The killer's identity remains unknown. The Zodiac murdered victims in Benicia, Vallejo, Lake Berryessa and San Francisco between December 1968 and October 1969. In April 2004, the San Francisco Police Department marked the case "inactive", yet re-opened the case at some point prior to March 2007.[2][3] The case also remains open in the city of Vallejo as well as in Napa County and Solano County.[4] The California Department of Justice has maintained an open case file on the Zodiac murders since 1969.[5]
The Zodiac Killer is one of the great unsolved serial killer mysteries of all time, taking only second place to Jack the Ripper.
Even though police investigated over 2,500 potential suspects, the case was never officially solved. This October, 1966 killing began a ghoulish series of murders that panicked the people of the San Francisco area. For years the Zodiac taunted the police with weird ciphers, phone calls, insulting and cryptic messages.
On the night of Sunday, October 30, 1966, long before anyone was to hear of the Zodiac, an 18-year-old student named Cheri Jo Bates was brutally murdered near the parking lot of Riverside City College's library annex. Cheri Jo Bates - Zodiac Victim
Cheri Jo Bates
Exactly what they did during this time is uncertain, but eventually the man attacked her, slashing her three times in the chest area, once in the back, and seven times across the throat.
The paint was analyzed, and was found to be common exterior house paint. Greasy, unidentified palm and fingerprints were also found in and on her car, about 200 feet away.
The watch, discovered at the crime scene.
Judging by these details, the murder of Cheri Jo Bates would appear to be nothing more mysterious than a particularly vicious crime of passion, committed perhaps by a spurned suitor, an ex-boyfriend, or a subject somehow linked to Miss Bates.
Woman Claims Her Father Was Zodiac Killer
SAN FRANCISCO -- A woman stepped forward Wednesday to claim her late father was the infamous Zodiac Killer and that she as a 7-year-old wrote and stamped some of the letters that taunted local police.
Kevin McLean, the former law partner of the late Melvin Belli, said he has led a two-year investigation into claims by Deborah Perez that her father, Guy Ward Hendrickson, was the Zodiac killer. Hendrickson, who lived in Orange County, died in 1993 of cancer.
Perez described Hendrickson as a carpenter, a father of six, with a violent nature.
As a youngster, Perez said she sometimes accompanied her father on his killing sprees to the Bay Area. Perez said that she wrote and stamped the letters to the San Francisco Chronicle following the murder of San Francisco cab driver Paul Stine in October 1969. “My father grabbed his gun. I heard shots. Perez said her father apologized for “doing bad things” on his death bed, but she didn’t know that involved the Zodiac killings.
The findings of McLean’s investigation have now been forwarded to the FBI and he has also asked local police for help in verifying Perez’s claims. In September 1969, the Zodiac struck in Napa County, stabbing two 20-year-old college students picnicking at Lake Berryessa. Ferrin, 22, was shot and killed seven months later at the Blue Springs Golf Club, while her companion, Michael Mageau, 19, survived.
On October 14, the San Francisco Chronicle received a letter from the Zodiac containing a swatch of Stine's shirt tail as proof he was the killer.