While the couple sat in Ferrin's car, a second car drove into the lot and parked alongside them but almost immediately drove away. Just before midnight on July 4, 1969, Darlene Ferrin and Michael Mageau drove into the Blue Rock Springs Park in Vallejo, four miles (6.4 km) from the Lake Herman Road murder site, and parked. The killer then shot Jensen five times in the back as she fled her body was found 28 feet from the car. It appeared that Jensen had exited the car first, but when Faraday was halfway out, the killer shot him in the head. The killer may have then exited the second car and walked toward the Rambler, possibly ordering the couple out of it. Utilizing available forensic data, Robert Graysmith postulated that another car pulled into the turnout just prior to 11:00 p.m.
The Solano County Sheriff's Department investigated the crime but no leads developed. Shortly after 11:00 p.m., their bodies were found by Stella Borges, who lived nearby. At about 10:15 p.m., Faraday parked his mother's Rambler in a gravel turnout, which was a well-known lovers' lane. They instead visited a friend before stopping at a local restaurant and then driving out on Lake Herman Road. The couple were on their first date and planned to attend a Christmas concert at Hogan High School, about three blocks from Jensen's home. The first murders widely attributed to the Zodiac Killer were the shootings of high school students Betty Lou Jensen and David Arthur Faraday on Decemon Lake Herman Road, just inside Benicia city limits. Paul Lee Stine, 29: shot and killed on October 11, 1969, in the Presidio Heights neighborhood in San Francisco.ĭavid Arthur Faraday and Betty Lou Jensen.Hartnell survived eight stab wounds to the back, but Shepard died as a result of her injuries on September 29, 1969. Bryan Calvin Hartnell, 20, and Cecelia Ann Shepard, 22: stabbed on September 27, 1969, at Lake Berryessa in Napa County.While Mageau survived the attack, Ferrin was pronounced dead on arrival at Kaiser Foundation Hospital. Michael Renault Mageau, 19, and Darlene Elizabeth Ferrin, 22: shot on July 4, 1969, in the parking lot of Blue Rock Springs Park in Vallejo.David Arthur Faraday, 17, and Betty Lou Jensen, 16: shot and killed on December 20, 1968, on Lake Herman Road, within the city limits of Benicia.Murders and correspondence Confirmed murdersĪlthough the Zodiac claimed to have committed 37 murders in letters to the newspapers, investigators agree on only seven confirmed victims, two of whom survived. 1.2.8 Later letters of suspicious authorship.1.2 Public speculation and Zodiac claims.The California Department of Justice has maintained an open case file on the Zodiac murders since 1969. The case also remains open in the city of Vallejo, as well as in Napa County and Solano County. The San Francisco Police Department marked the case "inactive" in April 2004, but re-opened it at some point prior to March 2007. While many theories regarding the identity of the killer have been suggested, the only suspect authorities ever publicly named was Arthur Leigh Allen, a former elementary school teacher and convicted sex offender who died in 1992.Īlthough the Zodiac ceased written communications around 1974, the unusual nature of the case led to international interest that has sustained throughout the years. Of the four ciphers he produced, two remain unsolved, and one took 51 years to crack. Some of the letters included cryptograms, or ciphers, in which the killer claimed that he was collecting his victims as slaves for the afterlife.
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The Zodiac originated the name himself in a series of taunting letters and cards that he mailed to regional newspapers, threatening killing sprees and bombings if they were not printed. The Zodiac himself claimed to have murdered 37 victims, and he has been linked to several other cold cases, some in Southern California or outside the state. He targeted young couples and a lone male cab driver, and his known attacks took place in Benicia, Vallejo, unincorporated Napa County, and the city of San Francisco proper. The Zodiac murdered five known victims in the San Francisco Bay Area between December 1968 and October 1969, operating in rural, urban and suburban settings. The case has been described as the most famous unsolved murder case in American history and has become a fixture of popular culture, inspiring amateur detectives to attempt to resolve it and entertainment such as films, television, novels, and video games.
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The Zodiac Killer, or simply Zodiac or the Zodiac, is the pseudonym of a serial killer who operated in Northern California in the late 1960s.
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