All language subtitles for Very.Scary.People.S01E09.Zodiac.Killer.I.Am.the.Zodiac.Part.1.1080p.HMAX.WEB-DL.DD2.0.H.264-hdalx_track3_[eng]

"This is the zodiac speaking.

"To kill something gives me
the most thrilling experience.

"I like killing people
because it is so much fun.

"It is more fun than killing
wild game in the forest

because man is the most
dangerous animal of all."

Welcome to "very scary people."

I'm Donnie wahlberg.

At the end of the 1960s,

a series of murders
in northern California

in different towns,
using different weapons

would turn out to be the work of one man,

but police didn't connect the crimes

until the killer did it for them.

Not satisfied with just
getting away with murder,

he bragged to newspaper reporters

and taunted investigators.

What would inspire someone to
conjure up such a twisted plot,

stalking innocent people
and killing them for sport?

His reign of terror
would go on for years,

and he would live in infamy,
naming himself the zodiac.

He taunted police with letters
and terrorized

the people they protect.

More than three decades later,

a famous serial killer case
goes unsolved.

The first set of murders
took place near Christmas.

Benicia is about an hour away
from San Francisco.

Benicia was a very quiet community.

Benicia never had the crime rate

that San Francisco had.

On December 20, 1968,

David Faraday
came to Betty Lou Jensen's house

to pick her up for their first date,

and they promised her parents

that they would return by
11 P.M.

David and Betty were just typical

high school kids back then.

Betty Lou Jensen was 16 years old

and David Faraday was 17 years old.

He was a popular young man.

Betty Lou Jensen was an art student

who showed tremendous talent.

They went to a restaurant,

spent some time with some friends.

They were supposed to go
to a Christmas play,

but instead, they went to
a place where young people park.

They went out to lake Herman road.

Lake Herman road back in 1968

was very much how it looks today.

It's actually rather isolated,
way out in the hills.

It was a lovers' Lane area.

They were looking for a place
to be alone.

Betty Lou and David
thought they were alone,

but they weren't.

We know that they were there
at 10:30.

Another person drove by
and saw their car and again,

after 11, another person
drove by and saw their car,

so they were out there for quite a while,

and we don't know exactly
when she planned to leave,

but she wasn't going to
make curfew that night.

Benicia was a safe town.

You're not going to think
twice about parking

at lake Herman road.

I'd be surprised if they were
worried about much

of anything right then.

They were in the car when suddenly,

a car came and blocked them off.

And this figure gets out

and walks around their car,

firing bullets into it.

A bullet shattered a window,

but at some point,

it appears the killer forced
the victims out of the vehicle.

David was shot in the head once,

and Betty Lou Jensen
was shot in the back five times

as she was trying to run away.

10 shots were fired that evening,

and apparently, the assailant
got back in the car

and drove away and was not spotted

after leaving the scene.

It wasn't so remote that there
weren't other people around,

so risky for the offender,

but he was also able
to commit these murders

and then get out of the area
pretty successfully.

Myself and my partner were going
back to the police department

when we heard the call
come over the air saying

there was some type of a disturbance

or a vehicle accident
on lake Herman road.

Possibly, they were ordered out
of the car by the responsible

and a boy was shot
right at the side of the car,

and the girl apparently tried to run,

and she was shot
and found 28 feet further on.

When we got there, we, again,
found the two victims

and, of course, realized
that this was not

just a routine call.

We could see the young lady
had run from the car,

and she was dead.

He was still breathing.

It was fairly cold,

and, in fact,
you could see the breath, too.

That's why we knew there was
some life left in him.

Oddly enough, even though
he was still alive,

a responding officer
did a chalk outline of his body.

The boy was an eagle scout.

The girl was on her first date

and there's no record of any misbehavior

on either one of them.

He was rushed to the hospital,
but he was doa,

but if you were at that scene
and saw the waste of life

in these young kids, turn your stomach.

This was real life.

Police found many shell casings
at the scene of the crime,

and they also found several bullets.

The evidence indicates that
there were certain elements

of gunshot residue on her dress

which indicated that
the first shot may have occurred

while she was closer to the killer.

The police also found the tire tracks

showing where the killer's car
had been parked.

They did take photographs,
picked up the spent cartridges,

did some fingerprinting on the car.

That was it and you have
to realize that we didn't have

the technology then that we have today.

The police initially
investigated the possibility

that the victims were killed
by someone they had known.

We had no idea at all who the responsible

or responsibles were.

It could have been more than one person.

We didn't know.

The police tend to focus
on the inner circle

because usually when someone is killed,

especially a low-risk
type victim like Betty Lou

and David farraday,

probably the perpetrator
knew them and was mad at them.

It's called a crime of passion.

There was one young boy

who apparently had an interest
in Betty Lou Jensen

and was jealous of her
relationship with David,

but police investigated and discovered

that he had an alibi
for the time of the crime.

Other suspects in the murders
of David and Betty Lou

included the usual suspects,

the local druggies they were focused on,

and it just went nowhere.

Do you have any idea
what the possible motive

might be for this killing?

We have no motive at this time.

The benicia case went cold
almost immediately.

Without a motive to go back

and find out what was the causation,

I mean, the causation for the person

or persons to do this,
you just speculate,

and there was all type of speculation,

which none of it actually panned out,

and it was hard to believe at first.

Is this really happening here
in this community?

We had some robberies and that
type of thing

but not where you just actually
zero in on someone

and just take their life.

The community was horrified
by this murder.

There were not murders
like this in the past.

It turns out that the killer was
actually just getting started.

The first murders happened
December 20, 1968.

It was on lake Herman road
just outside of vallejo

in Solano county, California.

After six months,
the double murder was cold.

They'd done everything they could do.

Barring a miracle, they weren't
gonna solve that murder,

and then they had a new one.

Darlene ferrin was 22 years old.

She was a wife, a mother,

and she was a very popular
waitress at a local restaurant.

She had been married once.

That ended, and she was relatively

early into her second marriage.

Darlene, or Dee as I knew her,
we met through our work.

I was a cook and she was
a waitress at the pancake house.

We ended up getting married.

Our daughter was born in January of 1968.

She was the type of person that
people could fall in love with

just because she was outgoing and bubbly,

just friendly to people.

I know it upset a lot
of the other waitresses

she worked with because
she always made better tips.

On the night of July 4th,

Darlene ferrin had apparently been out.

Everybody is downtown.
The sky is full of fireworks.

There's crowds.
There's a marching band.

I was working at my regular job.

She was gonna go out
and buy some fireworks,

and we were gonna meet at the house.

She went out with her friend Michael

just to kill some time until
her husband got home from work.

We don't know for sure what the nature

of their relationship was.

Michael developed some sort
of fixation on Darlene,

which led to an odd friendship.

Michael mageau told Darlene

that he wanted to talk to her
about something,

so they drove to blue rock Springs park.

They parked in the parking lot.

Blue rock Springs is a lovely place

and again, off the beaten path.

Again, a lovers' Lane area,

had only been there a few minutes,

and a car pulled up behind them

as they were parked in the car talking.

The vehicle pulled up behind
and sat there for a moment,

but they didn't think anything of it.

A few minutes later,

what appeared to be
the same vehicle returned.

Mike is very upset.

"It's the police," he thinks,
because the guy

is shining a huge light on him
and he walks toward the car.

But instead of asking for their license,

he opened fire through

the window of the passenger side.

Michael mageau is hit once in the jaw.

He was hit in the shoulder.

But the shooter isn't done yet.

He walks around the car
and then starts shooting Darlene

repeatedly in the driver's seat.

In the process of returning
to his vehicle,

Michael mageau cried out in pain,

causing the assailant to turn
around and return to the window

and fire twice more at each of them.

He got in his car and drove away.

Three teenagers were driving in the area,

and when they saw a vehicle
parked in the blue rock Springs

parking lot, they decided to investigate,

but when their headlights hit the area,

they saw Michael mageau
laying on the ground,

and one of the kids jumped out
and asked him if he was okay,

and Michael mageau explained
that they had been shot

and that they needed a doctor.

They drove on to a house
and called the police.

Darlene was still breathing
when police arrived,

and one of the detectives
tried to talk to her,

and she appeared to be
trying to say something,

but it wasn't intelligible.

The police found shell casings,

but that's really it
in terms of evidence.

No other evidence was found...
No footprints, no fingerprints,

no tire prints, nothing.

There didn't appear to be a motive.

To me, what's so interesting
is that these crime scenes

are pretty clean of emotion.

They're devoid of emotion.

You don't see any expression of anger

like any battering
to the face of the victims,

like coming up to the car
and yelling and screaming

and then punching and slapping them.

They're rushed to the hospital,

and at the hospital,
Darlene is pronounced dead,

but Michael miraculously survives.

Darlene ferrin is a little bit
like Laura Palmer

in the "twin peaks" television show.

You know, her death set off
this thing in vallejo.

One murder could be
the result of a grudge

or the act of a crazy boyfriend,

but these two similar murders
had police very worried

that it could be something
far more sinister.

They were both what you
might call blitz-style attacks,

using a handgun.

Now this is the beginning of a theme.

He's going to do this again.

We think that he's... it appears to us

that he is killing just for the thrill.

Like the son of Sam,
the Boston strangler, btk,

the zodiac stalks his prey
and then slaughtered them.

A couple parked at a lovers' Lane

was shot in December of 1968,

and then six months later,
another couple was shot.

Now, we have a second attack

that took the life of a young mother

but left a living witness
that could potentially identify

the shooter, and it's also possible

that Darlene knew the man who killed her.

There have been stories over the years

that Darlene ferrin was the victim

of some mysterious stalker
who was following her

in the weeks and months before her death.

She worked at an ihop, and he
would sit there and watch her.

Police were never able to find

whoever it was that was bothering her.

Michael mageau was very
traumatized by these events.

He was the only living person
to have seen the killer,

and that put him
in a very difficult place.

Mike is interviewed by the police,

and he is able to articulate
that a white man

approached the car, round face,
glasses, maybe 30s,

and he thinks that if he saw a photo,

he might be able
to identify this shooter.

It's not much to go on,

and the killer could just disappear,

except that he doesn't.

About 45 minutes after the shooting,

the killer chose to go
to a phone booth in vallejo

and actually report what he had
just done to Darlene and Mike

and take credit
for killing Betty Lou and David.

He identified the type of weapon
used as a 9 millimeter.

He also described Darlene's car.

When the dispatcher tried
to interrupt the caller

to ask him a question,
the man raised his voice

and said,
"I'm the one who did it."

Dispatcher Nancy slover
described the call as taunting,

and she said that at the end of the call,

the man said, "goodbye,"
in a long taunting tone.

That call was traced
to a nearby gas station,

but they were not able
to find any evidence,

and the killer was long gone.

He's ratcheting up what he's
doing, and he's changing.

The interesting thing
about the phone booth is,

what do you think is across the street?

Vallejo pd.

Now, this is the beginning of a theme.

He's gonna do this again.

He's taunting the police.

Why was he willing to take such risks

that could have resulted
in an arrest made of him?

Taking high risks is important
to this offender,

and it increases the thrill
and excitement of his murders.

Three days after the shooting,

vallejo detective ed rust interviewed

Michael mageau at the hospital,
and he provided

a detailed account
of what happened that night,

including a description of the killer.

He described the man
as being approximately 5'8",

a beefy build, short brown curly hair.

This murderer,
he's the sort of generic man

who could easily disappear into a crowd.

The most interesting aspects
of this attack at this point

are the similarities
and connections to the murders

that happened just six months before.

They were both what you
might call blitz-style attacks

using a handgun on victims
sitting in a parked vehicle.

He's choosing young couples
on a weekend under the moon

in a lovers' Lane on specific days.

I would not be surprised
if he had never had

a real relationship with a woman,

and so he's going to get people
that have what he does not have.

Somebody who in their own life
feels very powerless,

feels very weak and only feels
important and significant

if they can go out and kill somebody.

There was some sort of serial killer

operating in the bay area.

We think that he's... it appears to us

that he is killing just for the thrill.

For the next three weeks,
the investigation goes nowhere.

Then the killer
does something really odd.

He reaches out to the media.

Three bay area newspapers receive

three virtually identical
handwritten letters.

He wrote to
"the vallejo times."

He wrote to "the San Francisco examiner,"

and he wrote
to "the chronicle."

As a political cartoonist,

I was 20 feet away
when the letters came in.

We're across the hall.

These letters were so specific.

They really went into detail
about the victims

and their appearances
and the number of shots.

It couldn't have been anyone
other than the culprit.

These three letters were accompanied by

a section of a cipher, a coded message.

The letter claimed that
the ciphered message

would reveal the killer's identity.

Normally, killers don't send letters

bragging about their crimes to newspapers

and including mysterious codes

that they're trying to compel
people to work on,

so it was a very unique thing
for the newspaper.

He demanded that these ciphers
and the letters be published

in the newspapers and threatened
to go on a killing rampage

over the weekend if that was not done.

And they had to weigh a lot of
different factors

before deciding to publish.

They published them.

I don't think the police were
very happy with that,

and here is where you enlist the public.

Many citizens took this as
a challenge to try to solve it,

and they were successful.

Donald harden was a high school
teacher in salinas,

and he and his wife
saw the codes in the paper

and decided to start working on it.

It took Donald and Betty
20 hours on and off

to solve the first cipher
from the killer.

"I like killing people
because it is so much fun.

"It is more fun than killing
wild game in the forest

because man is the most
dangerous animal of all."

What is intriguing about
his choice of words

is he actually gave away the cipher

because everybody that's looking at this,

the hardens especially,
they were looking for I.

This is egotist.

He's going to begin his letter with I,

and they were right, and they said,

"okay. What's the most commonly
double letter

ever used in the English language?

I. Two ls.
"Well, I like killing people."

Now, they had an I.
They had two ls.

They had a g, an I, an n.

That's the way it starts,

and they solved it in that manner,

but it was basically based
on the killer's own egotism.

The last section of that
has never been decoded,

and, of course, the theory
is that it includes

the killer's name.

I actually think it was just
planted there to baffle

and confuse the decoders,

and it's obvious that he wants
to get credit for his crimes.

He appeared to want to taunt the police.

"Dear editor, this is
the zodiac speaking.

"In answer to your asking
for more details

"about the good times
I've had in vallejo,

I shall be very happy to supply
even more material."

That message made it clear just
how close police may have come

to catching the zodiac killer,

and as you'll see next,
the terror was far from over.

Welcome back to
"very scary people."

By the summer of 1969, two young couples

had been shot on lovers' lanes.

Three are dead,
and one is seriously injured.

Instead of retreating to the shadows,

the killer is writing
letters to newspapers.

The police and the public
have begun asking,

"what does zodiac really want,
and what will he do to get it?"

By the end of the summer in 1969,

we have two attacks,
three murder victims,

another victim who is seriously injured,

and now a killer who's writing
letters to the local newspaper

and taking credit for all of it.

He appeared to want to taunt the police.

Just days after the initial
communications from the killer,

a new letter arrived.

And that letter was the first
to begin with the phrase,

"this is the zodiac speaking."

"Dear editor, this 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 supply even more material."

He named himself.

He called himself zodiac.

What exactly that meant
and where the word zodiac

came from has never
been described by the killer.

When you think about
the definition of the zodiac,

the zodiac is everything
out there in the universe,

and it's all-powerful, and it's all dark.

It implies somebody who's omnipotent,

and so I think that this is

an individual who is very arrogant,

loves that power, loves that control.

He was kind of developing
his own character

through these communications,
through these ciphers.

The three-page letter includes
a great many details

about the Darlene and Michael attack

that only the killer could know.

"On the 4th of July,
I did not open the car door.

The window was rolled
down already."

The killer provided more details
about the crimes,

which apparently satisfied
police that he was responsible.

These letters contain some misspellings,

which led some people to believe

that the killer had
a very limited education.

The intelligence of the zodiac
is still an open question.

In his letters, he spells some
very difficult words

exactly correctly

and yet mess up on very simple words.

But it's also possible
that that was a put-on,

that he was trying to make
himself appear less intelligent

than he actually was in order
to throw off investigators.

I've always called it

as he's playing chess against the police.

I think the killer is matching wits.

He's making himself feel important.

He may have misspelled some words,

but the message that he's trying
to get across is very clear.

"Last Christmas in that episode
the police were wondering

"as to how I could shoot
and hit my victims in the dark.

"What I did was tape
a small pencil flashlight

"to the barrel of my gun.

"I was not happy to see

that I did not
get front page coverage."

He seemed to be very interested
in gaining publicity.

The zodiac obviously had
a tremendous ego.

When he didn't get
what he wanted, he complained.

His next move ensures
that he will continue to get

the attention from the public
that he's been seeking.

He hog-tied them so that they
were lying on their stomachs

with their feet tied behind their backs.

The zodiac then drew a foot-long knife

out of a scabbard in his belt.

And I'm just kind of,
like, waiting to die.

The zodiac killer craved publicity,

taunting the public with creepy
letters to the media

in which he said he had killed 37 people,

those letters often written in a cipher

he seemed to have invented himself.

After gunning down two teenage couples,

the killer starts writing to the press,

and he's given himself a name...
The zodiac.

It's as if he wants us to think of him

as a signature or a symbol, even a brand.

On September 27, 1969,

the zodiac showed up at lake berryessa,

where Bryan hartnell and Cecelia Shepard

were lying by the water's edge.

22-year-old Cecelia Shepard,

a local college student.

She was transferring from
one college to another,

and she got the help of her
fellow college student

Bryan hartnell to pack up her room.

Bryan hartnell was a young man
attending college for prelaw,

and he had had a previous
relationship with Cecelia

and obviously still had
a lot of feelings for her,

and they decided
to spend some time together.

The weather on September 27th

was very pleasant.

It was a beautiful day.

This is a remote lake.
This is up in the mountains.

Is there... you got through,
you know, from vallejo

and all the way over at napa,
and you go up this hill.

We were not on high alert

or expecting anything like this to occur.

We didn't have that type of community.

As they were sitting there,
Cecelia noticed a man

walking through the trees
in the distance.

She commented to Bryan about the man,

and Bryan assumed he was just there

doing whatever and dismissed the man.

As he approached and got closer
and closer,

he reached a point to where he
was approximately 75 feet away

when he stepped behind a tree.

Put on a hood with sunglasses
that had a chest covering

that had the zodiac's
crosshair symbol on it.

He approached them with his gun drawn.

Bryan started to get up,
and he told him to.

"Get down. Get back down,"
and he pointed the gun at him.

And he told Bryan and Cecelia
that he had escaped

from a prison,
and he needed their car keys

and some money to escape to Mexico.

He's wearing this scary
Halloween-mask contraption

on his head, engaging in conversation

with these people
who are looking up at him,

seeing this knife hang off
of him, seeing this gun,

seeing the ropes hang off of them.

That mask, his conversation
I'm sure increased their fear

and their expressions
and how they responded to him.

That's everything that they want

to see the fear
in the eyes of their victims.

Bryan said to him, he said,
"I don't have any money.

"I've only got some change.
Here, take mine.

"Take the change.
Take the car keys.

You can have it,"
and zodiac did not take it.

He had Cecelia tie up Bryan.

Then he tied up the two of them.

He hog-tied them so that they
were lying on their stomachs

with their feet tied behind their backs.

Bryan thought that was going
to be the end of that.

The zodiac then drew a foot-long knife

out of a scabbard in his belt
and stabbed Bryan

about six times in his back
and then turned to Cecelia.

Who then was screaming
and yelling and rolling

and trying to get away from him,

and he began stabbing her.

She was stabbed approximately 10 times...

Five times in the front,
five times in the back.

I felt my life, my energy,
just this dark...

And I'm, like, just kind of,
like, waiting to die.

He watched them for a moment or two

and then quietly walked away.

Bryan and Cecelia with these
multiple stab wounds

had been left to bleed to death,
but they don't give up.

The killer left both
of the victims alive.

They waited to be sure he was gone,

and then Bryan turned to her,

and he tried to get her loose
by using his teeth on her knots.

He was barely able to get it loose enough

to where she could get a hand free,

then he felt Cecelia actually
get a hand and loosen his knots,

and so he became free.

Bryan got up and tried to walk
to flag down help

and they were a good
300 yards away from the road.

He was never able to really get very far.

I couldn't see.
You know, I kept blacking out.

My legs kept getting weak.

Offshore, a father and son
see something on the shore,

and they row like crazy,

and they get the two park
rangers to come to them.

I was on patrol in napa
on the east side of town.

It was 7:15
when I received the call

to respond to a double
stabbing at lake berryessa,

so by the time I got to the scene,

it's over an hour that
the victims had lay injured.

Can you describe for us
what your attacker looked like?

He was of medium to short height,

kind of pouchy.

He had this black hood on.

He put it down to here,
just little slits in the eyes.

The costume at lake berryessa

is one of the most fascinating
portions of the case.

If not for Bryan hartnell's survival,

we would never have known about it.

He had some clip-on glasses that
were either affixed to the hood

or affixed to glasses underneath.

The circle on the chest
was a perfectly formed circle.

It was always puzzling to us
that the zodiac would wear

a mask to cover his identity
if he had intended to kill them.

I think he just felt like
his follow-up performance

had to be something just
shocking and terrifying,

so he created this costume,

but it wasn't for the benefit
of his victims.

It was for his own need.

When I got there at the scene,
I went right to Cecelia,

and my partner went to Bryan.

She knew that she was critically ill

and she knew that she had
to give as much information

as she could,
so we could try and catch him.

She had saw him without his hood on.

She saw that he had a round-type face

and that he had brown hair,

and then within 10 to 15 minutes,

the ambulance did arrive.

Bryan and Cecelia are taken
to the hospital,

and police comb this
crime scene for evidence.

They found several bootprints

which appeared to belong
to a military-style boot.

They're wing-walkers,
is what they were called.

These are extremely rare boots,

150,000 made and sold
only at military bases.

You had to literally be
in the Navy or the air force.

Those bootprints led from the area

where the killer
apparently parked his vehicle

down to the crime scene

and then back up to Bryan hartnell's car.

What I found was a karmann ghia
with Oregon plates,

and on the side, the zodiac
had scrolled his symbol,

which was the circle
with the crosshairs in it.

He writes with a blue
felt-tip pen on the car.

It's dead-on zodiac lettering.

He puts the time of the murder.

He puts all of his previous attacks.

The vallejo and benicia crimes,
and he ended that by saying,

"by knife, lake berryessa,"

so we knew that this all tied
together with one individual.

Without that message on that car
door, it's perfectly possible

that crime may never have been
connected to the zodiac.

He's doing the investigators'
work for them,

which goes back to the whole idea of,

"I want credit for these murders.

"These are mine.

Now make sure you give me credit
for these cases."

It's very compromising for him

because now they are going
to connect them

which ups his risk of being caught.

He was able to do what he always does.

He made a phone call to the police.

He is a cunning man.

He pulled out a gun and held it
to the back of his head.

We have reason to believe
that he's a maniac.

With each attack, he keeps
ratcheting up the risk factor.

It really begs the question,
what is he planning to do next?

Investigators hoping to crack
one of america's

most mysterious unsolved cases.

Authorities in California
have been trying

to hunt down
the zodiac killer for decades.

The murderer has been linked
to five deaths

in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

The zodiac, he was so brazen.

Calling the police a second time
in a downtown location

in daylight was very risky,

and at any point,
he could have gotten caught.

The subject stated,
"I want to report a murder.

"No, a double-murder.
I did it," and with that,

the officer could feel that
there was nobody on the line.

The police are able to trace the call,

and it goes to a pay phone
at a napa car wash

at 1231 main street,

just five blocks away
from the police station.

So close to them,

but, of course, when they
get there, there's no one there.

However, this time, they're able
to get a palm print.

He's right near the police
department once they figure out

which pay phone he's called from.

Being able to do this under
the nose of law enforcement

is certainly a way of saying,

"I can do this and carry it out
right in front of you,

and there's nothing
that you can do about it."

There's this sketch that comes
from some eyewitnesses

who saw a man earlier in the day.

He's white with brown hair
and has a round face.

He might be the zodiac.

Well, sheriff, what type
of person is this man?

He is a cunning man.

He knows just exactly what moves
he's going to make.

He knows where he's going to start

and when he's going to end,

and he knows just exactly

how this thing is gonna turn out.

We think that he's... it appears
to us that he is killing

just for the thrill of killing.

Well, we have reason to believe
that he's a maniac.

The attack on Cecelia Shepard
and Bryan hartnell

had been particularly brutal,
especially Cecelia.

She had been stabbed twice
as many times as Bryan.

Cecelia died three days after
the attack at lake berryessa.

She was lucky to have survived that long.

She fought back.

She was very strong, and unfortunately,

she was not strong enough.

Bryan miraculously survived.

This guy took his anger and all
of his fury out on the woman.

Once again, the men survive.
The women die.

That just seems to be the motif
of the zodiac crimes.

When you're in control
and you're able to shoot them

in a very cold-blooded manner,

the victims are no longer human beings.

I don't think that he was acting
under his total,

complete consciousness.

When a man is, if you don't
mind me using the word, sick,

you can't hold this against them,

but the real concern that I have is

that he doesn't do this again.

Contrary to all things logical,

this killer is leaving lots of clues,

almost intentional clues,
not just at the crime scene,

but he's also calling
the police from pay phones,

sending letters to the media,

talking out loud in front of a victim.

Why would a killer be so careless

or is it just all part
of his grand scheme?

Does it seem to you as
if you're pretty much

on the verge of finding this man?

Well, I wouldn't want to say that.

The one thing that is indisputable

is that this killer loves attention.

When you see taunting behavior in a case,

it's not typical,
even for a serial killer,

and they know that
if they taunt the police,

they run the risk of getting
caught a lot sooner,

but for zodiac, I think at
a certain point in his crimes,

it was the taunting behavior

that continued to motivate him more so

than the murders themselves.

With each attack, he keeps
ratcheting up the risk factor.

The first one was a shooting.

The second one followed by a phone call.

Now the third one,
there's the element of terror,

the executioner's costume, the knives,

tying the victims up, again,
followed by a phone call.

It really begs the question,
what is he planning to do next?

After the gruesome stabbing
attack at lake berryessa,

it's only two weeks before
the zodiac killer strikes again.

It's in the heart of San Francisco.

Paul stine was a cabdriver
who was working the evening

of October 11, 1969.

Paul was working two jobs at the time.

He was selling insurance

and also driving a cab, of course,

and he was putting
himself through college

and was pretty interesting,
intelligent guy.

We know some of what happened
because of the taxi logs.

Zodiac had been waiting under a place

called the pine street magazine
shop and it was on Geary.

The driver pulls by, and he says,

"hey. Can I get a ride?"

He directed the driver
to take him to a location

at the intersection of
Washington and maple streets,

which was located in the upscale
presidio heights neighborhood.

He drove out there
and went to park the car

where he was told to.

And for some reason,
"go another block further,"

says zodiac.

"I want you to go to
Washington and cherry."

He wants to get to an isolated spot.

When he pulled over
at the side of the road

and put the car in park,

zodiac apparently pulled out a gun

and held it to the back
of his head toward his ear

and fired a bullet,
which killed him instantly.

Some kids who were in a house

nearby apparently heard
some kind of commotion

and looked outside the window,

and they observed the man inside the cab

handling Paul stine's body.

What the kids see is really bizarre.

He was tearing off a square
of Paul stine's shirt,

and the cab driver is bleeding.

Zodiac gets out.
He begins wiping down the car.

He might have left prints.

Then he walked away up north up
cherry street and disappeared.

The three kids who were
observing what had happened

called the police,
and they described the killer.

The facts got confused,

and when the police broadcast
a description of the killer,

they described him as a black
man instead of a white man.

Two police officers who
were responding to the scene

were driving down Jackson street
one block north of Washington,

and they apparently saw this white man

walking down the street.

Zodiac is stopped by a police car,

and they see him.

Stocky man, round face.

The officers ask him if he
has seen anyone suspicious.

But zodiac says, "oh, yeah.
I saw a man running with a gun."

"He went that way," and they thank him,

and then off they go.

Zodiac was right there.
They would have caught him.

He was within arm's reach.

Who is this man, so ordinary
that his presence

near a crime scene doesn't alarm police

and yet so terrifying that

the entire country is now on alert?

With this chance to catch the killer

having slipped through their hands,

investigators hope
he'll make another mistake,

but zodiac is about to make
a move that changes everything.

The hunt for the zodiac killer
has only just begun,

next on "very scary people."

I'm Donnie wahlberg.
Thanks for watching.