[HN Gopher] Investigators say they've finally identified the Zod...
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       Investigators say they've finally identified the Zodiac Killer
        
       Author : afrcnc
       Score  : 232 points
       Date   : 2021-10-06 18:32 UTC (4 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.fox13now.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.fox13now.com)
        
       | silksowed wrote:
       | Mr. Cruz ? /s
        
       | aquova wrote:
       | So two new pieces of evidence are offered up by this article,
       | firstly that Zodiac was identified by several witnesses as having
       | a forehead scar, including being drawn on the famous sketch of
       | him, which matches a scar Poste had at the time. Secondly, some
       | sort of new solution to the cipher is possible by omitting
       | Poste's full name in some way.
       | 
       | As exciting as it would be, I always take these claims about
       | famous cases being solved with a grain of salt. It seems they
       | were also denied DNA evidence from another California case, and
       | bringing up excitement about Zodiac might let them press the
       | issue further. The scar I don't think is definitive proof by any
       | means, but if there is some new explanation to one of the
       | ciphers, I would be very interested in seeing it.
        
         | koboll wrote:
         | The guy REALLY looks like the police sketches too. Almost
         | perfectly the same, except for maybe a slight difference in
         | nose width.
        
           | gremloni wrote:
           | Does anyone else have issues with identifying and describing
           | facial features. I have no problems recognizing people, but
           | there's no way I can verbalize them on a specific features
           | basis. What kind of disorder do I have?
        
             | jahnu wrote:
             | Perhaps the artists are trained to ask questions of
             | witnesses that reveal details you wouldn't be able to give
             | up unprompted?
        
         | [deleted]
        
         | polynomial wrote:
         | Apparently there was also a paint-splattered watch recovered at
         | the Bates killing scene (tied to ZK in 1975 by FBI) and he
         | spent decades as a house painter. There was also a recovered
         | boot print from that scene that apparently was a match to him.
         | 
         | I guess we'll all have to wait for all the true crime podcasts
         | to spill the rest of the beans.
        
       | Bayart wrote:
       | David Oranchak's video last on his, Sam Blake's and Jarl Van
       | Eycke's cracking of Cipher Z-340 last year :
       | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1oQLPRE21o
        
       | [deleted]
        
       | [deleted]
        
       | johncessna wrote:
       | Weird, I just finished watching Veritasium's [1] latest video
       | which featured the techniques for finding the Golden State
       | Killer, and saw this one come across the feed.
       | 
       | [1]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KT18KJouHWg
        
         | nick_ wrote:
         | Mr. Zodiac creates spooky mysteries even still...
        
       | poundtown wrote:
       | bit unsettling hearing about his posse.
        
       | sfblah wrote:
       | Well that's a relief. Now they can arrest and prosecute him!
        
         | Shared404 wrote:
         | > The Case Breakers say they have identified the Zodiac Killer
         | as Gary Francis Poste, who passed away in 2018.
         | 
         | It would appear not.
        
           | romwell wrote:
           | I believe the parent comment was a sarcastic remark on that
           | very fact.
        
             | Shared404 wrote:
             | Yeah, I realized that a little too late :P .
             | 
             | Usually I'm pretty decent at picking up sarcasm over the
             | internet, but not today it turns out.
        
             | julianapostate wrote:
             | people on HN only use exclamation points in code or sarcasm
        
               | kelseyfrog wrote:
               | Thank you for pointing it out bluntly. For people like
               | me, it does help to read the unwritten rules.
        
         | romwell wrote:
         | /s (for those only reading the comment section)
        
         | misterbwong wrote:
         | Not sure if missing a /s but FTA:                  The Case
         | Breakers say they have identified the Zodiac Killer as Gary
         | Francis Poste, who passed away in 2018.
        
       | irrational wrote:
       | Oh good, Ted "Cancun" Cruz will finally be put into prison.
       | 
       | In all seriousness, my daughter in college was in a psychology
       | class where they were talking about serial killers. The Zodiac
       | killer came up and a guy in the class said, in all seriousness,
       | "Isn't Ted Cruz the Zodiac killer?"
        
         | ncmncm wrote:
         | I, personally, know of no hard evidence that could conclusively
         | prove that.
        
           | [deleted]
        
       | paxys wrote:
       | The "investigators" mentioned are The Case Breakers, described
       | (on their website) as "The elite team that's solving our greatest
       | mysteries". No mention of their actual credentials or
       | accomplishments.
        
         | cyberge99 wrote:
         | That's because they're still solving them.
         | 
         | ;)
        
       | ljm wrote:
       | I imagine the Zodiac Killer was actually more than one person.
       | 
       | Of course, this was back in the time when creating attractive
       | codewords for dangerous criminals was the norm.
       | 
       | Who's to say that the coded messages sent to newspapers weren't
       | actually meant for other people involved in the activity?
        
         | HPsquared wrote:
         | I'm reminded of that scene in Hot Fuzz - "No luck catching them
         | killers then?" .. "It's just the one killer actually!"
        
         | speedybird wrote:
         | The coded messages were handwritten. To my eye, they have the
         | same handwriting. Occam's Razor is just a rule of thumb, but I
         | think it applies here.
        
         | codezero wrote:
         | In the fox story, they note that he ran a criminal gang of
         | about 3 people, and recruited young men looking for a father
         | figure, so you might be right.
         | 
         | They paint it as him being the primary one doing the bad things
         | with the others as just lookouts/help w/ hiding evidence.
        
       | caymanjim wrote:
       | Is anyone familiar with Robert Graysmith's books on the Zodiac
       | Killer? The Fincher film "Zodiac" is based on Graysmith's
       | research/obsession. I don't think the film mentions anyone named
       | Poste at all. I'm wondering if he ever came across Graysmith's
       | radar.
        
       | cf100clunk wrote:
       | Loads of prior HN discussions on the solving of his cipher:
       | 
       | https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...
        
       | romwell wrote:
       | I believe the crowdsourced investigation has already yielded a
       | veritable result[1]; I'm not sure why the case needed to continue
       | being active.
       | 
       | [1] https://www.tedcruzforhumanpresident.com/
        
       | TedCancruz wrote:
       | It was me!
        
       | DaveSapien wrote:
       | Nice try Ted Cruz...
        
       | Ansil849 wrote:
       | I feel like at least twice a year, there is some story like
       | "Zodiac Killer Finally Identified" or "DB Cooper Finally Found".
       | And behind these stories is usually just one person or group of
       | people who are presenting their pet theory (which highlighted all
       | facts supporting it, and conveniently brushes aside all facts
       | which don't) and have savy media contacts so are able to get
       | media exposure to help promote what's frequently accompanied by a
       | book they are trying to sell copies of.
       | 
       | I don't know if that's the case here, but this pattern of events
       | has made me just tune out stories like this. I wish media outlets
       | would be more critical.
        
         | jmnicolas wrote:
         | Don't forget Jack The Ripper!
        
           | nobody9999 wrote:
           | >Don't forget Jack The Ripper!
           | 
           | That's a mystery long solved, friend[0].
           | 
           | [0] https://babylon5.fandom.com/wiki/Sebastian#History
        
             | Diederich wrote:
             | Emmy award nominated Babylon 5 episode!
             | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comes_the_Inquisitor
             | 
             | One of the best, among many, of the series.
        
           | fhood wrote:
           | At least the Zodiac killer is recent enough for uncovering
           | their identity to feel sort of feasible. That said, I
           | personally find the idea of it being Ted Cruz so amusing that
           | I see little reason to amend my head-canon, regardless of
           | evidence presented.
        
             | ubermonkey wrote:
             | THIS.
        
             | philwelch wrote:
             | I believe that would require time travel.
        
               | friedegg wrote:
               | "Asked how a teenage boy could've committed a crime more
               | than two decades ago, a police spokesman explained 'He's
               | very clever.'"
        
             | duskwuff wrote:
             | > my head cannon
             | 
             | The phrase you're thinking of is "headcanon" (cf.
             | https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/canon), although "head
             | cannon" evokes a much funnier mental image.
        
               | fhood wrote:
               | Despite knowing it was the same base as canonical, it
               | somehow never occurred to me to spell it that way. Thanks
               | for the heads up, but since google hasn't decided it
               | approves of "headcanon" I was forced to compromise in my
               | correction.
        
             | dandelany wrote:
             | I'm honestly so tired of hearing this lame conspiracy
             | theory/in-joke. It's so dumb and trollish and barely funny,
             | all it does is give ammo to repubs who think dems are
             | wackadoos. Fellow dems, this ain't it.
        
               | fhood wrote:
               | That's cool and all, but I personally enjoy it because of
               | Ted's personality specifically, not his specific
               | political affiliation. And also who cares? It's clearly a
               | joke, one that happens to appeal to my particular sense
               | of humor.
               | 
               | There are oodles of topics that provide plenty of
               | political ammunition, but anybody who takes this one
               | seriously is an idiot.
        
               | dandelany wrote:
               | Sorry, but I just recently watched a crowd of angry
               | trolls sell memes and Internet in-jokes as facts to
               | droves of angry Facebook users, and then they combined
               | forces to elect a fascist. I no longer believe this kind
               | of crap is inconsequential.
        
         | [deleted]
        
         | lqet wrote:
         | I find this quite convincing:
         | 
         | > In one note, the letters of Poste's full name were removed to
         | reveal an alternate message, [Jen Bucholtz, a former Army
         | counterintelligence agent] told Fox News.
         | 
         | > "So you've got to know Gary's full name in order to decipher
         | these anagrams," Bucholtz said. "I just don't think there's any
         | other way anybody would have figured it out."
        
           | Ansil849 wrote:
           | > I find this quite convincing
           | 
           | I would find evidence of it actually convincing, which you
           | would think would be foregrounded somewhere. And yet,
           | mysteriously, it is not. This suggests that the claim is
           | bullshit.
        
           | Pet_Ant wrote:
           | I want to see the details because there have been some
           | dubious decipherments before that were a real stretch, so I
           | want to see how plausible the ananagram is.
        
           | fullshark wrote:
           | I don't understand, so they have a deciphered letter from
           | zodiac, they removed the individual letters of Gary's name
           | from the message and got a 2nd message? Is that right?
        
             | celticninja wrote:
             | I think that one message could not be fully decoded, there
             | seemed to be some cruft in it. My guess is this cruft was
             | no longer in the decoded message once the letters of his
             | name are removed.
        
           | exporectomy wrote:
           | Stats or it didn't happen. That kind of seemingly incredible
           | coincidence can sometimes just be the mind playing tricks on
           | people who are unaware of how many ways a similar result
           | could have occurred by chance.
        
           | apeace wrote:
           | This would indeed be convincing, but I can't seem to find any
           | further information on it.
           | 
           | Here is the Case Breaker's blog announcement[1]. And here is
           | a press release from them with some details of their work[2].
           | 
           | I'd really like to see this in action, but it seems like they
           | haven't published it yet. Am I missing it?
           | 
           | [1] https://thecasebreakers.org/2021/09/the-last-zodiac-
           | victim/
           | 
           | [2] https://secureservercdn.net/166.62.114.250/g9q.07b.myftpu
           | plo...
        
             | kelseyfrog wrote:
             | I'm missing something here. I could create a coded message
             | that required apeace to decipher. That doesn't necessarily
             | mean that I'm you.
        
               | philwelch wrote:
               | But there's no reasonable motive for the Zodiac Killer to
               | do so. If he wanted to frame Gary Poaste, he would plant
               | evidence that was more obvious. If he wanted to toy with
               | the detectives who were trying to discover his identity
               | though--which is well within the pattern of behavior
               | observed from the Zodiac Killer--this is exactly the sort
               | of thing he would do.
        
         | treesknees wrote:
         | From the article
         | 
         | > In one note, the letters of Poste's full name were removed to
         | reveal an alternate message, she told Fox News. "So you've got
         | to know Gary's full name in order to decipher these anagrams,"
         | Bucholtz said. "I just don't think there's any other way
         | anybody would have figured it out."
         | 
         | To me it's pretty coincidental if the letters for this person's
         | full name just happen to be this person who also has other
         | characteristics matching the description including facial scars
         | from one of the police sketches.
        
           | Amezarak wrote:
           | The facial scars in the sketch vs the photo seem like a huge
           | stretch to me personally. It looks like they were just
           | sketching normal forehead lines. And sketches are not exactly
           | reliable in the first place. It really seems like someone
           | desperately looking for a pattern where there isn't one.
        
           | Ansil849 wrote:
           | #1 This is a pretty big claim. Extraordinary claims require
           | extraordinary evidence. And yet there is no evidence.
           | 
           | -or-
           | 
           | #2 It also sounds like they're saying if you remove various
           | letters of the alphabet from a cipher, you can get a readable
           | message. This is not notable.
        
             | random314 wrote:
             | #2 seems very notable
        
         | codazoda wrote:
         | It seems like even the article contradicts what this group
         | says...
         | 
         | > "Our Homicide Cold Case Unit has determined the murder of
         | Cheri Jo Bates in 1966 is not related to the Zodiac killer,"
         | the Riverside Police Department's Homicide Cold Case Unit told
         | Fox News.
        
           | bogwog wrote:
           | It seems like the group asked the police department to test
           | the DNA found in the Bates case to confirm it once and for
           | all, but the police department has refused.
           | 
           | So there's probably some internal politics thing going on
           | here.
        
           | pwinnski wrote:
           | The FBI says it is related, the local PD says it is not, and
           | to ask the FBI. The local PD is also refusing to do DNA tests
           | which would resolve the issue.
        
             | Ansil849 wrote:
             | > The local PD is also refusing to do DNA tests which would
             | resolve the issue.
             | 
             | Yeah, mean ol' law enforcement, refusing to do DNA tests
             | for any crank mystery squad solving team that demands them.
        
               | tacocataco wrote:
               | If the group wants to incurr the costs what does it
               | matter?
        
         | AlexCoventry wrote:
         | It sounds like there's a little bit of presumed Zodiac-Killer
         | DNA on his letters, and there's been some preliminary analysis
         | of it. Hopefully this evidence is suggestive enough to justify
         | a full comparison.
         | 
         | https://medium.com/@charlierusso23/why-has-dna-evidence-not-...
        
       | jfrunyon wrote:
       | I don't know enough about the Zodiac Killer to determine whether
       | or not this is true. But I do know that when the only
       | $search_engine results to something are from one media network (a
       | few Fox local & Fox News), and a tabloid... take it with a grain
       | of salt.
        
       | swayvil wrote:
       | "Investigators" is one of those utterly ambiguous yet powerfully
       | dominating terms, like "Authorities" and "Scientists".
       | 
       | We build our epistemological hierarchies like it's 2000 BC.
       | (Heck, like 2Billion BC, if you think of knowledge as a kind of
       | termite-mound. Memes are the new pheromones). Fancy cellphones
       | make no diff.
        
       | panzagl wrote:
       | And makers of true crime podcasts everywhere rejoiced...
        
       | mauz wrote:
       | Looking at the press release [1], it still feels relatively
       | circumstantial to me. Not sure that we can deem the Zodiac Killer
       | to be fully identified yet.
       | 
       | It's definitely not nearly as cut and dry as when they identified
       | the Golden State killer.
       | 
       | [1]:
       | https://secureservercdn.net/166.62.114.250/g9q.07b.myftpuplo...
        
         | bena wrote:
         | Do you know what circumstantial means?
         | 
         | It doesn't mean "weak". It means "pertaining to circumstances".
         | 
         | Nearly all evidence is circumstantial.
         | 
         | DNA is circumstantial evidence. Fingerprints are circumstantial
         | evidence. A smoking gun is circumstantial evidence.
         | 
         | Trials are based on circumstantial evidence. Hans Reiser was
         | arrested, tried, and convicted of murdering his wife based on
         | nothing but circumstantial evidence that a murder even
         | occurred. They didn't even have her body.
         | 
         | If a lawyer would jump up and shout "Objection, evidence is
         | circumstantial", the judge would look at them and say "Yeah, no
         | shit, what's your actual objection?"
        
           | space_rock wrote:
           | People don't know how to judge evidence. So they think
           | circumstantial evidence has no weight
        
           | mjburgess wrote:
           | Consult a dictionary, eg.,
           | 
           | > pointing indirectly towards someone's guilt but not
           | conclusively proving it.
           | 
           | You are correct that within a technical legal context most
           | evidence is circumstantial. But that isnt the only meaning of
           | the word, and indeed, largely not what is meant.
        
             | bena wrote:
             | What they meant is wrong.
             | 
             | I can consult Merriam Webster, which agrees with what I
             | said. https://www.merriam-
             | webster.com/dictionary/circumstantial%20...
             | 
             | Or Britannica
             | 
             | https://www.britannica.com/topic/circumstantial-evidence
             | 
             | Or Cornell
             | 
             | https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/circumstantial_evidence
             | 
             | Or basically any single law firm or courthouse
             | 
             | https://www.shouselaw.com/ca/defense/legal-
             | defenses/circumst...
             | 
             | https://www.ojp.gov/ncjrs/virtual-
             | library/abstracts/circumst...
             | 
             | https://www.nycourts.gov/judges/cji/1-General/CJI2d.Circums
             | t...
             | 
             | Yes, inferences must be made. But as a lot of those links
             | mention, direct evidence (the other kind of evidence) is
             | often worse as it's usually eyewitness accounts.
             | 
             | Lazy television writers have done us all a disservice by
             | repeated implication that circumstantial evidence isn't
             | good enough.
        
               | mannykannot wrote:
               | Putting aside the very first paragraph ("What they meant
               | is wrong"), this post makes some sound points.
               | 
               | It is also the case that the alleged new evidence for
               | Poste being the killer is, in fact, circumstantial with
               | respect to the issue of who committed the murders in
               | question.
               | 
               | So, returning to that first paragraph, to establish
               | whether what mauze meant is wrong, we must establish both
               | that mauze meant something other than what was written,
               | and that the intended meaning was wrong.
               | 
               | I do not see any conclusive evidence as to what mause
               | meant. Furthermore, bena's reply to mause suggests that
               | the intended meaning was 'weak'. That strikes me as
               | plausible, but as far as I can tell, it would not be an
               | obviously wrong characterization of the new evidence.
        
               | andrewzah wrote:
               | https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/circumstantial
               | 
               | 1. belonging to, consisting in, or dependent on
               | circumstances
               | 
               | 2. pertinent but not essential : incidental
               | 
               | The original comment used the word correctly. Because
               | dictionaries describe how people actually speak, not
               | prescribe rules on how to use words. That's why they get
               | updated every so often as word usages change.
        
               | elliekelly wrote:
               | But this is a word that has a technical meaning and a
               | colloquial meaning. It doesn't make sense to apply the
               | colloquial definition when a term is being used in the
               | context of a technical discussion.
               | 
               | In other words, the appropriate definition of a term of
               | art is... circumstantial. ;)
        
               | parineum wrote:
               | > how people actually speak
               | 
               | To counter that point, "circumstantial" has a legal
               | meaning that does not change as easily.
        
               | dctoedt wrote:
               | The Cornell Law dictionary that you cited is a good
               | summary of what lawyers and judges are likely to think:
               | _Evidence that_ implies _a person committed a crime, (for
               | example, the person was seen running away from the crime
               | scene). There must be a lot of circumstantial evidence
               | accumulated to have real weight. Compare to direct
               | evidence._
        
           | contravariant wrote:
           | Usually when a particular interpretation of a word renders it
           | utterly meaningless then that interpretation is not the
           | correct one.
           | 
           | In particular circumstantial _can_ mean  'pertaining to
           | circumstance' or it can be one of several other meanings
           | derived from the same root. One of which is its noun form
           | "Something incidental to the main subject, but of less
           | importance", which sounds like a more reasonable
           | interpretation. Or it may even be one of those words that
           | only has a particular meaning in a legal context.
        
             | I_complete_me wrote:
             | I've been looking for an appropriate context to refer to a
             | recently new-found word, to wit "polysemy". Is this it?
        
             | bena wrote:
             | People glommed onto the idea of circumstantial meaning weak
             | from police and legal procedurals.
             | 
             | And since we are talking about evidence, we should be using
             | it within the context of evidence. And in that context,
             | some or all of the evidence being circumstantial has no
             | bearing on whether or not it is good evidence.
             | 
             | This isn't a matter of "other meanings [being] derived from
             | the same root". There is no root. It's a misappropriation
             | of a word from lazy television writers.
        
               | jfrunyon wrote:
               | > good evidence
               | 
               | > literally hearsay
        
               | elliekelly wrote:
               | Hearsay evidence can be good evidence, too.
        
           | sumosudo wrote:
           | Other than first-hand knowledge, all evidence is
           | circumstantial. In response to all your detractors comments:
           | looking up words in dictionaries for law jargon is a bad
           | idea, you will get yourself thrown in the dock. Blacks
           | dictionary only.
           | 
           | CIRCUMSTANTIAL EVIDENCE. The term in- cludes all evidence of
           | indirect nature. Milligan v. State, 109 Fla. 219, 147 So.
           | 260, 263. It is direct evidence as to facts deposed to but
           | indirect as to the factum probandum, Brown v. State, 126
           | Tex.Cr.R. 449, 72 S.W.2d 269, 270; evidence of facts or
           | circumstances from which the existence or nonexistence of
           | fact in issue may be inferred. People v. Steele, 37 N.Y.S.2d
           | 199, 200, 179 Misc. 587; Wolff v. Employers Fire Ins. Co.,
           | 282 Ky. 824, 140 S.W.2d 640, 645, 130 A.L.R. 682; Scott v.
           | State, 57 Ga.App. 489, 195 S.E. 923, 924; inferences drawn
           | from facts proved, Hatfield v. Levy Bros., 18 Ca1.2d 798, 117
           | P. 2d 841, 845; preponderance of probabilities, Hercules Pow-
           | der Co., v. Nieratko, 113 N.J.L. 188, 173 A. 606, 610; pro-
           | cess of decision by which court or jury may reason from
           | circumstances known or proved, to establish by inference the
           | principal fact, People v. Taddio, 292 N.Y. 488, 55 N.E. 2d
           | 749, 750. It means that existence of principal facts is only
           | inferred from circumstances. Twin City Fire Ins. Co. v.
           | Lonas, 255 Ky. 717, 75 S.W.2d 348, 350. When the existence of
           | the principal fact is deduced from evidentiary by a process
           | of probable reasoning, the evi- dence and proof are said to
           | be presumptive. Best, Pres. 246; Id. 12. All presumptive
           | evidence is circumstantial be- cause necessarily derived from
           | or made up of circum- stances, but all circumstantial
           | evidence is not presumptive. Burrill. The proof of various
           | facts or circumstances which usual- ly attend the main fact
           | in dispute, and therefore tend to prove its existence, or to
           | sustain, by their consistency, the hypothesis claimed. Or as
           | otherwise defined, it consists in reasoning from facts which
           | are known or proved to es- tablish such as are conjectured to
           | exist.
           | 
           | INDIRECT EVIDENCE. Is that which only tends to establish the
           | issue by proof of various facts sustaining by their
           | consistency the hypothesis claimed. It consists of both
           | inferences and pre- sumptions. Lake County v. Neilon, 44 Or.
           | 14, 74 P. 212, 214.
        
         | polynomial wrote:
         | This is exactly why I want to see more info about the cipher
         | they solved (that and my innate interest in ciphers.) The claim
         | is that when you remove all the letters of his full name, there
         | is a 2nd message hidden there.
         | 
         | This is exactly the sort of thing I would immensely like to get
         | ahold of and apply some stochastic models to, in addition to
         | just knowing more of the specifics.
         | 
         | In any case, if they have truly deciphered a message that
         | implicates him, it would be significantly more than
         | circumstantial.
         | 
         | What really pains me is the paucity of substantial information
         | backing up the claim, that and the story seems to have been
         | broken by TMZ, ugh.
        
       | gumby wrote:
       | This case didn't only inspire documentaries but also inspired the
       | song "Dire Wolf" by the Grateful Dead.
        
         | watertom wrote:
         | The Zodiac didn't inspire the song, the Hound of the
         | Baskerville's inspired the song.
         | 
         | "So the Zodiac actually emerged some months after the song was
         | finished"
         | 
         | Story behind the song "Dire Wolf"
         | http://deadessays.blogspot.com/2012/10/dire-wolf-1969.html
        
           | gumby wrote:
           | The full quotation from the page you linked to is,
           | 
           | "So the Zodiac actually emerged some months after the song
           | was finished - but, as we'll see, Garcia immediately made the
           | connection between the killer and the song in live shows that
           | October, when Zodiac frenzy gripped San Francisco. (He was
           | recording pedal steel in the studio for CS&N on October 24;
           | and on October 26 he mentions the Zodiac and "paranoid
           | fantasies" onstage; so his memory of driving home in fear
           | seems to be quite literal.)"
           | 
           | Is a song, especially a Dead song, finished when the pen
           | leaves the paper?
        
       | oh_sigh wrote:
       | What are the ethics of potentially identifying deceased people as
       | baddies? Unless there is DNA evidence which remains(which I
       | doubt), or they find incontrovertible evidence in his home or
       | something like that(I also doubt), this is just a guess that will
       | drastically affect his probably otherwise-normal family whether
       | the allegations are true or not.
        
         | no_butterscotch wrote:
         | This was my first thought as well.
         | 
         | Other ethics include the press now reaching out to the
         | surviving family of this man? "So and so, who call themselves
         | investigators, say your father is the Zodiac Killer! Thoughts?"
         | 
         | Are there rules around this crap?
        
         | lazide wrote:
         | Near as I can tell, as long as they don't have an estate to sue
         | you it's a-ok (based on current media cycles anyway). Only
         | mostly sarcastic.
        
         | nescioquid wrote:
         | This was the question on my mind as well. The alleged "perp"
         | died in 2018, but I didn't see any mention of the duration of
         | the group's investigation. Did this group identify him as a
         | person of interest before his death? If so, that raises yet
         | more more questions (e.g. no statutory limitation on murder).
         | 
         | > Hans Smits told Fox News he spent 10 years hiding a
         | whistleblower who said he escaped a criminal "posse" headed by
         | Poste. The man, who The Case Breakers only referred to as Wil,
         | told Smits the posse roamed California's High Sierra region and
         | that he was "groomed into a killing machine."
         | 
         | > Smits said he gave Wil financial, logistical and emotional
         | support over the years and moved him around for nearly 10 years
         | in an effort to keep him safe.
         | 
         | > "I'm the one that took him to the FBI office and put him on a
         | train and sent him out of state," Smits said.
         | 
         | The story does not seem to explicitly state Smits is a member
         | of the Case Breakers, but if Smits knows Wil, and Case Breakers
         | only identify the whistleblower as Wil, it seems to imply Smits
         | is a member of Code Breakers.
         | 
         | If that is all true, they were working Poste as a person of
         | interest while he was still alive.
        
       | purple_ferret wrote:
       | A quick google doesn't show this guy on lists of common suspects.
       | 
       | Where did he come from and what is supposed to be his motive?
        
       | darepublic wrote:
       | Time for another zodiac movie, this time including the subsequent
       | murders and the eventual posthumous uncovering of the murderer.
       | No matter how convincing the evidence it's just not satisfactory
       | that the guy can't be tried.
        
         | bickeringyokel wrote:
         | Can't wait for Hollywood to make the new movie and change all
         | the details of this new evidence for entertainment value.
        
       | julienchastang wrote:
       | How about using this same forensic team to determine the true
       | identity of Satoshi Nakamoto :-)
        
         | real_satoshi wrote:
         | Look, I don't know why this keeps coming up. I am _not_ the
         | zodiac killer.
        
           | technocratius wrote:
           | Please don't try to turn this place into reddit.
        
             | dane-pgp wrote:
             | Please try to turn Reddit into this place.
        
       | ncmncm wrote:
       | Now that we have _maybe_ identified somebody who killed, what, 37
       | people?, let 's start identifying individuals responsible for
       | _millions_ of more horrendous deaths, often drawn out over months
       | of suffering, and maybe try to stop them.
       | 
       | The guys who first put lead in gasoline are long dead already.
       | There were people who fought getting it out of the gasoline, and
       | they are mostly dead, by now, too. Likewise, leaded paint. That
       | was banned in 1978. Thousands of people are still being killed by
       | paint exposure, though, many indirectly by violent tendencies
       | induced by lead paint exposure, which people still experience, by
       | the millions, every day.
       | 
       | Lots of people fought tooth and nail to keep people in doubt
       | about tobacco smoke causing lung cancer. They are mostly dead.
       | The top academic in statistics was one of those, and was
       | personally responsible for decades of denial that observational
       | study could determine causation, fetishizing random-controlled
       | trials, RCTs. (RCTs are great, but anybody who insists that
       | _only_ RCTs can demonstrate causation is a fetishist.) He 's dead
       | too, but his legacy lives on, still killing people _en mass_.
       | 
       | The people who started hydrogenating vegetable oils, starting
       | with waste cottonseed oil, are long dead. But trans fats,
       | produced by hydrogenation, were only (technically) banned from
       | the US diet in 2017. That was an outcome of Fred Kummerow's
       | entire career: he knew in the '50s that trans fats were poison,
       | and worked for decades to get them banned. He died in 2016. I say
       | "technically" because certain corporations have special
       | dispensation to continue poisoning people. Maybe, catch them?
       | Maybe, catch whoever fought the 2017 ban, who had poisoned people
       | for many decades before, and sought to continue? They are mostly
       | still alive.
       | 
       | The biggest public health problem in the US today, killing way
       | more than COVID-19, comes from (being precise!) consumption of
       | fructose without adequate accompanying fiber. The sodas,
       | Coke/Pepsi the biggest, but also juice, apple, orange, cranberry,
       | Red Bull, Monster, are worst. But sugar, which is half fructose,
       | is added to _practically everything_ nowadays, not just breakfast
       | cereal. Almost the whole food industry is devoted to stripping
       | out fiber and selling the rest; when  "the rest" has, or gets
       | added, sugar, it becomes slow poison. (Robert Lustig videos on
       | Youtube are a great way to start learning about this. He has
       | books out, too. Lustig is an endocrinologist, the smartest kind
       | of medical doctor.)
       | 
       | One of the reasons sugar is added to everything is that we were
       | told for decades that saturated fat was bad for us. (Another is
       | that sugar production is _massively_ subsidized, so is the
       | cheapest ingredient.) All the stuff blamed on sat fat turns out
       | to be caused, instead, by the trans fats and sugar. The saturated
       | fat is not only totally harmless, it is important for brain
       | function, so its loss compounds the problem.
       | 
       | Thus, the people taking fiber out of and putting sugar into
       | everything are the biggest _current_ mass killers. Likewise,
       | everybody maintaining sugar production subsidies. Stringing them
       | up may be an over-reaction. Anyway _stopping them_ seems like a
       | good idea. At least, require fructose-content and fructose vs.
       | fiber labeling? Think about them next time the news is full of
       | somebody killing a dozen people. Is a dozen bad, but millions _A-
       | OK_?
        
         | boogies wrote:
         | > Robert Lustig videos on Youtube are a great way to start
         | learning about this.
         | 
         | Or off YT:
         | 
         | https://videos.lukesmith.xyz/w/feioCyaQEZ1ogHK1oNJM4K
         | 
         | > Thus, the people taking fiber out of and putting sugar into
         | everything are the biggest current mass killers. Stringing them
         | up may be an over-reaction. Maybe convicting them would be,
         | too? Anyway stopping them seems like a good idea. Think about
         | them next time the news is full of somebody killing a dozen
         | people. Is a dozen bad, but a million A-OK?
         | 
         | IMO simply not compelling millions of people to pay them for it
         | would be a good start. Defund all the agencies that promote
         | poison, whether by subsidizing corn syrup, villianizing natural
         | saturated fats to sell trans fats and sugar, or conspiring with
         | drug companies and corrupt researchers to sell addictive
         | substances (as discussed this week:
         | https://dynomight.net/alcohol-trial/).
        
           | ncmncm wrote:
           | I like to play the videos at 1.5x-2x speed, with subtitles.
           | That makes a 90-minute lecture take a more easily found 60 or
           | 45 minutes.
           | 
           | Tobacco advertising is banned in the US, and tobacco use is
           | in decline there. (The US State Department works to outlaw
           | bans in other countries. True!) A ban on advertising sugar-
           | laced products -- high sugar-to-fiber ratio products,
           | specifically -- ought to help.
        
         | sva_ wrote:
         | > The saturated fat is not only totally harmless,
         | 
         | I was under the impression that you should still keep a balance
         | between unsaturated and saturated fats to keep cholesterol in
         | check?
        
           | ncmncm wrote:
           | I have not heard of any such thing. Inuit who have never had
           | access to unsaturated fat do not start getting heart disease
           | until they adopt a supermarket-driven diet.
           | 
           | Cholesterol as a measure of health is driven to some degree
           | by Big Pharma, who would like to have everyone taking statins
           | for the whole rest of their lives. Certainly, dietary
           | cholesterol is absolutely harmless, always has been.
        
             | wbhart wrote:
             | According to an article on PubMed, that's largely a myth,
             | based on early, faulty studies [1].
             | 
             | [1] "Low incidence of cardiovascular disease among the
             | Inuit--what is the evidence?"
        
       | amatecha wrote:
       | "For the full story, and more evidence from the Case Breakers,
       | visit"[0]
       | 
       | Can we update the link to just go to the full story rather than
       | the summarized version? (sorry, I know it's kinda "offtopic" but
       | that just bugged me starting to read and just being redirected to
       | another site)
       | 
       | [0] https://www.foxnews.com/us/cold-case-zodiac-killer-
       | identifie...
        
         | [deleted]
        
         | [deleted]
        
         | lqet wrote:
         | By far the most interesting takeaway from the full FOX news
         | article is that it seems possible that the Zodiac Killer was
         | actually _a group_ of people:
         | 
         | > Hans Smits told Fox News he spent 10 years hiding a
         | whistleblower who said he escaped a criminal "posse" headed by
         | Poste [now identified as the Zodiac]. The man, who The Case
         | Breakers only referred to as Wil, told Smits the posse roamed
         | California's High Sierra region and that he was "groomed into a
         | killing machine."
         | 
         | > In addition, Wil said he witnessed Poste burying murder
         | weapons in the woods, Smits said.
         | 
         | > "They put out several bear caches out there in case something
         | happened," Smits said.
         | 
         | > Smits said he gave Wil financial, logistical and emotional
         | support over the years and moved him around for nearly 10 years
         | in an effort to keep him safe.
         | 
         | > Despite being dead for three years, some people are
         | mysteriously still loyal to him, said Michelle, who also
         | declined to provide her last name.
         | 
         | > "He targeted young men who didn't have a father figure," she
         | said. "It was a posse of three but the one [Poste] did a lot of
         | damage. He still has some kind of control... and he's gone."
        
           | microtherion wrote:
           | This part of the article actually made me _more_ skeptical
           | about the rest of the claims. The rest sounds like fairly
           | convincing forensics, but then it veers off into rather
           | outlandish conspiracy territory. And if you look at the
           | earlier article on the  "Case Breakers" site, the whole thing
           | appears to have _started_ in conspiracy territory:
           | https://thecasebreakers.org/2021/09/the-last-zodiac-victim/
           | 
           | That's not to say that no such weapons cache exists. I
           | imagine there must be plenty of outlaw-ish people in rural
           | regions with sizable above- and underground collections of
           | firearms. But often their boasts of paramilitary acumen tend
           | to be rather overstated, so claims of a serial killer
           | grooming posthumously loyal killing machines would require
           | rather extraordinary proof.
        
           | CancunVacation wrote:
           | So that means that Ted Cruz hasn't been ruled out as a
           | suspect?
        
             | [deleted]
        
           | gaetgu wrote:
           | One hundred percent. That is something that, to my knowledge,
           | was not known before. If it is indeed true then it would
           | bring some interesting questions along with it.
        
         | colpabar wrote:
         | It's fox news, it would get flagged immediately. Using the
         | local station seems to have bought some time.
        
         | efojs wrote:
         | Articles on the Case Breakers' site:
         | 
         | https://thecasebreakers.org/2021/10/cold-case-team-says-zodi...
         | 
         | https://thecasebreakers.org/2021/09/the-last-zodiac-victim/
         | 
         | Press release #1:
         | https://secureservercdn.net/166.62.114.250/g9q.07b.myftpuplo...
        
       | gandalfian wrote:
       | So no one from the film.
        
       | steve76 wrote:
       | Dig him up and whip his bones.
        
       | jgrahamc wrote:
       | _Other clues include deciphering letters sent by the Zodiac that
       | revealed him as the killer, said Jen Bucholtz, a former Army
       | counterintelligence agent who works on cold cases. In one note,
       | the letters of Poste 's full name were removed to reveal an
       | alternate message, she told Fox News.
       | 
       | "So you've got to know Gary's full name in order to decipher
       | these anagrams," Bucholtz said. "I just don't think there's any
       | other way anybody would have figured it out."_
       | 
       | I'd love to see that evidence.
        
       | spoonjim wrote:
       | I'll need some more evidence to believe it. They're strongly
       | citing the "scars" on his forehead which, to my eye, look a lot
       | like the wrinkles on anyone's forehead.
        
         | philwelch wrote:
         | If you look closely, different people don't tend to have
         | matching forehead wrinkles.
        
       | pengaru wrote:
       | For anyone disinterested in giving any FOX site clicks, here's an
       | alternative source:
       | 
       | https://www.sfgate.com/crime/article/Investigators-claim-thi...
        
       | SubiculumCode wrote:
       | I wonder if neuroscience will ever come up with a treatment for
       | serial killers that would cure them of their murderous
       | obsessions.
       | 
       | I believe some serial killers are constantly thinking about
       | murder, while others might have two sides to their personalities
       | that avoid thinking about the other, like a switch.
        
         | ssklash wrote:
         | From what I've seen/read, it seems like many serial killers
         | have a consistent urge/voices telling them/impulse to kill that
         | they are able to resist for a time, lose control, kill, and
         | then repeat the cycle.
        
         | jimbob45 wrote:
         | I've wondered how many potential serial killers there are out
         | there that will never kill simply because we, as a society,
         | have elevated video games, movies, and adult entertainment to
         | such an extent that killing just isn't as gratifying as blowing
         | time on WoW, Netflix, or PH.
        
           | some_furry wrote:
           | This is a feature, not a bug.
        
           | FooBarBizBazz wrote:
           | This has probably also lost us virtuosos in other more
           | positive fields.
        
       | outside1234 wrote:
       | Ted Cruz?
        
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       (page generated 2021-10-06 23:00 UTC)