Zodiac killer mysteries deepen as decoded messages emerge
The Zodiac remains one of the most mysterious serial killers in U.S. history, active at the turn of the 1960s and 1970s. He is credited with murdering 37 people but was never caught. Investigators continue to examine his activities, but the case is full of unresolved issues, including encrypted messages the killer sent to the media.
The Zodiac sent four communications to the press. Two of them have already been deciphered, while the others remain a mystery. The letters were written in a unique cipher involving the substitution of letters with various signs, numbers, or sets of symbols.
The Zodiac - one of the major criminal mysteries of the U.S
The first letters reached three California newspapers: "The Chronicle," "Times-Herald," and "Examiner." Although each contained a different fragment of the cipher, the newspapers decided to publish them following threats from the Zodiac, who promised more crimes if his conditions were not met. It turned out the code was less complicated than assumed, as Donald Gene and Betty June Harden solved it on August 8, 1969, just a week after receiving it.
Deciphering the next messages took more time and was only achieved in December 2020. American programmer David Oranchak, Belgian Jarl Van Eycke, and Australian mathematician Sam Blake announced then that they had cracked the so-called "340 cipher." In 2021, Fayçal Ziraoui claimed that by using the key discovered in December 2020, he was able to decipher the last two messages within two weeks.
The last messages from the Zodiac supposedly revealed his name and the location where a bomb was hidden. Ziraoui suggests the killer used the "340 cipher" due to its mysteriousness, seeing no need to create a new code. The cipher named "Z32" included 32 characters and a map of the cities of Berkeley and Oakland in California. Ziraoui claims that the code pointed to Mount Diablo in California, suggesting geographical coordinates to Lake Tahoe, from where one of the Zodiac's victims, Donna Lass, originated, who died several months after receiving the letter. This could mean the Zodiac planned the murder there.
The second message "Z13," consisting of only 13 characters, was supposed to contain his name. Ziraoui again used the "340 cipher" and noticed analogies to the "trifid triple cipher" from 1901, allowing him to translate the code into the sequence of letters: K A Y R.
Ziraoui's findings are becoming crucial because the main suspect was Lawrence "Kane" Kaye, a World War II sailor who faced numerous legal issues after moving to California. Kane was 45 years old during the Zodiac's peak activity. The sister of one victim, Darlene Ferrin, recognized Kane as the stranger who disturbed her in a restaurant, and Kathleen Johns identified him as the kidnapper she escaped from.
Ziraoui submitted his analyses to the FBI. Opinions on his discoveries are divided, with some suggesting that the 13-character code is too short for full deciphering. Nevertheless, Emmanuel Thomé, a cryptography expert from the French National Institute of Scientific Research and Digital Technology, highlighted in an interview with "The New York Times" that Ziraoui's methods should be thoroughly examined by the authorities.
