. In this cipher
than amicable
phone
shots fired, and the positions of the
I want you to print this cipher on the front page of your
at the
hour of the murder. The cops even located Ferrin's
number of
from astrological symbols, Morse code, Greek signs, navy semaphore, weather symbols, and letters of the alphabet.
The police thoroughly checked out all possible jealousy and revenge motives. Dean Ferrin was an immediate suspea. However, he had been in the company of coworkers at the time of the murder and in any case had consistently excused his wife's dates as something she had to "get out of her system." Detectives tracked down a bartender who had
terms.
the
facts
segments consisted of eight
investigation.
whom she
&
them I which police know.
killed
some
two bodies at the Lake Herman murder scene. He did the same for the Blue Rock killing, describing what Darlene Ferrin was wearing, how he had shot Mike Mageau in the knee, and what brand of ammunition he had used. The writer then included in each letter a one-third segment of a cipher message that he had composed. Each of the
had been absolutely the weapon, the po-
caller
about the ammunition; as for
husband, from
I
nition, the
weren't able to determine exaaly what type of pis-
liked him. But he
I
looked to be either a 9-mm. or a
Another such slug turned up where Darlene Fer-
fallen
prove
shall state
all
go on a
night.
I
weekend
kill
ram-
will cruse killing lone
people in the night then
move
on to kill again, untill I end up with a dozen people over
the
was a maniac.
the weekend.
That became evident on August
1,
1969,
when
three
Bay Area newspapers — the Vallejo Times-Herald, the San Francisco Examiner, and the San Francisco Chroni-
—each
cle
There was no signature, only another symbol: a
The papers printed portions of the letter but at the request some of it. They did, however, honor the killer's demand to print the three segments of his cipher.
received virtually identical letters taking credit for
the murders of Betty
Lou Jensen, David Faraday, and Dar-
lene Ferrin. Using a fclt-tippcd
pen with blue ink, the
circle
with an overlying cross. of the police withheld
kill-
13
UNSOLVED CRIMES
At the same
time, the cipher
Mare
intelligence at
was turned over
IS SO MUCH MORE FUN THAN KILLING WILD GAME IN
BECAUSE
to U.S. naval
FUN
Island for decoding. But that proved
easier said than done.
When
naval cryptanalysts got no-
of code breakers at the National Security Agency and the Central Intelligence Agency.
meantime, hundreds
if
not thousands of avid
crossword-puzzle solvers and other readers were trying their
own hands at unraveling the cipher in the newspapers. Among them was Donald Gene Harden, a 41 -year-old hisNorth Salinas High School, 100 miles south of San Francisco. As a youngster. Harden had been fascinated by codes and still had a book or two on the subject. Harden and his wife, Bettye, went to work on Sunday morning, August 3, and started applying some basic
tory and economics teacher at
English frequency
common
most
rules: the letter E, for
in the language,
example,
I
followed by T, A, O, N,
I
WILL NOT GIVE YOU MY NAME BECAUSE YOU WILL TRY TO SLOI I
the
is
IT
IS
THE FORREST BECAUSE MAN IS THE MOST DANGEROUE ANAMAL OF ALL TO KILL SOMETHING GIVES ME THE MOST THRILLING EXPERENCE IT IS EVEN BETTER THAN GETTING YOUR ROCKS OFF WITH A GIRL THE BEST PART OF IT IS THAE WHEN DIE WILL BE REBORN IN PARADICE AND THEI HAVE KILLED WILL BECOME MY SLAVES
where, the cipher was sent to Washington for the attention
In the
IT
DOWN OR ATOP MY COLLECTIOG OF
I,
R, and S; the most frequent two-letter combinations are
SLAVES FOR AFTERLIFE
TH, HE, and AN; the most recurrent three-letter combinations are THE, ING, CON, and ENT, while the letter most often doubled is L. The Hardens knew, too, that it is
EBEORIETEMETHHPITI The Hardens' work
sheets were examined with great inby naval inteihgence, which certified them as correct. The last line seemed to be nothing more than a random collection of letters, possibly designed simply to confuse and
impossible to write a message of any length without repeating words. ful
To
that knowledge, they
derer might start out with the the
word
added a
little
thought-
— such as the idea that an egomaniacal
speculation
"kill" or "killing,"
word "I," would
terest
mur-
distract the investigators.
likely repeat
and might even begin with,
The
"I
."
like killing
.
Donald and Bettye Harden worked and
started in again
Monday
all
through Sunday
morning. The
with symbols, and had
track code breakers: letter
Q
number of
£ was
it
was
make
crypt-
writer
was
prove
and more
the killer
it."
Dear Editor is the Zodiac speaking. In answer to your asking for more details about the good times I have had in Vallejo, I shall be very happy to
on purpose considering his obvious intelligence. He had, however, committed errors in his own code. Another problem was figuring out which of the three segments of the cryptogram came first. Nevertheless, in 20 hours of work, the Hardens had cracked the code. the nature of the
letter
Despite
were not
The
attocious, quite pos-
This
sibly
The message left no doubt about was dealing with:
7.
note, Vallejo police
The murderer obliged with a new, hand-printed letter to the papers that was three pages long. And for the first time — and for reasons known only to him — the man gave himself the name Zodiac. He began:
the symbol for the letter E; the actual
and punctuation were
first
convinced that the
facts to
let-
had, for instance, used a backward
represented by seven different symbols.
killer's spelling
wrote again on Thursday, August
publicly requested that he get in touch again "with
traps to side-
no fewer than 15 times at random to
analysts think letter
He
laid a
totally
they
killer,
found, had used a complex substitution code, replacing ters
killer
the details included in the
.
supply even more material.
mind
society
I
The Zodiac related that on the Fourth of July, he did not open the door of Darlene Ferrin's Corvair; the window was
LIKE KILLING PEOPLE
14
M
.
an
down. He
already
said that
is
most dangeroue anamal of all.
the
Mike Mageau
originally
M. Blackman,
was
some of
but had lunged into the backseat
sitting in the front seat
Boon, and Timothie
very violendy with his legs; that's
track," said Vallejo Detective Sergeant
knee." Zodiac resented the idea that he had departed "the
was leading
cene of the killing with squealing described in the Vallejo papers."
tires
&C raceing engine as
He had
driven
he said, "so as not to draw attention to
ly,
how
next described
away slow-
car."
who saw him "was
about 40-45 rather shabbly dressed." Turning to the earlier "Christmass" cops
'I
how
Medical
killing,
diac probably
five shots
Jensen's back while both of
and that the
killer
was a brooding and
fellow
man
looks
by high did
I
is
that his victims
could see his victim's silhouette on
ceilling
if
you aim
you
darck spot
it
will see a
gun.
would be
a
might be pleas "to in
which event
world for
own
its
life,
neglect
it
seemed,
still
had some
the world to catch him.
the killer decided to shift his area of opera-
By September 1969, he had chosen a new hunting ground— the Lake Berryessa recreation district, 35 miles north of Vallejo in the winemaking Napa Valley. And now, he resumed his patrol for young, helpless targets. Twice on tions.
in.
had to do was spray them
who
was the case. Zodiac, do while yearning for
Shrewdly,
of the
.
the bright,
of potential victims but then
backed off and looked elsewhere. In midafternoon, three 21 -year-old women,
finally
local college
were parked at a fast-food .stand when a youngish man drove up next to them in what they variously described as a silver or ice blue 1966 Chevrolet two-door sedan bearing California plates. The man made no overt move, but students,
something about him made the
women
extremely uneasy.
next to
theirs,
down and
chain-
think to take
down
sat silently in his car
For long minutes, he pretending not to observe them, head
he was.
Tuesday, August 12, the papers
balmy afternoon of Saturday, September 27, he
may have approached two sets
.
was obvious how much Zodiac relished playing cat and mouse with investigators. "By the way, " he wrote, "are the police haveing a good time with the code.' If not, tell them to cheer up; when they do crack it they will have me." That was a lie. The killer did not realize that the code already had been deciphered and that no one had the faintest idea
On
afterlife refleas
in life."
that
killing to
It
of
him If
center of the black dot in the light.
address.
an
calls
of
beam
taped to the gun barrel, the
No
and telephone
If
bullet will strike exactly in the
I
of
black or
in the center
All
his slaves in
as a grand gesture, to punish the
across.
When
feel-
thrill
usually an expression of
flash
at a wall or
of light about 3 to 6
circle
the
a grandiose paranoid quite likely might take his
notice, in the center of the
of light
is
be found out, exposed, perhaps cornered,
What
my
"Comparing
grandeur." The psychological profile went on to sug-
was tape a small pencel
light to the barrel of
you
loner with deep-seated
inferiority.
omnipotence indicating a paranoid delusion of
feeling of
srounded
&C trees.
hills
sent to the California
"He probably feels that his down on him for some reason. The belief
gest that the notes Bullshit that area
says in the cipher
inadequacy," said the report.
so
them
Wrote Zodiac:
the horizon.
was
John Lynch, who
all, it
20 miles northeast of Vallejo, evaluation. The report came back that Zo-
killing to the satisfaction of sex
clar-
were running. The papers had printed that the night was well-lit
cipher message
for a psychiatric
a negro
Zodiac
were "The
Facility in Vacaville,
ings of isolation
he had managed to peg
Lou
accurately into Betty
the investigation. "After " will not give you my name.'
The Zodiac's
Zodiac
he had called police from the phone
booth, and that the passerby
ified for the
my
E. Pheiberte
garble might be just that — a garble to try to throw us off the
The boy, wrote Zodiac, was "thrashing out how I shot him in the
after being shot.
F. L.
the guesses. But the cops were unimpressed.
smoking
published
cigarettes.
The women did not
the license-plate number, but they did notice that he was reasonably nice looking, between 25 and 35 years of age, around six feet tall and weighing upwards of 200 pounds.
Donald and Bettye Harden's solution to the cryptogram, and everyone tried to make a name out of the jumble of letters at the end: Emmet O. Wright, Robert Henipliill, Van
15
UNSOLVED CRIMES
^ a
p
r t
3
^.
c
B i^
p
H
n
;r
M.
y
Salinas schoolteacher
Gene Harden
V
'/
(right)
c
a;
,4
Donald and his
decoded the threemailed to the San Francisco Chronicle and two other area newspapers on July 31, 1969. Harden's work wife, Bettye,
part cipher
(left)
sheet (above)
shows
his trans-
lation of the first part of the
cryptogram, in which Zodiac states his motive for murder— "I like killing people because is
so
—and
much fun"
it
his belief
that the dead will be his slaves in "paradice."
^ ^
I
^
S
ti
a X
?!
i^
^
A
o
--^
'ing figure.
Almost as frightening as the weapon was the man's appearance. Under cover of an oak tree. Zodiac had donned a square black hood that sat stiffly on his shoulders. There were slits for his mouth and eyes, and a pair of clip-on sunglasses
Shepard, 22, and Bryan Hartnell, 20, had
been close friends for two years at Pacific Union College
Angwin.
was
lake
Cecelia Shepard
a wildcat.
about
a treeless stretch, where water covered the land
was
fitted
over the eyeholes.
On
a long bib that
extended from the hood to cover the gunman's chest was stitched a white circle with a cross
one
hip,
superimposed on
it.
On
he wore a bayonet-like knife in a wooden sheath;
from the other hung a black holster along with several lengths of white plastic clothesline. In his right hand, he held
a blued-steel semiautomatic outstretched at the young couple
on the blanket.
An
isolated picnic area
ryessa (left) killing
right
is
was
on Lake Ber-
the site of a Zodiac
on September 27, 1969. At journalist-artist
smith's depiction of
Robert Gray-
how
the killer
looked that day, clad in a fourcornered hood, dark glasses, and a tunic emblazoned with a three-inchwide crossed circle. Although he holds a pistol in his right hand, the
weapons of death are at his left hand: a clothesline and a foot-long knife.
UNSOLVED CRIMES
"I
want your money and car keys,"
almost monotone voice.
He
"Hey, what am I looking at? I can't stand this." He mrned his head and froze, determined not to make a sound, knowing that if he did, he would die. At last. Zodiac was finished,
said Zodiac in a calm,
claimed that he had escaped
from prison in Montana, that he had killed a guard in the process, and needed a car in which to escape to Mexico. The
fulfilled. He stood, and still holding the bloody bayonet, walked back along the peninsula and up the gravel trail to
one he drove now was "too hot," he said. Bryan Harmell relaxed a bit, thinking it was just a robbery. He gave the gunman his keys and his money — it amounted to less than a dollar — and started talking with him, trying to keep the situation calm. Zodiac listened for a few minutes, then said, "Lie face
down on
and
boy up," he
by
knife.
said.
Zodiac returned to
make
Back es,
There was more conversation in the same voice, so calm and quiet that Bryan could not believe they would be hurt. But then Zodiac's voice took on a new tone. "I'm going to have to stab you people," he said. said Hartnell. "I'm chicken.
a telephone
she
cr>'ing
his car, started
was
Though
still
it
up, and drove off to
call.
at the lake, Cecelia
consciousness.
"I'm getting nervous."
first,"
his
Sept 27-69-6:30
Zodiac took over, and after tying up the young woman himself, he bound Bryan Hartnell securely, and then
me
on the passenger-side door. He made symbol and printed:
12-20-68
easily.
"Please stab
He
haunches,
7-4-69
a few loose knots that he could have escaped from
said:
his
Vallejo
She looped the clothesline around Harmell's wrists and tied
started writing
on
the ground. I'm
Zodiac turned to Shepard. the
There, he stepped over to Harmell's car.
circle-and-cross trademark
you up." going to have to Hartnell thought about going for the gun. But there was Cecelia Shepard to consider. Besides, all the hooded man wanted was money. tie
cars.
took out a black felt-tipped pen, squatted
tie
"You
two
the
Shepard incredibly recovered
her aorta had been cut in
two
and she and Bryan Hartnell
alive,
plac-
started
out for help.
Hartnell started thinking about getting loose. Painfully,
he rolled himself into a position where he could start gnawing with his teeth at the plastic clothesline binding Cecelia
Shepard's wrists.
I
made
The
slippery coating of blood covering the
"I'll do just that," said Zodiac, and whipped out his bayonet. He knelt and started slamming the foot-long knife into
little easier, and he slowly loosened them and freed Shepard. Somehow, she overcame her agony to untie Hartnell. They both summoned the strength
Hartnell's back.
to
Blood was spurting up into Cecelia Shepard's face and she was screaming for Zodiac to stop. Still on his knees. Zodiac
young son m a boat out on the and groans. When he looked toward the peninsula and saw the bloody couple, he started up his outboard motor and sped off in the direction of the nearest ranger station two miles up the lake. Bryan Hartnell had
knots
couldn't stand to see her stabbed."
let
out an eerie sort of grating growl.
young
woman and
stabbed her
He
then began
plunging the knife with a frantic rhythm — into her back, her chest, her groin, her
for help.
father fishing with his
lake heard their pleas
whirled to the
in the ribs,
cr>-
A
his task a
seen the fisherman, but
abdomen.
when
the boat roared
spaired of help from that quarter.
"Stop! Stop! Stop!" screamed Shepard.
He
He would
away he
de-
have to seek
The young woman was writhing in agony on the ground, and Zodiac worked to pin down the slender figure, to hold her steady for death. The knife continued to rise and fall —
help himself.
24 times in aU. A few feet away, Bryan Harmell was still dimly conscious and watching the macabre scene. One knife thrust had grazed the sac surrounding his heart but had not penetrated
took the fisherman close to half an hour to reach the ranger station and another 15 minutes or so for two rescue parties to reach the peninsula, one by car and the
it.
As
started to crawl along the path leading off
the peninsula, although he that he could scarcely
was
so
weak from
loss of
blood
move.
It
second by boat. The ranger in the patrol car found Br)'an Harmell still valiantly crawling up the trail, 300 yards from
he looked on, the thought flashed through his head.
20
ZODIAC
where Cecelia Shepard lay. Hartnell told the ranger that Shepard was out on the peninsula. The ranger jumped back in his car and rushed down to find her. The park facilities at Lake Berryessa did not include an ambulance. The nearest emergency team was an hour away, at Queen of the Valley Hospital in Napa. The rangers did what little they could for first aid and wrapped the two desperately wounded young people in blankets to wait. At 7:40 p.m., about 70 minutes after the assault, the duty officer at the
incoming
Napa Count)'
call
on
Police
Department answered the
line one.
murder — no, a double murder," said on the other end. "They are two miles north of park headquarters. They were in a white Volkswagen Karmann-Ghia." The caller paused, and the Napa County dut>' officer asked: "Where are you?" "I'm the one who did it," whispered the voice. The caller put down the receiver, but he did not hang up. The police officer could hear traffic noises and voices in "I
want
to report a
the calm, young-sounding voice
CECELIA
ANN SHEPARD
the background.
Acting quickly, the officer called the phone company, a pay phone at the Napa Car- Wash Napa, 27 miles from the scene of the attack. Typically for Zodiac, the phone was scarcely four blcKks from the police station. But by the time the cops got there, the killer was gone. It was close to 8:30 when an ambulance finally arrived at the lake, and another hour or so passed before Cecelia Shepard and Br) an Hannell reached the hospital. Although he
which traced the
on Main
call to
Street in
was
critically wounded, Hartnell's chances of survival seemed good. Doctors worked over Shepard in the operat-
ing
room most of the night, but her wounds were simply too
massive for her to her
when
live.
Cecelia Shepard's parents were with
she died at 3:45 the next afternoon.
A guard was assigned to watch over Bryan Hartnell around the clock. "With a psychopath on the loose, we can't take any chances with the only living witness," said a captam in the Napa Sheriffs Office. Indeed. Aside from Harmell's description of the the attack, there were precious few clues.
The
man and Twenr>'-year-old pre-law student Bryan Hartnell survived the
three college
Lake Berryessa attack and provided police with a descrip-
women told of their encounter with the odd-acting young man earlier in the afternoon, and an artist produced a composite sketch
from
their descriptions.
anyone resembling the
tion of Cecelia Shepard's killer.
But police did not find
picture. Fingerprint technicians did
21
To
claim credit for what he believed to
be a double murder at Lake Berryessa, Zodiac called the police from this Napa pay phone, leaving the receiver dangling after
making
the
call.
manage, however, to telephone — possibly
At the
lift
a
palm
from the car-wash
print
a useful bit of evidence.
scene, near
Bryan Hartnell's
car, detectives
found
deep footprints that confirmed a weight of around 220 poimds for Zodiac. The shoe was a size 10 '/z. A manufacturer's
boot
trademark on the sole identified
known
as a
Wing Walker. More
it
as a chukka-style
than 1,000,000 pairs
had been produced under military contract; 103,700 pairs had been shipped to Ogden, Utah, for distribution to navy and air force bases on the West Coast. Zodiac, it appeared, might be connected with the armed forces. That was something, but potential suspects.
And
an impossible universe of dismay of police, the killer activities. After the murders of
it
left
to the
seemed to be stepping up his Betty Lou Jensen and David Faraday, Zodiac had paused nearly seven months before killmg Darlene Ferrin. Only 12 weeks had passed between Ferrin's death and his strike at Lake Berryessa.
The next killed
chose
interval
shorter
still.
Two
weeks
after
Cecelia Shepard, Zodiac murdered again.
this victim at
Francisco
was
random
also,
but
he
He
now in the city of San
itself.
At 9:30 p.m. on the foggy evening of Saturday, Oaober Paul Lee Stine was waiting for a fare in the cab rank of the world-renowned St. Francis Hotel near Union Square. 1
1,
The 29-year-old
Stine
was studying
for a Ph.D. in English
San Francisco State and needed all the part-time taxi money he could make. Not that he particularly cared for driving a cab; five weeks before, he had been robbed by a couple of armed men. That worried Stine's wife, and it worat
ried him.
The
theaters in the
Union Square area were
dis-
gorging smiling, chattering patrons, and a stream of yellow taxicabs flowed through the streets. Stine responded to a
radio dispatch for an address on Ninth
away from
Avenue and pulled
the curb.
But the masses of people slowed everything down, and
was just inching along. Stine halted when a stocky man flagged him down and came up to the window. The man gave an address that was not too far from the Ninth Avenue call, on Washington Street at Maple in the section of the city called Presidio Heights. Its principal landmark is the Presidio, the headquarters of the U.S. Sixth Army, the traffic
which sprawls over 1 ,400 heavily wooded parklike acres. It would require only a quick detour to take the man to his
—
sand
In the
Lake Ber-
at the
ryessa picnic
investigators
site,
found deep footprints with a trademark in the sole's
circular
instep (inset)-
The mark
identi-
fied the killer's shoes as size
10 '/2 government-issue Wing Walkers, made by Avon, a Massachusetts company. (TTie sole of
an identical shoe
shown
above.) Clear heel prints
is
suggested that Zodiac had
—
walked rather than run from the scene.
other into
;JpSrf»-^"' ;|gp^
clothes.
j^jj.
The
what anatomists—and coroners — call the zygomatic arch, a bony prominence in front of the ear, and lodged in the muscle overlying the arch. Paul Lee Stine was dead by the time the bullet chunks came to rest. Zodiac got out of the backseat and slid into the front. The third ripped through
time
was
At
down
9:55.
that
moment, a 14-year-old
at the
girl
happened to look
cab from the second-floor window of a house
across the street. She yelled for her 16-year-old brother.
They saw a heavyset man in the front seat of the cab. He had the driver's head in his lap and appeared to be struggling with him or searching him. Zodiac was looking for the driver's wallet. He found it and then yanked at the dead man's shirt and ripped away a piece of the garment. Next, he leaned over the body and
destination. Stine
waved him
down
into the backseat of the cab, quickly jotted
on
the address
About
1
minutes
his trip sheet, later, the
ton Street address. For
changed farther
his
mind
down
and
started to
some reason — perhaps
at the last
roll.
cab arrived at the Washing-
the street, to the corner of
started wiping
the passenger
minute — Stine drove a
and yanked
frantically at the encircling
it
wipe down the
He got
out
driver's door,
in to
toward the
From
arm, but though he was a well-
them
He
Presidio.
their
window,
called the police,
police operator asked
any case, for in his right hand Zodiac held a 9-mm. semiautomatic pistol. He jammed it had but a second or two,
to
the handle,
back. Stine clawed
muscled 180 pounds, he could not loosen the embrace.
the driver's side of the cab.
and the mirror. He opened the door and leaned wipe the dashboard area again. Then he closed the door and walked away, heading north on Cherry Street
Washington and
The dark, fog-shrouded grounds of the Presidio were two blocks away. Zodiac leaned forward, swung his left forearm around Cherry.
the cab driver's head,
down
and came around the cab
little
the kids
who if
had witnessed
it all.
One
logged in the alarm at 9:58.
the crime
was
still
of
The
in progress.
"Yes," answered the teenager.
in
The operator
tried to get a physical description of the
made pulp of his brain
man, and in the confusion of the moment a critical error was made. He jotted down that the man leaving the cab — a negro male adult — instead of a WMA, a was an white male adult. The operator asked in which direction the man had gone
side of his head;
and whether he was armed.
against the cabby's right temple
There was very
little
and pulled the
trigger.
sound. Stine's head absorbed most
NMA
of the muzzle blast as the heavy, copper-coated slug ex-
ploded into his
skull,
fragmenting into three pieces that
tissue. Two of them exited on the left one dropped to the floor of the car, the
23
UNSOLVED CRIMES
'.W Paul Seine's
left
arm dangles out
^^^
the front
passenger door of his yellow cab (bottom) on the night of October 11, 1969. Inside the car, parked at the
comer of
Washington and Cherry streets, the dead cabby lay sprawled across the front seat, his head resting on the floorboard.
^^^^^
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ORIGINAL ORAUIING
Additional infor^tion hes Supplementing our Bulletin 87-69 of October 13, 1969. known as ZUDIAL . developed the above amended drau/ing of murder suspect Brou/n Hoir, possibly »lth 3S-4S Years, approxinately 5'a-. Heavy Build, Short Automatic. Red Tint, HJeors Glasses. Armed Kith 9
UIIW,
were assigned to every bus. No fewer than 70 units of heavily
armed Napa cops rode shotgun on the buses; Forestry Department rangers in pickups helped guard the buses, and aircraft from the sheriffs department and trolled the school-bus routes. Said
m
Available for comparison!
Inspectors Armstrong 4 Toschi Homicide Detail CASE NO. 696314
years of age, five feet eight inches,
official:
The
little
psychological
Thomas
C.
Lynch issued a statement promising Zodiac help and full protection of his rights if he would give himself up. "He obviously is an intelligent individual," said Lynch. "He
knows that eventually he will be taken into custody, so would be best that he give himself up before tragedy
it
is
written in blood."
The Sunday Examiner
"You
you help
patrolmen
had ever encountered Zodiac. Nonetheless, working from the officers' description, a police arrist constructed a
glasses.
authorities also decided to use a
warfare. California State Attorney General
plea: its
200 pounds, with short
reddish-brown hair and heavy-rimmed
with despair." denied that two of
THOIWS J. CAHILL CHIFF OF POLICE
composite drawing: Zodiac was seen as between 35 and 45
the local flying club pa-
one Napa school
do you overreact to a threat like that? We're worrying whether we've done enough." And what was happening in Napa County was happening all around the Bay Area. At this point, the cops got a little better idea of what Zodiac looked like — at the expense of some embarrassment. Finally, the two radio-car patrolmen who had raced to Cherry and Jackson streets on the night of the taxi driver's murder realized that they had come face-to-face with Zodiac. The two officers were said to be "shattered and Officially, the S.F.P.D.
it ing.
ANY INFORMATION!
"How
filled
Slugs, Casings, Latents, Handiur
face
life
yourself.
Examiner.
We
We
offer
But we do offer vou
new
30
printed
its
own
pious, self-serving
as a hunted, tormented animal
— unless
ask that you give yourself up, to the
you no protection, and no sympathy. fair
treatment, the assurance of medical
ZODIAC
Famed
attorney Mclvin Belli
(right) appears
on an October
22, 1969, morning
show with
ready to take diac.
help and the
benefits of
full
the lure the editors killer:
"And we
your
legal rights."
hoped would land the
offer to
tell
nowned
Then came tele-
phone number and the suggestion to call collect. Zodiac fell for none of this. He had the authorities thoroughly buffaloed, and he meant to pursue his own agenda. He might even have been exercising his sense of humor. A
frightened. Literally
an October 20 stratSan Francisco's Hall of Justice, Inspectors Toschi and Armstrong conferred with detectives from the police and sheriffs departments of no fewer than sbc
egy session held
gence, the FBI, the U.S. Post Office, the California
the state Bureau of Criminal Identification
police speculated.
jumped at Zodiac's on such short notice, but suggestion. Bailey was unavailable TV two-hour, early-morning the Belli agreed to appear on Dunbar. host talk show with Jim Whatever the
operated behind a sidewalk picture win-
He was
and
Investigation.
than 100 murderers with only three convictions. Called "the
Street.
intelli-
Highway
and Zodiac was unaware of the meeting, of course, but being as cagey as he surely was, he had to know that time and the odds were turning against him. Or so the Patrol,
I
Montgomery
in
suburban counties, plus representatives from naval
"This is the Zodiac speaking," the calm voice said. "I want you to get in touch with F. Lee Bailey. If you can't come up with Bailey, I'll settle for Melvin Belli. want one or the other to appear on the Channel Seven talk show. I'll make contact by telephone." Bailey and Belli were the two most successful criminal lawyers in the coimtry. Bailey, who was known as the master of acquittal, was famed for having defended no fewer
Belli
murder game — and maybe a little hundreds of cops were on the hunt and
his
starting to coordinate their efforts; at
San Francisco.
Francisco's
from the Zo-
never called.
Just possibly, reasoned the authorities. Zodiac could be
was about to begin. At 2 a.m. on October 22, 1969, the phone jangled at the police department in Oakland, the city across the bay from
dow on San
calls
killer
as the defender of such headline malefactors as
growing weary of
bizarre episode
king of torts,"
talk
Hollywood mobster Mickey Cohen and Jack Ruby, slayer of presidential assassin Lee Harvey Oswald, and for his flamboyant courtroom style.
publicity-loving
your story." There was a
The
TV
host Jim Dunbar,
re-
31
case, the authorities
— UNSOLVED CRLME5
Injecting
humor
into his deadly
and cryptic correspond-
November
ence. Zodiac wrote a
8,
1969, note to the
San Francisco Chronicle on a "Jesters" greeting card. He enclosed a letter in which he claimed seven viaims two more than the poUce were aware of and a second cipher (background). This code was never broken.
—
What followed could only be described
The first call came in at 7: 10 a.m., during a commercial, and the man quickly hung up. He called again 10 minutes later. Belli asked the man if they might call him by a name
police cars followed
ominous than Zodiac. "Sam," answered the youthful voice. Belli asked where they might meet. "Meet me at the top of the Fairmont Hotel," said Sam. "Without anyone else, or I'll jump." At this point, Sam hung up, perhaps to defeat a phone company trace. But he soon called back. Belli
asked
that he did but insisted said he
was, never showed up. After about 45 minutes, Melvin decided to go home, and the parade reversed
The Oakland cop who had taken the
was sick, that he had headaches. want to go to the gas chamber,"
have headaches.
If
I
kill
1
said
Sam.
"1
from
show
The
police gathered together three
who had
talked to Zodiac: the Vallejo
Zodiac, they concluded.
Who
don't get them."
him
the original call
and Napa switchboard operators and Br) an Hartnell. They all agreed that Zodiac's voice was deeper and more mature. Sam sounded too young and insecure, too patheric to be
no one had gone to the gas chamber in California for years, that this talk was his passpon to sunival. He asked Sam how long he had been exSoothingly, Belli told
Belli
itself.
claiming to be Zodiac thought that the talk
of the four people
Sam answered that his problem was not mental. He
"1 don't
man
voice sounded different.
he needed medical attention.
if
a gaggle of
crews, radio trucks, re-
and photographers. Zodiac, or Sam, or whoever he
porters,
less
TV camera
by
as a procession of
was followed by
the absurd. Melvin Belli's car
was
not Zodiac? Police succeeded
if
it,
subsequent phone
that
calls
made
who had
a mental patient
to
Belli.
Sam
in tracing
turned out to be
access to a telephone at
Napa
State Hospital.
periencing the headaches.
"Since Belli
I
killed a kid,"
asked
the
if
"No," answered Sam. Belli It
asked
if
had no
effect. it
so
the
fits.
"I just
he took aspirin.
And
Whether Zodiac did or did not make that
responded Sam.
man had
have headaches."
Sam said
Zodiac
fever.
Yet the
calls,
ing school buses,
in the grip
of
like
you're in a great deal of pain," said the
again. "I'm going to
kill
and
railing
and threatening to an extent
quired postage.
contained another bloodstained scrap of cabdriver Paul
them; I'm going to
Srine's shirt.
The message was
those kids."
The next time Sam phoned, the call was not broadcast. "Do you want me to be your lawyer? There is goodness in you. Would you like to tell me anything?" asked Belli. "Nothing," answered Sam, then added, "I feel an awful
thought funny.
On
printed
on a greeting card that the killer was a picture of a soaking wet
the front
fountain pen, with the caption: "Sorry I
just
"and
lonesomeness."
washed I
can't
Zodiac's
my pen
.
.
." Inside
do a thing with
own
about the gas chamber and staned talking to
Sam about where to meet. He suggested the Old St. Mary's Church in Chinatown rather than the Fairmont. Sam countered with Shop on Mission
This 1
is
10:30 that same morning.
32
haven't written, but
was the pimch line:
hand-printed message began as usual:
the Zodiac speaking
though you would nead a
good laugh before you hear the bad news you won't get the
Street at
1
the flap
it!"
he would speak to the district attorney
the St. Vincent de Paul Thrift
in-
10, 1969, two letters arrived at As usual, both of them had double the reBy way of authentication, the first envelope
the newspaper.
anorney. "Your voice sounds muffled. What's the matter?"
Belli said that
was
curiously silent about the
On Monday, November
headache," explained Sam.
Sam moaned
was
venting yet another cipher, talking again about target-
not seen before.
kill all
killer
was too preoccupied with claiming two more murders,
a dozen of which were broadcast to the
At one point, a sound resembling a faint scream came over the phone and Belli asked, "What was that?"
"You sound
to
episode the next time he wrote to the Chronicle. Perhaps he
television audience.
"My
first call
he must have gotten a kick out
police,
of the subsequent uproar. San Francisco
that he did bur that
went, on and on, over the course of two hours
and 35 phone
Oakland
/\
t\
b
' effecrive" way to avoid leaving fingerprints.
had been out of
months
Zo-
mail before California enaaed a ban on such sales and thus
Des July Aug Sept Oct = 7.
it
killmg.
to say that he always painted his fingertips with
All of his guns but one, he continued,
schi sent
far that
ver\ different
when he was not
coats of transparent model airplane glue
At the bottom of the card Zodiac had written:
by
killer said that the police descrif)-
in
August
had been slain in San Jose, 50 miles south of San Francisco. Each of them had been stabbed repeatedly; neither had been sexually assaulted.
case in which
girls
But the apparent link to Zodiac dissolved when
another person was arrested for the crimes. In the second of the letters received
Zodiac announced that he was changing
on November his st\!e.
He
10,
again
claimed seven murders, but said:
I
have gro\Mi
rather angr\' with the police for their telling lies
So
I
shall
about me.
change the way the
collecting of slaves.
I
shall
no longer announce to anyone. when I committ my murders, they shall look like routine robberies, killings of anger,
a few fake accidents,
The
&
etc.
police shall never catch
me.
A bomb
diagram Zodiac sent to the Chronicle on No\ em-
ber 9, 1969, notes in the top right comer, "bus goes bang car passes by ok." The bomb's trigger mechanism entailed having the passing bus break a photoelectric
34
beam.
ZODIAC
walking
down
park when
them
&; one of
&c asked
this
if I
the
reasons, the Chronicle refrained from printing the
to the
hilJ
cop car pulled up called
me
threat part of the
Nothing further was heard from Zodiac
over
saw any one
Christmas card to Melvin
acting suspicisous or strange in the last 5 to
was
yes there
10 min &:
this
ber 27.
letter.
Zodiac wished the law-
yer a
a gun
he sent a
also contained yet another swatch of
"Merry Xmass and New Year," and, for the seemed to be having some second thoughts:
man who
was running by waveing
The envelope
until
was opened on Decem-
Belli that
Paul Stine's shirt and a short
said
I
bomb-
letter.
first
time,
&C the cops peeled rubber &:
The one
went around the comer as I directed them &: I dissap eared into the park a block &i
a half
away never
this thing in I
pig doesnt
you up
am
1
me won't
extreamly
it
in
check
icult to
hold
afraid
will loose control
booboos?
again and take
rile
I
Zodiac hooted at the police for thinking that he ever meant to take on a school bus with a gun. He had a much better idea — a bomb — and he explained how he could make a death-spewing, electrically triggered mine from a bag of ammonium nitrate fertilizer, a gallon of stove oil, and some bags of gravel. For the edification of the cops, Zodiac sketched out the device and described how it could be tall
vehicle
—a
bus for instance — would
1
think you
do not have
am
moment.
am
&
nineth
drownding.
TTie
Belli that
bomb was
schoolchildren were safe for
so big and
difficult to
dig
in,
and the trigger mechanism needed a lot of work to get it just right. Zodiac signed off: "If I hold back too long from no nine,
will loose complet..."
I
Zodiac crossed out that word and substituted the word "all," and then continued: "controol of my self &: set the
trip the trigger its
I
1
dif-
viaom. Please
Zodiac confided to the
placed in an elevated position at the side of the road so that
mechanism, while an auto could not, because of height. Zodiac went on:
me
help
my
me.
let
it
to have your noze rubed in \our
it
is
cannot
finding
posibly tenth
a
ask of you
1
reach out for help because of
to be seen
again.
Hey
thing
please help me.
this,
lower
bomb
up. Please help
much
longer."
me
I
can not remain
in control for
Victim No. 9 and maybe No. 10? That sounded as if Zodiac wanted the police to know — or think— that he had
the
by continually searching the
an eighth time since his November letters. The police undertook a painstaking appraisal of unsolved homicides
road sides looking for
that
manpower
&
thing.
&
to stop this one
it
wont do
killed
this
had wrinen
schedule the busses bee
re
ause the
bomb
had occurred between
None seemed
to re roat
can be adapted
in his
new conditions. Have fun!! By the way
Belli
do everything
could be rather messy
I
you
e\er help you
to bluff me.
they read the
letter,
Inspeaor Toschi and
leagues immediately queried
army bomb
ble?" one of
"It cerrainlv is."
them responded.
letter that
he was plan-
in style.
pleaded with Zodiac through the pages of the "You have asked me for help and I promise you
if
When
Christmas.
Zodiac — but of course he
Chronicle:
it
tr>-
November and
second November
ning a radical change
to
early
to point clearly to
will
in
my power to provide you
may need
or
may want."
Belli
with what-
offered to meet
Zodiac alone — or with a priest, psychiatrist, or reporter, whatever Zodiac wished. He told the killer: "You say you
his col-
are 'losing control'
experts. "Possi-
For obvious
worse. Let
35
me
and may kill again. now."
help vou
Do
not
make
things
Belli told reporters that
rational
mood when
sidering his funire
he
felt
Zodiac had been
he wrote the
and knew
it
letters,
in
a calm,
was con-
that he
to be bleak. "Unless he gets
proper legal representation, he will
most probably be
tenced to die in the gas chamber. That
is
why
he
is
sen-
crying
out for help."
Zodiac
may have been doing nothing of the sort. He may Belli around. He never answered
simply have been jerking the lawyer's appeal.
Kathleen Johns had
L
visit
the distance
a long drive ahead as she set out to
her sick mother on Sunday,
from Johns's home
in
March
22, 1970;
San Bernardino, east
of Los Angeles, to her mother's house in Petaluma, a small farming community northwest of San Francisco,
The 23-year-old Johns was not trip; she had a 10-month old baby and was seven months pregnant. But she rested during the day and set out late in the afternoon, hoping that the baby would sleep during most of the trip.
was some 400
miles.
looking forward to the
It
was about midnight when Johns noticed
steady bghts of a
car in her rearview mirror.
the
She
would pass. Instead, the and soundmg his horn. Then he pulled alongside and hollered that Johns's left rear wheel was wobbling. Johns pulled over to the side of Highway 132, and the man pulled in behind her, got out, and came up to her window. slowed to see
if
the other car
driver started blinking his lights
neatly dressed
Johns could see and clean-shaven, about 30 years
maybe.
In his hand, he held a tire iron.
In the glare of his headlights, Kathleen
that he
was
old, a serviceman
"Your in
a
left
rear wheel
is
wobbling," the
soft, gentle voice. "I'll tighten
man
your lugs
if
said again,
you'd
like."
Johns thanked him and could hear him working on the wheel. In a few minutes, he came back and said, "O.K. That should do it." Then he got back in his car and drove off. Kathleen Johns had driven less than 100 feet when the
went spinning off. The station wagon lurched and ground to a halt on the left rear axle. The stranger immediately stopped and backed up. "Oh, no," he said. "The trouble's worse than I thought. I'll give you a ride to
rear wheel
the service station."
Up
ahead, about a quarter-mile in
the distance, they could see the floodlights
Arco gas
and sign of an
station.
Kathleen Johns had few options. She picked up her baby
Two
months
after
Melvin
Belli's fruitless televi-
sion appearance, he received a Christmas letter
from Zodiac. Mailed locally with double postage and signed with the emblematic crossed circle, it was the killer's eighth letter and the first in
which he asked
for help.
ZODIAC
and got
in the stranger's car.
headlights were
in the ignition.
still
Then
he did that, Johns told herself, she would
she noticed that her
and remembered that the keys were The man hopped out, punched off the
car with her baby
still lit
Abruptly, the
and removed the keys.
lights,
if
down
a farm road.
A couple
"Do you always go around
field.
grass
of times he slowed as
I
at her.
helping people on the road
them they don't need any
you."
Kathleen Johns was certain that he meant
knew he meant
it
when
And
it.
she
he said, "I'm going to throw
baby out."
the
But nothing happened immediately. The stranger kept driving
down one back
road and up another.
A
couple of
Srine.
hours passed. Ever>- so often, her captor would repeat that
was about
she it,
he spoke
in
to die, that he
As
man
would
kill
her.
When
no emotion of any
her. First, she concentrated
in case she
and
same time," Kathleen Johns
on
somehow managed
from the dashboard showed her a
kind.
the appearance of the to survive.
fairly
The glow
strong face with a
back.
author
his investigation, "this old semi-
the freeway, his lights
It is
When
police
unlikely that he hitched a ride; he
have taken a bike along or he
five foot nine; she thought the man was a little and weighed somewhere in the neighborhood of 170 pounds. His hair seemed to be brown, worn in a sort of crew cut, and he had glasses with heavy rims; a band of elastic around his head held the spectacles firmly in place. He had on a blue-black nylon jacket over a white shirt, with
Johns was
Back
San Bernardino, Kathleen Johns studied
in
may
may have walked.
mug
shots of potential suspeas sent to her by San Francisco P.D.
shorter
Inspeaor Dave Toschi. Her kidnapper was not tures. "If
I
saw him
again, though,
I
would
in the pic-
instantly rec-
ognize him," she said. Despite Johns's reaction to the Zodiac composite, there
was not enough supporting evidence
black bell-bortt)m trousers. His highly polished black shoes
Maybe the
come
later told
Zodiac.
a puzzlement.
chin that retained the scars of adolescent acne. Kathleen
reminded Johns of navy-issue footwear. a navy man.
was going on
He was shining
calling for her to
went to retrieve Kathleen Johns's station wagon, the car was gone. They ultimately found it on another road some distance away — completely gutted by fire. The kidnapper apparently had returned to the car, gone to the trouble of putting the wheel back on, then driven the vehicle to where he torched it. How he had then remrned to his own car \sas
he said
frightened as she was, Kathleen Johns kept her wits
about
the
through the grass.
There was a weird postscript to the episode.
a monotone, slowly, precisely, his voice be-
traying no anger,
field
must have flashed on the man because the driver stopped that big thing on a dime and jumped out and yelled 'What the hell is going on?' and this guy jumped in his car and split." Later, at a local police station, Kathleen Johns happened to look at a bulletin board with some wanted posters tacked on it. "Oh, my God," she screamed. "That's him. That's him right there." She was staring at the composite drawing of the man wanted for the murder of San Francisco cabdriver Paul
By now, Johns was thoroughly scared. They rode in si30 minutes. Finally, the man turned to her and said: "You know you're going to die. You know I'm
also
man
truck
lence for another
kill
She could see the a flashlight into the
"About
help," he said in a voice filled with menace.
going to
He had made
In a flash,
She found a shallow irrigation ditch lined with tall and dropped into it, holding her body over her infant
Robert Graysmith during
get through with
the brakes.
up a freeway ramp.
to muffle the cries.
like this?" she asked.
"When
the
Johns had the door open. Clutching her baby, she leaped out, dashed across the dark road and out into the middle of a
to pull over but accelerated again. Kathleen thought he
might be working up to make a pass
jump out of
start running.
man jammed on
the mistake of driving
The Arco station came up — and receded into the distance. The man kept driving. He passed one exit, then another. That was weird. Johns became uncomfortable but said nothing. Eventually, the man swung off the highway and started
and
for the police to lay the
stranger
abduction to Zodiac officially. Nevertheless, the suspicion
made up her mind to escape — or at least tr\'. The man drove carefully and slowed almost but not quite to a halt at stop signs. The next time
was strong. As Robert Graysmith wrote: "The faa that the murder attempt on Kathleen and her baby occurred near and that the man was dressed midnight, on a weekend in Navy garb and wore a crew cut, led me to belie\c that she
was
Kathleen Johns
she
would
give
it
a
.
37
.
.
UNSOLVED CRIMES
t
had escaped from the Zodiac killer. Added to this was the fact that the stranger wore dark-riinmed glasses and spoke
in the
monotone voice
that
all
the surviving vic-
tims have mentioned."
Over
the next several months, Zodiac's letter-
writing campaign to the media and police
jumped
Between April 20 and October 27, 1970, the killer composed and mailed no fewer than seven bragging, taunting messages in which, among other things, he suggested that he had claimed another 10 into overdrive.
"slaves" for his
As
afterlife.
usual, the April
20
letter.
Zodiac's ninth in San
Francisco, opened with the now-familiar salutation is the Zodiac speaking" and went on to inquire if anybody had solved his last cipher. What came across crystal clear was Zodiac's statement that he had killed 1 people to date and that it would have been a lot more had his bus bomb not been a dud. The killer explained that the device had been "swamped out" in a recent rain. But there was a new and more complicated bomb now. Zodiac promised, and he sketched it out in a diagram. He then wrote: "I hope you have fun trying figure
"This
out
who
I
killed."
At the end of the letter he said that the score stood at 10 for Zodiac and zero for the San Francisco police. The killer's next communication arrived a little over a week later, on Wednesday, April 29. Zodiac was in a humorous mood again. He sent a greeting card that showed
two gnarled prospectors riding along, one on a donkey, the other on a panting, pooped-out dragon. The punch line read, "Sorry to hear your ass
His message:
is
a dragon."
He would bomb
a school bus unless the
authorities publicized the details of his latest
threat to use
it
And something I
that he
had made
else:
would like some nice Zodiac butons
to see
wandering about town. Every one else had these buttons like,
® black power,
melvin eats
bluber, etc. Well
me up
it
considerbly
would cheer saw
if
1
a lot of people wearing
my
bomb and
the
in his letter of April 20.
/.
K
ZODIAC
buton. Please no nasty ones
next Fall to dig
it
up.
like melvin's
On the enclosed oil company highway map Zodiac had drawn a V whose angle rested on Mt. Diablo in Contra Costa County across the bay. On the summit was a U.S. Navy radio relay station. The mountain's name, Spanish for "devil," sounded an ominous note, but investigators were stumped when they tried to extraa useful clues from the map. And as before, no one could crack the cipher. Zodiac
sounded as though Zodiac was miffed at Melvin Belli reason, or maybe it was just another one of the
It
for
some
weird jokes.
killer's
San Francisco's police chief labeled the
bomb threat a ruse
but nevertheless held a press conference to
know
let
the public
Zodiac was again talking about bombs.
that
ever, at police request, the papers did not print the
Howbomb
diagram — and no Zodiac buttons were ordered.
That
A
A
postmarked June 26 the Zodiac speaking," and then launched
responding to the Chronicle. began, "This
might
Zodiac. Yet he waited two months before
irritated
is
letter
I
have become very upset with
my
I
to punish
But
now
1
is
ended
Some
snapped one
detective.
in
May and
"We If
had
postscript.
code
Map
Zodiac had
bomb
is set.
burning her
found them.
him
shall tie
credit for Kathleen Johns's ab-
would
He began by inflict
on the
in the hereafter:
over ant
hills
then burned. Others shall
be placed
June, the police had no idea
beef I
Zodiac wrote out a two-line, 32-character
untill
in
cages &c fed
salt
they are gorged then
shall listen to their pleass
for water
and
I
shall
laugh at
them.
coupled with
will tell
I
&
nails
al-
cipher and said:
The
I
pine splinters driven under their
their
have
the victims might have been.
As a
my
and watch them scream &C twich and squirm. Others shall have
But Zodiac could easily have
in the papers. Besides, the S.F.P.D.
ready issued an arrest warrant in the case."
who
in
slaves awaiting
er writing out a traffic ticket.
more
howers one
describing the exquisite tortures he
A San Francisco city policeman had in fact been slain with
killed twice
I
threats in the other letter to the Chronicle.
sitting in
lying,"
starting with
&i her baby that
Having apparently taken
a .38-caliber revolver the Friday before as he sat in his cruis-
man. "He's
un-
duction four months before. Zodiac poured out a torrent of
0^-12 SFPD-0
it
how
out for
a parked car with a .38
read about
little list,
woeman
car where
School Buss.
school
man
simultaneously on
reiterated to the Chronicle
evening a few months back that
1
shot a
Zodiac became pos-
now
I
for a coupple
them
summer, so punished them in another way. the
July 27.
at this point.
letters arrived
gave a rather interesting ride
nice -^^ buttons.
full
One
the
they did not comply, by
if
anilating a
Monday,
have a
wishes for them to
wear some promiced
Two
So
San Fran Bay
Area. They have not complied
with
and
passed,
itively garrulous.
happy Zodiac was about the buttons and continued:
into a complaint:
the people of
have been enjoying another chuckle.
just
month
It went on and on — 2^diac hanging his slaves by their thumbs. Zodiac cooking victims in the sun. Zodiac skinning his prey alive and watching them run around shrieking. The
this
you where the
You
have
until!
39
.
UNSOLVED CRIMES
killer
revealed himself to be a Gilbert
and Sullivan
fan, for
the lord high executioner, describes the unfortunates
are
on
his
death
skeleton with a message that perfectly suited Zodiac's pur-
who
pose.
Zodiac's version,
like Gilbert
who
and
Sullivan's,
marked
for
collected autographs, people with
I
and
irritating laughs,
in
you ache
them be missed."
I'll
tuated his
with the
Zodiac ended with
it
bones,
know my name. And so
As Ko-Ko
list
people
The Mikado, Zodiac puncrefrain: "They'd none of them be
never kissed."
missed. They'd none of
feel
my
who ate peppermint and breathed in his face, and women who dressed like men. He added a new offender to the group — "The girl who flabby hands
"FROM YOUR SECRET PAL," announced the card,
followed by a verse:
list.
execution people
Zodiac enclosed a Halloween card featuring a dancing
ries.
he paraphrased lines from The Mikado, in which Ko-Ko,
to
did in
clue
you
in
.
.
his version of the lord high execu-
Paul Avery caught his breath and fumbled to open the
tioner's aria:
taunting card.
why
our game! Happy Halloween!"
And uncompromising
"But then
kind such as wachamacallit,
In large letters across the inside of the card.
thingmebob, and
printed
like wise, well-
nevermind, and tut tut tut
letter
contained a
SFPD =
0,
new
=
practice
on
and gave him
their pistol range. In the Chronicle
one of them himself. The California media played the story for
13.
worth, of course, and that in turn soon
of the detectives
elicited
a
all
it
letter
was from
an anonymous tipster to Avery. The note had been mailed from southern California — and it added a whole new dimension to the Zodiac killings. The writer told Avery about
Halloween murder of Cheri Jo Bates some years before. letter stated that there were numerous similarities with the San Francisco Zodiac kilhngs and that the Riverside police had "a wealth of information." The writer urged Avery to look into the matter. He did, and when photothe
The
decided not to print the two latest
letters. They wondered would react; he might make a mistake that would trap him. Months went by — and nothing, no word at all from Zodiac. Finally, on October 12, the Chronicle published the July 27 letters. Two weeks later another letter from Zodiac let everyone know that he was still around. The recipient this time was Paul Avery, the Chronicle
the publicity-craving Zodiac
who had
Zodiac claiming a 14th victim — or was Avery the The police were taking no chances. They
newsroom, Avery's colleagues began wearing buttons on their lapels — but not the ones that Zodiac had in mind. These declared, "I Am Not Paul Avery." Avery started wearing
In any case, the police and the editors of the Chronicle
reporter
and had drawn a dozen disembodied eyes
"PEEK-A-BOO -YOU ARE DOOMED!"
issued the reporter a license to carry a .38
recent slayings.
how
runelike symbol
some
on the case thought Zodiac was bluffing, that he was not continuing to kill. But if he was still active, he was making very good indeed on his promise to disguise his deeds. They weren't able to connect him to any
Most
his
also included a cryptic,
intended prey?
score for the authorities to
Zodiac
He had
Zodiac had
"Z" and
with a large
it
with the legend,
Was
up the blanks I rather leave up to you. But it really doesn't matter whom you place upon the list, for none of them be missed, none of them be missed.
The
"4-TEEN." He signed
cross-and-circle symbol.
tut,
and whashisname, and you know who, but the task of filling
contemplate:
spoil
copies of
some of the documents
held by the Riverside P.D.
reached the Chronicle, Paul Avery
down
lost
no time husding
to Riverside.
Three days later, Avery caught a plane to Sacramento and met with Sherwood Morrill, the top handwriting expert at the state Bureau of Criminal Identification and Investiga-
written most of the paper's Zodiac sto-
On
back of a children's Halloween card (inmailed to Chronicle crime reporter Paul Avery (right) on October 27, 1970, Zodiac makes the
set)
further reference to the
way
he intends to acquire
slaves that will serve
40
him
in "paradice."
UNSOLVED CRIMES
Southern California newspapers such as the Los Angeles Times (below) were quick to announce the connection be-
tween Zodiac and the 1966 killing of Riverside coed Cheri Jo Bates.
tion. In sealed
envelopes given to him by the Riverside P.D.,
Aveiy carried the actual letters from Cheri Jo Bates's slayer and a photo of the verse scratched into the library desktop. Morrill studied the three penciled notes with the crude
block
"BATES
letters spelling
HAD TO
DIE." At
first
Most
lay claim to the crimes.
Zodiac was
that
other investigators thought
the Riverside
killer.
Zodiac wrote
years.
I
and was gradually losing
letter
turned to the envelopes addressed to Joseph Bates, the Riverside police, and the Riverside Press-Enterprise. "This be-
tinued to boost his tally of victims.
now," he
gins to look alike gives
who
it
away. The Riverside
wrote the Zodiac
On November in a letter to
tionably the
Then, "Yes,
said.
letters
letters in
this is
what
were by the same
man
however, he remained his
the desk
words were
work of Zodiac. The is
Like
hand-printing scratched
the
I
when a
silence
letter arrived
was broken on
not at the San Fran-
Los Angeles Times. Zodiac's
scathing:
handwriting to Morrill; the analyst concluded that
match that of the Bates the Riverside cops
letter writer
felt like
They reasoned
it
have always said
crack proof.
If
the
going to catch me, they had best get off their fat asses &:
who
do something. Because the
longer they fiddle
&
fart
around, the more slaves I
did not
will collect for
my
after
life.
— Zodiac. Nevertheless, Zodiac gave the cops grudging credit for "stumbling
sticking with their original sus-
that even though Zodiac
had not yet
across
San Francisco area in 1967, when the Bates letters were received, he still could have read about the unsolved Riverside murders and written the letters to falsely debut
I
am
Blue Meannies are evere
had known Cheri Jo Bates, although they had never been able to pin anything on him. The police sent a sample of his
his
15, 1971,
Avery that the Riverside writing was "unques-
vinced. Their favored suspect remained the local youth
made
When he did write, self —and he con-
cunning
months before writing again. The
March
have been received by the Chronicle." The Riverside police, however, were not totally con-
pect.
less frequently,
After the Avery Halloween card, the killer waited almost five
same as on the three letters, particularly like that on the envelopes, and this hand-printing is by the same person who has been preparing the Zodiac letters that
on
interest.
bitter,
cisco Chronicle but at the
northern California."
16, after further study, Morrill confirmed
less
if
on the letters did not seem to match that of Zodiac; the letters were too big and blocky. Morrill then glance, the printing
and
In asthe coming he had reached a crest of sorts with the Mikado
Cos
my
Riverside aaivity"
who had
Paul Avery
in the
They
— although
pursued the
link.
it
was newsman
But Zodiac snorted:
are only finding the
Auficlc;5 ^xxatB ^^*.3V«^\^
„*/
^^'j
J"*?*'
am now
who
in control of
brown
hair
cut; heavy,
worn
in
a
thick-rimmed
glasses held in place by a thin
band of elastic. A one-time navy man, this fellow knew about code and explosives also. He was a Gilbert and Sullivan aficionado and often quoted lyrics for friends. An acquaintance described him
will play all
'"/
things,
"K
yours truly:
i/Tf^
0-- guess
SFPD
crew
waiting for a good
movie about me.
the description
saults: five feet eight inches tall;
good but
smarter and better he
will get tired
me.
is
fit
given by survivors of Zodiac's as-
have always been here.
1
That
wit-
nessed the slaying of taxi driver
n,.
-
}->
SFPD
-
c
as very intelligent but a mile-
a-minute talker — "nervous,
ZoThat was again, and all clues led to never heard from diac. He was hard work over many long of much ends. By dint dead in 1 979 to crack managed Graysmith finally Robert hours, the last trace of
the 340-charaaer cipher the
killer
had
netic,
deep depression. "I
message was incomprehensible and shed no
light
on
The the
in fact
(
murders ascribed to Zodiac. Although no one had enough evidence even to make any arrest, many law enforcement favorite suspect.
One
early candidate
habit of baiting policemen attracted attention
was known
in the military
was a heavy-
I
have
toward is
women and
better than sex."
had questioned and cleared him. And the witnesses to the
War 11 and who had trouble
during World
to be a hot-tempered person
getting along with
women where
he worked.
He owned
Stine killing,
when shown
"too old and too
a
white Chevrolet — the kind of car associated with the Zodiac homicides. He had spent time at Terry's Waffle Shop in Vallejo,
once confided, "What
enough cause to pull him in for fingerprinting. The police secured a sample of the man's handwriting; it approximated that of Zodiac, but there was not enough of the sample for an expert to rule him in or out. In any case, Inspeaor Toschi
whose
middle-aged man. Investigators learned that the suspect
had taught code
.
less, was what Zodiac had written in his first coded message, which amateur cryptologists Donald and Bettye Harden had broken in 1969. The police had heard about him through a tip but could never place him at the scene of a killing. They never had
out no
all,
set
.
That, more or
police of various jurisdictions checked In fewerthethan 2,500 suspects at one time or another for the
had a
look O.K. on the outside," the suspea had told ." He was known to have a female
friend yet frequendy exhibited hostility
killer's identity.
officials
may
people, "but inside
sent the Chronicle
with the dripping-fountain-pen card a decade before.
fre-
and temperamental" — who was prone to periods of
The most
who
where the murdered Darlene Hcrrin worked, and in the Lake Bcrryessa area shortly alter Cecel-
alone
interesting suspect
among
the vicinity of
45
man
was a
strange
young man
the possible Zodiacs could be placed in
all six
student at Riverside
was placed
a photograph, declared the
fat."
of the
known
Cin College
killings.
in
1966,
He had been a when Cheri Jo
.
UNSOLVED CRIMES
The 1970 low-budget Zodiac was first of several movies based on the killer. The most famous was
the
Dirty Harry, in which Clint East-
wood plays a police investigator who tracks down a hooded sniper.
was
Bates
slain,
been living
menced
and he had
in Vallejo at the
WHO
IS
time of the 1968-1969 murders. In 1971,
he had
HE
. . .
WHAT
HE
IS
. .
.
WHEN
IS
HE
north to Santa Rosa, where
'Keep Your
next decade. a perfect
He was
scriptions.
Off The
in-
Streets
vestigators learned of an in-
when
as a teenager he
.
.
My
.
knew about
he
explo-
and he had served in where he had been taught code procedures. The police heard about him through his family. He was a collector of guns and a sives,
the navy,
To
hunter.
game"
"true
HAL R6eD-B0B JON€S
or "the most
dangerous game." On the day of the Lake Berryessa at-
i^AcveNTURe
RAY LYNCH
tdm RTTMAN*'P^°^'^!Pf.J'5^
a
He was Zodiac-brand
wrist watch
and a ring with a
COLOR
Z
monogram, which he said was a gift from his sister. In the course of the search and interrogation. Inspector Tos-
had the man fingerprintmade him produce a writing sample on the spot. But the prints did not match the print that had been colchi
ed and
^DMHAN50NIW«NTReLL6MANNVCARPOZAlwE[WER^WAHS5MA~MARINKOVICH,WHANSON IN
arrived in the
middle of the search.
ZODIAC
and he sometimes
spoke of human beings as
them pause.
The man wearing
''^^^'""
a freezer
of animal innards and
mutilated rodent bodies — to give
Next
Victim"
RKO GOLDEN GATE
his brother
sister-in-law,
full
.
As a student of chemis-
135. try,
Thmking
— including
things
Or"
ZODIAC SAYS "I toy Awake Nights
had gotten into a brawl with five Marines and whipped them all. He was intelligent to match, with an IQ above
and a black hood.
none of those items, but they did find enough weird
And Wives
hulking
and enormously strong; stance
sheath,
Toschi and his crew found
Daughters
look-alike for the Zodiac de-
The
items to look
colored jacket, a knife in a
Sisters
The man was
listed
for, including pieces of bloody shirt, rope, pens, glasses, a blue or dark-
GOING TO STRIKE AGAIN??
moved
he remained for most of the
their search.
warrant
GOLDEN GATE AT TAYLOR
673-4841
•
"A HISTORY Of THE
DO YOU
MOTORCYCLt"
WIN A FREE KAWASAKI 350cc
KNOW WHY
MOTORCYCLE
HE Kins??
from Paul
lected
As it
Stine's cab.
to the man's handwriting,
was
unlike that in Zodi-
ac's messages.
However, the
a bloody knife she spotted lying on the seat of his car.
man might well have purposely altered his writing since he knew that the police were attempting to connect him to the
"That's chicken blood," he explained. "1 use
Zodiac murders.
tacks in September
Two
months
1
969, his sister-in-law asked him about
it
to
kill
chickci-
Despite the failure to nail the man, Toschi never forgot
pher, the sister-in-law inquired about a sheet of paper he
about him, and as time went on, more interesting things
was holding
came
ens."
"This later,"
is
the
later,
about the time of the second
was covered with lines of strange symbols. work of an insane person. I'll show it to you
that
he replied, but never did. There were other oddities
and as the Zodiac case unfolded
to light.
1973 at tially
A psychologist who
his family's request
violent"
interviewed the
man
in
concluded that he was "poten-
and "capable of
killing." In
1975 he was
newspapers,
convicted of child molestation and spent three years in an
the family in early 1971 finally decided to get in touch with
institution for the criminally insane. After his release in
as well,
in the
man
Inspeaor Dave Toschi.
1978, parole officers persuaded the
Armed with a search warrant, Toschi led a party of police to a trailer in Santa Rosa where the man occasionally lived.
chiatric tests. In inkblot free-association tests, items starting
The door
to the trailer
was wide open, so
the cops
with the
com-
first
46
letter
to submit to psy-
Z came up with amazing frequency. The very
association astounded everyone; the blot, responded
ZODIAC
man, reminded him of "a zygomatic arch" — the area of Zodiac viaim Paul Stine's skull through which a bullet fragment had passed.
have committed suicide, or died
the
ural causes.
in
an accident or from nat-
possibility, too, that
he might sim-
ply have stopped killing. His madness, or at least the ag-
man
Investigators learned that as a youth in 1965, the
There was a
gressive part of
it,
some doctors
suggested, could have
had told a pair of hunting companions that, given the choice, he would rather hunt people; he would stalk his human prey at night with a flashlight taped to his gun barrel. He would, he went on, "write taunting letters to the police and the papers. And I would call myself the Zodiac." Later, the man was said to have told other friends that he was the Zodiac and to have related details of some of the murders. But such "confessions" by unbalanced persons are relatively common in spectacular murder cases and do not
burned itself out as he grew older; his murderous past might seem to him now nothing more than a terrible dream.
constitute real evidence.
found personal computer
files,
but they were
pointing as the videotape.
The
flicker of
In
cut
1978 Toschi said the
him loose because we
evidence. Believe me,
guy. Personally, In
May
killings
my
we
man was
their best suspect:
weren't able to find did everything
gut feeling
is
we
that he
is
In
been interested district
"We
in
Sacramento. In the years that
ings that could be attributed to him.
No
letters.
Some
No
The
in the
tape proved that the dead
man had
crimes — but there was nothing that a
They
also
just as disap-
hope that the case
after
all.
an extended period of remission. That dormancy might pre-
fol-
vail for the rest
kill-
of his
life.
Then
again,
it
might not.*
authorities
speculated that he might be in prison, convicted on an
unrelated charge, or that
Becaiase
he might
Tie ZoAif c
investiga-
Not then, at any rate, and perhaps for the best of reasons: The prime suspect, however insane, may also have been innocent. If that is so. Zodiac may still be among us. And, like a cancer, his malignant illness may simply have been in
was shifted from local jurisdictions to the State of The bulk of the files were sent to the state De-
lowed there was no hint of the Zodiac.
among
attorney could use for a prosecution.
on Zodiac
man." the Zodiac
California.
partment of Justice
of excitement
for so long
might be solved died away. The books would not be closed
could with the
1981 responsibility for investigating
stir
man who
the
cerning the case.
any physical
the
1992 there was a
when
had been the prime suspect died. A videotape labeled "Zodiac" was a disappointment—its contents were limited to news reports contors
less) rds or
During Zodiat^f, week-long run at San Francisco's Golden Gate theater, moviegoers were asked to speculate on the killer's motives and drop their answers into a box in the lobby. Typical of the responses was the one above, speculating that he killed out of hatred for women and the police.
47
il
•^K/Sfe.V'i
^t'?
2
Verdict stuck a Een Rex McElroy Chevrolet up
cigarette into his
• started
his
the pickup in gear.
tavern on gine
Elm
hummed and
was forming a still
He
sat
Street in
little
where he was,
the July sun beat
way from
still
in front
of
never been
D&G's
It
how
he'd sat inside drink-
was. The only ally he had with him was his
wife, Trena, sitting in the passenger seat.
McElroy did — it was only first beer — had ballooned his weight to 240 pounds and given him a big gut, but he was still a powerful man; a barrel chest and hamlike arms bulked out his five-foot-ten-inch frame. His slicked-back hair, originally dark brown, was dyed pitch-
The kind of drinking
that
10:30 a.m. and he'd already knocked off his
It
gleamed
was
sky,
men
with guns — men
July 10,
was about
to die.
greasily
That
the
town
bully didn't
could happen there,
in that
town, must have
who most wanted to
McElroy dead. A quiet, out-of-the-way country village 450 people, Skidmore was an unlikely stage for murder.
see
of
Ordinarily, the
more was
liveliest
event that ever happened in Skid-
the Punkin Festival, the annual harvest celebra-
tion featuring frog-jumping competitions, beautiful-baby
and
contests, square dancing,
down
free
barbeque. The show-
with Ken Rex McElroy took place on one of Skid-
more's two paved
streets.
There were no
traffic lights in the
town, no fast-food restaurants, no movie theaters. At one
end of town there rose a grain elevator. At the other was the tiny business district, anchored at the intersection of Elm
without blinking.
morning
it
seemed improbable even to those
his eyes told the story:
this
come was a couple
he'd
up and down the street knew — took aim. It 1981, and the notorious Ken Rex McElroy,
scourge of Skidmore,
and mean. McElroy was mean. Nobody but a fool tangled with him one-on-one if he could help it. Ken Rex went around with a .38-caliber pistol stuck under his shirt. He'd shot at least three men, he'd burned a man's house down to even a score, and he habitually beat up his women. People had learned a long time ago to take it seriously when McElroy threatened them; they knew what he was capable of doing. Even the police were wary of him. One time he'd pulled a double-barreled shotgun on a cop But
summer
Beneath the glaring
it.
puffy, his eyes bloodshot
And
jail,
The closest
waiting for his lawyer to bail him out.
that everybody
above heavy eyebrows. His sideburns grew almost to the jawline. Ken Rex had been handsome a long time ago; now he merely looked trashy, his face black.
prison yet.
McElroy had sworn that the law would never curb his freedom, and it seemed as if the law never would — or never could — no matter how sick people were of his violence and bullying, how tired they were of feeling afraid and helpless. D&G's had emptied out. Maybe 60 people stood in the street or peered from windows and doorways, their eyes fLxed on the idling truck. And as they watched, the morning's tension stretched to snapping. The cigarette still dangled from McElroy 's lips, but there wouldn't be time to light
down. A knot of men and more men were
didn't really matter
in
of nights in
his truck,
coming out of D8cG's. and he
was: He'd been charged with dozens of crimes, but he'd
Skidmore, Missouri, while the en-
many — he'd been outnumbered when ing,
mouth and
Silverado, but he didn't put
and Walnut
seem himself as he
He didn't make a menacing move or even mutter a threat. The men gathered near his truck didn't do much either. Mainly they glared at him, grim but quiet.
streets.
A
little
shabby, with abandoned build-
ings that hinted at better days, the business disttia in 1981
sat in the idling truck.
consisted of a post office, a bank, enterprises.
A
and a handful of
lesser
person could buy gas at Harry Sumy's
sta-
Bowenkamp's store, the local gossip there was Mom's B&B. For a Cafe, Mom being proprietor Inez Boyer. Next door to the cinderblock building that housed Mom's was D&G's tav-
Bo and meal and some
The time for talk was over. Townsfolk had been talking about Ken Rex McElroy for years — his thieving and raping and shooting, the way he'd frighten people out of testifying against him in court. They knew what a slippery fish he
tion or groceries at
Lois
Battered by years of hard living and heavy drinking. Ken Rex McElroy's face grew jowly and furrowed, but the menacing look in his eyes never changed.
49
UNSOLVED CRIMES
The crowd of men outside D&G's tavern on morning of Ken Rex McElroy's death included many farmers with spreads outside town. They grew corn, wheat, and soybeans. They raised hogs. They pastured cattle on the gently rolling hills. It was good farming country, and many of these men were well-to-do; some families, like the Clements, had assets worth a million dollars or more. Not that they were likely to do anything flashier with their money gether poor.
em, a squat, stripped-down place with corrugated-metal walls, a concrete floor, and a few pool tables. Its owners were brothers Del and Greg Clement, members of an old, well-to-do Slddmore farming family. Aside from Mom's and D&G's, the only gathering place for the community was the Sam R. Albright American Legion hall, across the from the B&B. That was Slddmore. To get what
the
street
it
didn't offer, people
could drive 13 miles to Maryville, the seat of
Nodaway
than buy a handsome pair of
County, with a population of 10,000; or they could make the 40-mile-long trip south to
commonly
called
—
St.
Joseph — St. Joe, as
cowboy boots or a
top-
of-the-line, air-conditioned pickup.
Ken Rex McElroy was not born to prosperity. He was the
it's
the nearest big city, boasting a popula-
tion of nearly 77,000.
But
if
Slddmore was small and dowdy,
it
wasn't alto-
In this
1981 view of Skidmore's Elm
advertisement for hybrid
50
com
Street,
an
Mom's C*-, D&G's tavera -
adorns
(c. A few doors beyond the cafe, hnddles beside the large, flat-roofed bank.
VERDICT
13th of 14 surviving children of Tony and Mabel McElroy,
who were
living in eastern
Kansas
at the time of his birth in
1934. A rough, whiskey-loving, big-talking man, Tony McElroy barely provided for his brood. Before Ken was born, Tony had worked on a crew building a highway through Skidmore. At other times he was a farm hand or a tenant farmer, and the family moved around a lot from one rural community to another in Kansas and Missouri. The McElroys finally settled down when Tony bought 175 acres about four miles southeast of Skidmore in the 1940s. But owning a farm didn't lift the family fortunes much. The McElroys stayed poor, living on the edge. Their house was much too little for such a big family, and the fit was even tighter when some of the older children married and
brought
their
spouses there to live^ Except for a couple o
6^d^S':*--
Ken Rex would live in the house until he died. Tony McElroy didn't have much use for his son when Ken Rex was a boy. The father often jeered at him in public, it was said, and openly favored his youngest son, Tim. Ken Rex didn't get much affeaion from his siblings, either. The
brief periods.
other children kept their distance from him; even as a
little
w
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*^i?
UNSOLVED CRIMES
Wearing a black
15-year-old
shirt,
Ken Rex McElroy
stands shoulder to
Graham ConsoUdated
shoulder with his eighth-grade teacher in this 1950
School yearbook photo. Held back twice, Ken Rex had his 13-year-old brother Tim (back row, far left) as a classmate.
kid he
was angry and hot-tempered. He looked up
of his older brothers, a hard-bitten guy for theft.
It
who
did
one
profits
seemed
time
selves:
Ken Rex McElroy
to
jail
wouldn't be long before Ken Rex was following
At school, Ken Rex was surly and defiant to his teachers. He was also a bully, big enough to push the other kids around and ruthless enough to pull a knife on them to get his way. He hated doing schoolwork and had to repeat the fifth grade twice. He was about 15 when he quit school for good; he'd gotten only as far as the eighth grade and was virtually illiterate. Years later, when he was out drinking in bars, he would pull out big wads of bills and say: "Look at that. I got more of it at home too. A whole damn trunkful. Not bad for a man who can't even read and write." Ken Rex worked on the family place, but he wasn't cut out to be a farmer. At 15 he took a job at a nursery in Iowa but was fired almost immediately for messing around with a young girl who worked there. He was only 1 8 when he got married for the first time, to a 16-year-old named Oleta from St. Joe. The couple went to live in Denver for a while, where McElroy got a construaion job. While he was there
when
just liked to steal.
Rustling livelihood. es,
became
his specialty
the mainstay of his
hors-
and, although his principal territory for plying his craft
state line to eastern
became a big-time
also
made
forays across the
Kansas and southern Iowa.
who was
one
thief,
very
He soon
good
at out-
smarting the cops. Late one night, for example, he and an ex-convict bar
buddy were on
their
way home
after
a suc-
cessful raid on a farm when the trailer they were hauling piqued the curiosity of a deputy sheriff on patrol — with
good reason: There were four stolen cows in the trailer. The deputy started after the truck. When McElroy noticed that he was being followed, a clever plan occurred to him. The country roads were as familiar to him as the back of his hand, and he sped to a bridge that he knew was ahead. He drove onto the bridge and quickly angled the trailer so that it blocked the road. Jumping out of his truck, he unhitched the trailer, with the cows still inside, and drove off with his
a heavy piece of steel
friend.
He
could afford to take his time, since the deputy
was stuck behind the improvised barricade. After a while McElroy stopped at a pay phone and called the highway patrol to report that his horse trailer was missing; it had been stolen from his farm, he said. He was in the sheriff
clear
— the deputy sheriff hadn't been able to see the truck's
license plate.
The next day McElroy It was
from the sheriffs department.
retrieved the trailer left
to the sheriff to
deal with the cows.
A night's work didn't always go so smoothly, but if McEl-
of such events.
McElroy could have earned an honest
living
from
roy
his
made a
slip,
he
knew how
to handle
McElroy
coonhounds. But he was not at heart an honest man, and
instance, a farmer surprised
he already
knew how easy it was to make money stealing. moved out to Colorado, he and a friend had bought an old Ford and removed the backseat. They would
horses.
Before he
the
cruise the countryside at night, slipping
The charges were withdrawn. To cover his tracks, McElroy
would then
sell
onto farms to loot
When the
farmer
filed
man and smashed him
charges,
in the face
it.
One
time, for
was stealing two McElroy went to see
as he
with the butt of a
back to Missouri, he took up thievwasn't choosy — if he couldn't lay his hands
judged
it
safe to sell
them
rifle.
often brought stolen ani-
mals back to his family farm and kept them there
the grain at local elevators.
When McElroy moved He
and
From hogs he branched out into cattle and
was northwest Missouri, he
on him. As a consequence, neck pains and occasional blackouts would plague him for the rest of his life. When Ken Rex and Oleta returned to Missouri, he made some money from what would come to be his one enduring legirimate pursuit, training and selling coonhounds. He had a gift for it. "Without question, he was the best trainer around," one hunter would later say. And this was no mean achievement around Skidmore, where good dogs were prized. A hound that proved a winner in local field trials might be worth several thousand dollars, and it could also earn its owner a lot of money from the betting that was part
ing again.
also got in-
ner of Missouri.
fell
grain bins; they
He
reinforced the floor of the Ford with ply-
wood, added a switch that enabled him to shut off the brake lights, and began to steal hogs all over the northwest cor-
in his footsteps.
he suffered a severe head injury
He
to rustling.
than the thefts them-
far less motivational
at local
until
he
markets or auctions.
McElroy also developed a system that utilized the other main outlet for his nighttime energies — women. His appetite for sex seemed insatiable, and he had girlfriends
on anything better, he would take little stuff that didn't earn him much of anything, such as chickens. Sometimes the
54
VERDICT
throughout the area, some married, some not,
who were good looks and aggressive manner. Many of them helped him out by letting him deposit stolen
girl
attracted to his dark
unless the night visits stopped.
livestock at their farms; they later sold the animals in their
adventure-loving girlfriends, McElroy went to the farm-
own
house with the idea of burning
a cold, malevolent stare. Late that night, with a couple of it down. He thought no one them slipped inside, where they helped themselves to food from the refrigerator and washed their snack down with whiskey. Suddenly they heard someone moving around upstairs. McElroy thought it must be Donna's uncle. He canceled his plans for arson, saying that he liked the man and wasn't inclined to kill him. Donna became pregnant by Ken Rex and gave birth to a boy. Meanwhile, McElroy, who was still married to Oleta, was pursuing a 15-year-old named Sharon, the daughter of a poor family who lived near St. Joe. She was dreamy and naive but soon received an unforgettable lesson about the true nature of her lover: During an argument in his pickup one night, McElroy picked up a shotgun, pointed it just below her chin, and pulled the trigger. The blast ripped open the flesh under Sharon's jaw and scarred her for life. Nevertheless, when McElroy and Oleta were divorced not long afterward, Sharon married the man who'd shot her. Sharon had a son in 1959 and a daughter in 1961. McEl-
names, giving him most of the proceeds. The pleasure
was home, and
company was their main reward. Ken Rex McElroy felt entitled to other people's livestock, and he apparently felt the same way about females: They were there to be taken. The wife of a rich farmer was a prize that he particularly enjoyed, but even better was what he called young meat — girls who were scarcely more than chilof his
dren.
Love — and sometimes even
lust
— seem
to have been
was driven mainly by the desire to conquer and to wield power over his conquests. McElroy 's sex life was steeped in violence. He direaed his fury both at women and at anybody who tried to stand between him and a woman he wanted. In his engrossing book on McElroy's life and death. In Broad Daylight, lawyer and sociologist Harry N. MacLean documents Ken Rex's affair with a girl named Donna, who lived on her grandparents' farm. When she was 13 she began shpping
beside the point; he
out of the house at night to meet him. Donna's grandfather
warned McElroy, who was some seven years older than
and a married man, that he would go to authorities McElroy silenced him with
the
55
the three of
UNSOLVED CRIMES
roy beat his
McElroy was charged
new young
wife regularly and deep-
with
ened her misery by tak-
he had a
ing
up
all
four crimes, but first-rate
lawyer
from Kansas City to defend him, Richard E.
with Sally, the 13-
year-old sister of one of
coon-hunting buddies. He began hanging around her school, giving her rides home and
"Gene" McFadin. McFadin was a master of the
plying her with candy.
investigations, requested
After warning her that
changes of venue, and used technicalities to buy
his
he'd
kill
didn't
her father
if
do what he want-
After his parents passed
bluff
— two
fierce
it
on
to him,
in.
against
not
time for his client — time that
McElroy was
virtu-
ally sure to use to per-
to forget about
come cheap, but
testifying.
his client
He always
McFadin's
skills
did
appeared to have no shortage
paid cash.
McFadin pulled out all the stops to fight the four felony charges in Andrew County. He launched a time-devouring
they thought.
fact-finding mission
1964 McElroy left Sharon and Sally and their seven children at the farm and took up residence in St. Joe with
would do
Wood, whom he'd been seeing for three home and gone to live in a little aparther hard-drinking stepfather, a man named
— the
as long as
it
the charges against his
18-year-old Alice
most picayune bit of information had even a marginal connection to client. When the lawyer got around
from Alice and her companion a year had been lodged, they changed their story completely, now claiming that they'd been coerced into to taking depositions
left
after the charges
ment to escape Otha Embrey; her natural father, an alcoholic, had abandoned the family when she was a baby. McElroy drifted in and out of the apartment, drinking heavily, beating Alice whenever he was displeased, and disappearing for long periods without bothering to say why. But the relationship endured, and a son was born in 1968. By then both Sharon and Sally had left the McElroy farm, and Ken Rex, who'd apparendy lost interest in them and was willing to let them
moved
him
of money.
In
go,
insisted
suade potential wimesses
around Skidmore didn't think much of the living arrangements in the McElroy household. Ken Rex McElroy didn't
years. She had
the tiny farm-
TTie sign
McElroy farmhouse, where his parents and his brother Tim were also living. Between 1961 and 1964 Sally had three children. Sharon meantime had two more. People
much what
McEh-oy enlarged
warning of a guard dog was no Dobermans discouraged would-be visitors.
house he'd grown up
the
care
He
on conducting lengthy
she
he moved Sally into
ed,
art of delay.
making
their earlier statements.
Alice stuck
it
McElroy was home
free.
out at the farm for three years, until she
could no longer bear the beatings, the drinking, and McElroy's taste for violent sex. She fled with her little boy to her
mother and stepfather Embrey's home
in St.
Joe — not
much
of a refuge, but better than the farm.
McElroy called Otha Embrey and announced that he was coming to get the son that he'd fathered by Alice, and he added that he'd shoot anyone who stood in his way. "The hell you will," Embrey replied. Not long afterward, McElroy showed up near the Embrey house with a rifle. Spotting him through a window, Embrey got his shotgun. But McElroy disappeared from sight, and Embrey set the weapon aside, thinking that McElroy had been bluffing. Then the living-room window shattered, and a rifle bullet tore into
Alice in soon afterward.
McElroy introduced Alice to the business of stealing. One day she and another of Ken Rex's girlfriends were driving a car piled high with tools and furniture in Andrew County, just south of McElroy's home ground of Nodaway County, when the sheriff stopped them. He'd been grappling with a rash of thefts in his county and was pretty sure that McElroy was behind them. He teamed up with another invesrigator to grill the two women, who broke down and described a series of jobs they'd done with McElroy, including two instances of stealing hogs and two of housebreaking.
Embrey's thigh.
McElroy was charged with felonious assault, but convicwould depend on Embrey's testimony. The case was
tion
Renowned as a trainer of coonhounds, Ken Rex McElroy shows off a pupil in a training harness. Lean and long-legged, this particular dog was prized for its speed in the hunt.
56
w
"
lM'"**'
S^;--
'*.
Ifefc
.^^
^
•J«'ing details
Trena McCloud was about 12 years old when she took up with Ken Rex McElroy, then in his middle thirties. She was a pretty blond girl who lived on a rundown farm a few miles from the McElroy place. Shy, not much of a smdent,
sentence or possibly even the death penalty,
roy adopted his usual approach:
who
many
somehow
lost.
But she had a secret
Ken Rex McElroy was taking her
to a motel in
When she got pregnant at the age of
14, she
school and in
May
St.
could document his crimes.
Ken Rex McElafter the
When
person
he discovered
woman who
had taken her in: "1 know where your girls go to school and what bus they take," he said. "I think we oughta trade girl
of her classmates, she seemed remote and
passive at school,
He went
Trena's whereabouts, he repeatedly called the
conscious that her hardscrabble upbringing set her socially
beneath
women
were ridmg with Trena's stepfather, Ronnie McNeely, through the streets of Maryville when McElroy caught up
relentlessly, threatening
for girl, don't
life:
The
Joe.
threats
new home
dropped out of
moved to McElroy's farm, where a son was bom
you?" were not enough to dislodge Trena from her
immediately. In
all,
she stayed in foster care for
about a year; then, in 1974, she took Derome and went to live with her grandparents in Whiting, Kansas. But after a
of 1973.
McElroy treated her the same way he treated Alice Wood, with outbursts of verbal and physical abuse and sexual savagery. He also kept up his blatant womanizing. It seemed that two women at home just weren't enough for him; he was always on the prowl. He expected total submission from his women, but Trena and Alice had a breaking point. Not long after Trena's baby boy was born, she and Alice left the farm with their children. They made their way to an aunt of Trena's where they dropped off the children and then went out to celebrate their newfound freedom. As it
few months there she became so bored and lonely that, despite the horrible treatment McElroy had handed her, she caved in and called him one day, saying that she wanted to go back to him. Not long afterward, McElroy divorced Sharon and married Trena. She signed a statement absolving her husband of any wrongdoing: "I do not wish to engage
in
any criminal or
McElroy; that any and
legal actions against
all
accusations that
I
Kenneth Rex
made
against
any improper or criminal conduct between Mr. McElroy and myself were made because of my feelings of frustration
58
At 24, Trena McElroy looks worn and older than her years. Seduced by Ken Rex McElroy by the time
was
she
him
13, she stayed with
despite the physical
and
psychological abuse he
heaped on her. ful
How power-
on her is comment she
a hold he had
suggested in a
made
after
ways did
he died: "I
as
I
was
al-
told."
#t
'^^Wii'>^.
''\
UNSOLVED CRIMES
was over. It was not the kind of promise he was likely to keep. A preliminary hearing was
your front yard." you want to try it," Warren said, "go ahead." The threatening phone calls kept coming, and convoys of McElroys began driving past the minister's house. Warren began carrying guns in his car and sleeping with a pis-
scheduled to take place in
tol
charged with felonious as-
es in
He
"If
sault in the first degree.
posted bond for $30,000 and was released after signing a document promising to
remain peaceable
until the case
under
his pillow.
McElroy was not espeworried. The biggest danger to him would be
The Bowenkamps and Tim Warren weren't the only people on Ken Rex McElroy's hate list. The
Bowenkamp's
wife of the highway patrol
five
weeks, on August 18.
cially
testimo-
and he figured that he could handle Bo — if, in fact. Bo survived his wounds. McElroy didn't deny that he'd done the
officer
shooting, but he insisted
told her
that he'd fired in self-
"several
who'd arrested the town bully began getting threatening telephone calls. "If your husband tes-
ny,
defense.
Bo had come
at
tifies
Gene McFadin,
the attorney
es of assaulting
who
him with a butcher knife, in felony cases involving he said. (He told his family that same story, insisting that he only meant to scare Bowenkamp; if he'd wanted to kill him, he would have blown his
head
defended McElroy against charga long string of successes
Bo Bowenkamp, had his
off.)
McElroy mounted a campaign es think twice
about
to
make potential witness-
testifying at the hearing,
and he
also
Bowenkamp from the community. As far as he was concerned, anyone who supported Bo was an enemy
tried to isolate
and would be treated accordingly. An early target of his wrath was a local minister named Tim Warren, a young man who gave fire-and-brimstone sermons at the Christian Church in Skidmore. Warren visited Lois Bowenkamp and offered to help her in any way he could, and he went to see Bo in the hospital. After the first hospital visit the young minister got an anonymous telephone call: "If you don't mind your own business," a man's voice said, "we'll have to hurt you." Two days later, after Warren had paid a visit to Lois, the anonymous caller had another message: "I told you to mind your own business, and now we're going to take your little boy and kill him and throw him out in piec-
trouble-prone
on one occasion, members of your
family are going to die."
One
client.
at the trial," the caller
of the officer's daugh-
worked as a checker at a discount store in Maryville, and McElroy began showing up there. He would load up a shopping cart with merchandise and take it to her line, then walk out after she began ringing up the items. One Saturday night in August, when the Skidmore Punkin Festival was in full swing, a young farmer sat beside Ken Rex McElroy in D&G's tavern. McElroy was drinking heavily, and the farmer wasn't altogether sober himself. He dared to ask McElroy an insulting question: How was it that he'd merely wounded Romaine Henry and Bo Bowenkamp, since he was such an avid coon hunter and reputed to be a great shot? McElroy didn't say anything, but later ters
in the
evening he lured the farmer out to his pickup truck,
which was parked near the B&B loading dock. There he brandished his rifle at the young man, who grabbed the barrel and hung on for dear life. Apologizing abjectly and repeatedly, the farmer finally
managed
to talk his
way out
of the situation.
A
66
few minutes
later.
Marshal David Dunbar came by.
VERDICT
and McElroy against "It's
called
him
over.
"Are you going to
September
testify
me at the trial?" my job," said Dunbar.
of
trial in
anybody who'd put mc in jail for the rest of my life," McElroy said. He wasn't exaggerating; it was possible to get life for the kind of assault he was charged with. For then,
rifle.
trial
away without on Monday morning he turned in his resignation. The job wasn't worth dying for, he decided. As the preliminary hearing drew closer, the McElroy menace closed in on Skidmore like the summer heat. Ken Rex's clan would slowly cruise the streets with guns conspicuously displayed. The McElroys also made a point of scaring customers away from the B&B. One day Ken Rex stopped his pickup across the street from the grocery store, got out, and pointed a gun at its entrance. On other occasions, he simply parked near the store. The Bowenkamps'
last
5.
The
court's
constituted a crime;
if it
did, the
trial
back again,
Tim Warren, who remained
first
He
judge scheduled the
this
put off until the
trial
The judge accordingly
time to June 25.
to terrorize his antagonists.
a stalwart support for the Bo-
wenkamps, answered his phone to hear McElroy say, "I'm going to come over and castrate you, and then I'm going to cut your little boy up in pieces and feed him to you while
Bo
second ques-
a butcher knife in his hand.
new
On November
McElroy now had months
was whether there was reason to believe that Ken Rex McElroy was the perpetrator. The hearing didn't take long. Bowenkamp described what had gone on between him and McElroy on the evening of the shooting. He was standing about three feet inside the doorway of his store's loading dock, he said, when McElroy shot him. When lawyer Gene McFadin cross-examined the old man, he questioned whether cutting up boxes was the rea-
Bowenkamp had
December
pushed the
tion
son
for
current legislative session ended.
visit.
the day of the hearing arrived.
Bowenkamp
town of Bethany, Missouri, 80
matically entitled to have a client's
night before the
highway patrolman parked outside Bowenkamps' house the to make sure McElroy didn't pay
order of business was to decide whether the shooting of
who was
1
preliminary hearing, a
At
any northwest Missouri county. The judge,
24 McFadin asked for a postponement. He claimed that he was unable to locate some witnesses he considered important, among them the repairman Bo Bowenkamp had been waiting for on the evening of the shooting and the ambulance attendants who'd taken the wounded man to the hospital. McFadin also claimed that bond restrictions imposed on his client had prevented McElroy from traveling to McFadin's Kansas City office to meet with him. The judge granted the motion and set a new trial date of February 5, 98 1. in late January, McFadin was back to ask for yet another delay. The wily lawyer had added a Missouri state senator to the defense team — and under state law a legislator was auto-
Just
getting hurt, but
a last-minute
a motion claiming that, because
notoriety, he could not receive a fair
miles east of Skidmore. There, a
Trena McElroy appeared behind Dunbar and aimed
On the
filed
transferred the case to the
a shotgim at the marshal. Dunbar walked
business took a turn for the worse.
1980, he
reputed to be afraid of McElroy, granted the motion and
"I'll kill
the second time that evening, he brought out his
2,
Ken Rex McElroy's
you're laying there bleeding from the castration. We're going to send
you pieces of your
wife's
body
in
an envelope."
On another occasion, McElroy appeared at Warren's house Thompson submachine gun. Bowenkamp, McElroy declared old man had to die. One night in D&G's,
with a .45-caliber
Turning
his attention to
publicly that the
Ken Rex offered to buy copperhead snakes for $50 apiece; he would put the poisonous vipers in Bo Bowenkamp's car,
sug-
gested that the grocer
he said. Another time, as Trena displayed a long corn knife,
loading dock
McElroy
was armed, that he was outside the doorway brandishing a knife, and that McElroy had shot him in self-defense. Ballistics evidence undercut this contention: The trajectory of the shotgun pellets found in the ceiling of the store indicated that Bo had been inside, not outside, when the shots were fired. Even so, McFadin moved that the assault charge against McElroy be dismissed. The judge rejected the motion and bound the case over for
artful stalling
now went
into high gear.
he'd give
him a
large
sum
to "accidentally" run
of
money
for
Bowenkamp
through. McElroy boasted that he'd bet thousands of dollars that he'd
be acquitted for shooting
Bowenkamp. He
had the money. One day, on impulse, he paid cash for a new, fully equipped pickup truck, peeling off bills from a fat wad of them that he pulled from his shirt piKket. He also boasted about the tens of thousands of dollars he was paying Gene McFadin. certainly
trial.
McFadin's
man weapon
told a
using the
On
67
UNSOLVED CRIMES
As
months passed, anxiety in Skidmore rose steadily wondered when McElroy might stop talking and do some of the things he was threatening. The Bowenkamps were suffering in the atmosphere of dread; hardly anyone had the nerve to come to their store. In fact, the townsfolk of Skidmore weren't going much of anywhere. Children were told to come straight home from school, and doors were locked behind them. The streets were often eerily empty, echoing with the growl of a slow-moving column of McElroy trucks that reminded people of the dangers of crossing Ken Rex and his tribe. Even D&G's tavern began
talking about his conviction.
the
trial
he
town of BethWhere Bo Bowenwas shot was the crux of
all
along, that he'd been just
opened on June 25, 1981,
inside the
was to
try to
might have been outside, holding a knife that roy fear for his it
possible that
store. McBowenkamp made McEl-
One
and defend himself with his gun. "Isn't you are confused about where you were
you
if
older
will,"
short while
man, a
retired
he said, and later,
the tavern to the
high-powered
he wants another
intimidation
filled
in the face,
he explained, then
farmer and former army officer
left
the ugly charade. "Like hell
D&G's
with his two sons.
A
he took up a position on the route from
Bowenkamp home.
rifle.
When somebody
In his
hands was a
asked him what he
was doing. Ward said he was going to kill McElroy if he came that way. But nothing happened — at least not then. When McElroy left D&G's tavern he drove off in the opposite direction.
Pete Ward's brave stance marked a critical turning point. As people described the moment in succeeding days, the mood of the town began changing from passivity to defiance. Men stopped averting their eyes when McElroy swaggered down Elm Street or slouched over a beer in D&G's. The community discovered the collective courage to stand up to him. Ward had showed them how. McElroy seemed to realize that the balance of power had shifted in some subtle but fundamental way. He asked a friend who'd spent time in prison about life behind bars, and the man tried to reassure him that it wasn't so bad. Nevertheless, McElroy seemed to despair. He was dead, he said, either in prison or out of it. Then he added, "I'm going to take a few of them with me." McElroy could be generous with his friends, and he handed the ex-con $500. The man said that he would never be able to pay it back. "It doesn't
position close to the dock, the prosecuting attorney asserted,
neck only
Bowenkamp
named Pete Ward, couldn't take
McFadin asked. No, said Bowenkamp. It was not possible. McElroy took the stand and stated that he'd had trouble starting his truck that evening and was waiting beside it when Bowenkamp started shouting at him to get off the property. Suddenly he saw Bowenkamp lunging toward him with a knife. He seized a shotgun he had in his truck and fired simply to make the grocer back off, he said. Not realizing that he'd hit Bowenkamp, he managed to get his truck going and leave. That was what had happened. Selfdefense, and no intent to harm. The prosecution presented the damning evidence of the shotgun pellets in the store's ceiling. They'd dug in at a point 17 feet inside the building. Given that faa and McElroy's hit in the
get off,"
off. I've al-
rip his backside open.
life
could have been
and
me
disgust
going to shoot
standing.'"
Bowenkamp
it
and alarm. Things looked black for the Bowenkamps. Ken Rex McElroy had said he'd kill anybody who put him behind bars, and few doubted that he was capable of carrying out his threat. Four days after the jury had rendered its verdict, McElroy was in D&G's when Trena walked in and handed him an M-1 rifle with a bayonet affixed to it. Under the terms of his bond Ken Rex was banned from carrying a gun, but then he wasn't known for according undue regard to legal fine points. He put a cartridge into the chamber and began making jabbing motions with the bayonet. He was the
in the
demonstrate that
now
of a new campaign of The prospea people of Skidmore with
door leading from the dock into the
Fadin's strategy
appeal
$20,000 for the appeal."
any, close to a year after the shooting.
kamp had been standing when the case. He testified, as he had
"I'll
lawyer better get
ready paid him $30,000, and
to close early.
The
"My
he predicted.
as people
he was
standing inside the doorway.
The diagrams destroyed McElroy's defense. On June 26 him of second-degree assault and recommended a sentence of two years. However, he didn't have to go to jail immediately. Under Missouri law he had the right to remain free on bond during the appeal process, which might drag on for months. Later that day Ken Rex McElroy was back at D&cG's tavern, drinking and the jury convicted
68
VERDICT
make any
difference,"
McElroy
said. "I
won't
live
out the
of July 9, but the others didn't find out about arrived in
Ward knew that McElroy had violated the terms of bond when he flaunted the M-1 in D&G's, and he told the Nodaway County prosecutor about the incident, hoping that McElroy would be jailed sometime before his lengthy appeals were allowed to run their course. He, his two sons, and a man named Gary Dowling signed an affidavit dePete
his
scribing the incident,
until they
it
town on Friday morning. Whenever the news of the latest delay came, it was for many the last straw. Once again Ken Rex would have more time to prey on Skidmore, more time to inflia new torment, especially on the signers of the affidavit. The crowd buzzed and milled around until one man came up with the kernel
week, anyway."
and the prosecutor
filed
of a plan. "Everybody's here," he said. "Let's see
if
we can
some way to protect these four guys." The group, some 60 strong, went into the American Legion hall to discuss things. Then someone had the idea of asking Danny Estes, the Nodaway County sheriff, to come over from Maryville and talk to them about what they could do to stop McElroy from doing any more harm. Sheriff Estes came right away, walking into the Legion hall 20 minutes after he got the call from Skidmore; he had a notion how anxious the people there were about McElroy, and he sympathized with them. But there was nothing he or anybody else could do just then to get McElroy off the
a petition with
get together
the Harrison County court in Bethany to have McElroy's bond revoked. A hearing was set for July 10. McElroy was furious. He confronted Pete Ward and demanded to know if he'd signed the affidavit. Ward didn't deny it, but he refused to say who else had signed. McElroy guessed correctly that Ward's sons were signers, but he was wrong about his fourth accuser, whom he thought was Del Clement, one of the owners of D&G's. Using his customary tactic, McElroy made sure that his enemies got a look at some firepower. He showed up near
and
figure out
Pete Ward's house in Skidmore with a pistol in his hand, and he drove out to the Ward family's farm, where he poked a rifle out the window of his pickup at one of Ward's sons. He also paid a visit to the Clements' farm, where he ostentatiously took aim at some of their horses. As word of McElroy's threatening behavior spread, townspeople began carrying guns themselves. There was even speculation, some of it public, about the possibility of getting rid of Ken Rex once and for all. The hearing to consider revoking McElroy's bail was set for the morning of Friday, July 10, in Bethany. The men
he told the men at the Legion hall; the law said the man was entitled to his freedom until the upcoming hearing. The sheriff could only suggest that the men keep a very
who'd signed the affidavit were required to appear: Now McElroy would be certain who his enemies were. But Ward had so galvanized the Skidmore community that dozens of people decided to attend the hearing and present a united front. They weren't going to leave the signers out on a limb by themselves. When he saw how many supporters the signers had, the people reasoned, McElroy might think twice
yourselves killed," he said.
about going
careful
to
anyone's house or farm, that person should
from neighbors
"What
if
"If that
vised
summon
help
fast.
we shoot him some
hogs on the back roads.'" one happens,
it
night
when
man
asked.
happens," the sheriff
them against taking on McElroy
A short
he's out stealing
said,
but he ad-
at night. "You'll get
while
away from Skidmore. The town was on
later, Estes
drove
own. there was going
its
McElroy had heard the day before that some kind of meeting about him in Skidmore. Maybe he thought he could intimidate the whole gang of them — the farmers and the shopkeepers and their damned bossy women — just by showing up; or maybe he had to show up, lest he look weak. Or maybe he came to towTi thinking something else altogether: He'd said he'd never go to prison, and maybe he drove into Skidmore that morning to make sure he never would. Whatever was going on in his head, at 9:30 a.m. Ken Rex told Trena that they were going into town. Trena was frightened. It was too dangerous, she said. He shrugged her off, and they drove away from the farm in to be
meet at
Cafe at about 7:30 on Friday morning; everyone
would make the 80-mile
watch on Ken Rex's whereabouts and actions and one another. If he turned up at
stay in close touch with
after the particular individuals.
The anti-McElroy contingent had agreed
Mom's
streets,
Bethany together. At the last McFadin worked his customary magic: At his request — he was busy with another trial, he said — the hearing was postponed for 10 days. A few people in Skidmore got word of the postponement on the evening trip to
minute, however, lawyer
the Silverado.
69
UNSOLVED CRIMES
town they found pickups parked everywhere around main intersection of Elm and Walnut, but a slot was available in front of D&G's. The McElroys parked and went into the tavern. Ken Rex ordered a beer, a pack of cigarettes, and some Rolaids. Almost instantly the crowd at the Legion hall got word of his arrival. There was a long silence. Then someone said, "Let's go and have a beer." People looked at one another. In
the
of the men at the hall walked and crowding around McElroy. He calmly smoked a cigarette and drank his beer. After a while he said to Trena, "Well, we'd better go." He bought a six-pack and went out the door. Behind him, someone said, "Get out of town, and stay out of town." Another then started to move. to
D&G's,
voice said,
At
least
filling
Most
the place
"And don't come back, goddamn it." two men — people argued later about whether
VERDICT
— were already taking steps to make Ken Rex McElroy wouldn't come back — to D&G's, to Skidmore, or anywhere else. At some point after news of his presence in town reached the Legion hall, this twosome or trio talked together and decided to act. Exacdy what they said or whether anyone else knew of their intentions is unknown outside of Skidmore. But they seem to have moved without hesitation. The McElroys got into the Silverado, and the townspeople came out of D&G's and gaththere'd been a third
sure that
ered to the right of the truck.
Ken Rex
started the engine.
Trena was watching the crowd when, she alleged later, she saw Del Clement walk across the
and take out a She cried out,
were fired from the .22, but the ward, wasn't hit again.
target,
"Oh, God! Oh, God! Oh, God!
now slumped
for-
Please stop shooting
him," Trena screamed. Someone hauled her out of the truck. She
walked
It
was
blindly,
still
yelling, as she
was
led
up the
bank.
street to the
over.
Elm
Street emptied, but the roar of the Sil-
the air — McElroy's foot had and stayed there, pressing it to the floor. At last the engine seized, shuddered, and fell silent. In the bank, between screams and sobs, Trena said, "They shot Ken Rex! They shot Ken Rex! They didn't have to do that."
verado's engine
still
filled
jerked onto the accelerator
"Yes, they did," a leave us
townswoman
told her.
"You
didn't
any choice."
After a while, the head of the
bank
McElroy's
called
street to his truck
brother Tim, told him that something bad had happened to
.30-30
not hit McElroy again. Then
Ken Rex, and asked him to come get Trena. A few minutes Tim McElroy drove slowly past the Silverado. In the bank he told Trena he wanted to check on Ken Rex. She said he was dead and she wanted to go home. Around 1 1 o'clock, about 45 minutes after the shooting, the sheriffs office in Maryville first got wind of the trouble in Skidmore. Not from anybody in the town, though; the news came from Gene McFadin. The lawyer had gotten a phone call about the shooting, and now he was asking the sheriff what was going on. At about the same time McFadin was making his call, someone in Skidmore finally summoned an ambulance. Police and medical personnel arrived about 20 minutes later. By then a few people had gathered across the street from the Silverado and were staring at the body inside. The sheriff strode toward them, his face twisted
came what would turn out
with anger.
rifle.
"They've got guns!"
Then
the rear
later
window
of the
truck shattered, and a large hole
appeared
The
in
Ken Rex McElroy's
shot from the .3030 had entered the right side of his neck and passed through his mouth, tearing open the tongue, spraying fragments of teeth and gum and cheek on the dashboard before continuing on through the front window. The face.
first
.30-30 continued to
the fatal bullet, a
from a .22
who was
rifle
fire
but did to be
magnum round fired by a man
standing close to the
post office.
The
bullet entered
near the top of McElroy's head,
and the skull disintegrated as if it had been smashed by a gigantic hammer. Tumbling through the right side of the brain, the shot
ripped through tissue and blood
Ken Rex McElroy quite dead. More rounds
vessels, leaving
just
tavern
on July
10, 1981.
people," he shouted.
"You were
The ambulance driver reached into the truck and checked As he expected, there was none. An electronic heart monitor confirmed that McElroy was dead. A gurney was brought alongside the Silverado, and the ambulance attendants wrestled the massive body onto it. Two men came across the street to help. The ambulance driver asked them,
"Who
After the
is
this
guy?"
Ken Rex McElroy," one of the men said. Silverado had been towed away, a policeman
"This here
is
suggested that the pool of blood
Skidmore's
The men
seen
through the shattered window are checking the tavern's front wall for bullet holes.
it,
for a pulse.
Keys still in the ignition. Ken Rex McElroy's blood-soaked Chevrolet Silverado sits in front of
D&G's
"Goddamn
supposed to watch him, not blow him away!"
fire
truck
in the street
was brought
be hosed away.
to the scene
and took
On his
death certificate (below)
McEkoy
is
Ken Rex
tactfully identified as a farmer.
Pages from the autopsy report point out
word Love tattooed on McElroy's left arm, along with the coroner's conclusion as to the cause of death: a gunshot wound to the right side of the head. the
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