All language subtitles for Before.They.Kill.Again.S01E04.1080p.WEB.h264-FREQUENCY_track3_[eng]

Oh, Lord.

You know,
I've never heard him talk.

This is the first time
I ever heard his voice.

I didn't know who shot me.

I didn't know
it was a serial killer.

There are serial killers
out there,

but nobody thinks
it's gonna happen to them.

I never thought
it would happen to me.

I figure sooner or later
they're gonna get him.

But he took off
and disappeared.

He's playing this game,

"Catch me if you can."

[reporter] Somewhere
in New York City tonight,

another bizarre criminal
may be getting ready
to strike again,

but police are out in force
to try to stop it.

It's like a cat
and mouse game with him.

You want to understand him.

You want to
get into their mind

because you wanna figure out

their thinking
and what they're
gonna do next.

[Zodiac speaking]

I enjoyed the hunt.

You had one mission.

You're trying to
get into a man's mind,
what he thinks

or why he would want
to do something like that.

He's playing his games.
We'll play ours.

[Zodiac speaking]

He was winning the battle.

We were dealing with
a very twisted mind.

For a detective,
this is an adrenaline rush.

You're being challenged
by a madman

and trying to figure out
what made him tick.

Who knows what's going on

in the mind
of a serial killer?

[theme music playing]

Saturday, October 2nd, 1993,
I went to Highland Park
by myself.

When I was leaving...

I hear this noise.

So I stop
and I look to my left.

He was in the bushes
and I looked, and he's...

Just like that.

And I just told him "f you"
and I kept on walking.

So as I'm walking, I saw
this shadow coming running.

I turned around
and he was standing there.

He pulled out a zip gun.

And he shot me.

I was shot on the left side
of my neck.

I don't know if you can see.

There's a little
teeny spot down there.

I was laying on my back,
bleeding out the neck.

And the blood was
dripping down my arm.

I started crying as I said,
"I'm going to die here
in this grass."

Um...

[sighs]

Um, just give me a minute.
One minute.

[gunshot]

May 31st, 1990,
I was a sergeant

in the Queens crimes against
senior citizen's squad.

Joe Proce was almost
an 80-year-old man.

Bordering on being senile.

He was down on his luck.

He lived in
a basement apartment

on the Brooklyn-Queens border.

And somebody
followed this guy home

in the middle of the night
and he shot him in the back.

Shot him one time
and he left a note.

This is the note
that was handed to me.

The note says,
"This is the Zodiac.

The twelve sign will die

when the belts in the heaven
are seen."

It's got a circle
in crosshairs,

and it's got a circle
with three pie slices in it.

When I first saw this note,
I knew very little
about astrology.

I didn't know that this was
the sign of Scorpio.

And I didn't know
this is the sign of Gemini

and the other sign,
he meant it to be Taurus.

Alluding to
the constellations.

But it did give me
a very uneasy feeling.

I had heard of the Zodiac
on the West Coast.

This killer on the West Coast

killed a great many people.

Shooting young people

sitting in cars late at night,

and he contacted the press,

taking credit
for his violent acts.

I also knew that he was
never apprehended.

So, you know, my mind went to,

could this possibly
be the same guy?

He's got the circle
in the crosshairs,

much like
the San Francisco Zodiac,
that was his calling card.

But we contacted
San Francisco detectives

and after a quick examination
of the letters,

they responded by telling us
that we were dealing with

a copycat.

Copycats come out
of the woodwork because

they want some attention.

I knew the author
of this letter

was a very deranged person.

I needed to take him
off the street

before he shot somebody else.

I was in my office
and I got a call

from Detective Bill Clark
from the homicide squad.

And he said,
"Sarge, I just got a call
from a Post reporter.

She said she got
a note from a guy
claiming to be the Zodiac."

I said,
"Bill, fax it to me ASAP."

When I saw that letter,

you know, it was
a holy [bleep] moment.

It really was.

As soon as I saw it,
I knew it was the same guy.

"This is the Zodiac.
The 12 sign will die

when the belts
in the heaven are seen."

So that's basically the same,
no more games, pigs.

So he's taunting the NYPD.

That just amped everyone up.

We're gonna get you.
We're gonna get you.

But he's claiming he's already
shot three people.

This note is saying
the first sign

is dead on March 8th.

The second sign is dead
on March 29th.

The third sign is dead
on May 31st.

We know Joseph Proce
was shot on May 31st.

I said, holy [bleep].
We had two shootings
prior to that.

I was shocked.

He wrote
"All shoot in Brooklyn"

because he thought
he was in Brooklyn

when he shot Proce.

We asked Brooklyn detectives
to check their records.

A few hours later, they said,
"We've got two shootings

in the 75 precinct,
right at these times
and dates."

On March 8th, was a guy
by the name of Orozco,

and the second guy
was Montenesdro.

Montenesdro was pretty drunk.

He just asked me
what my birthday was,
and he shot me.

[Michael] Roscoe,
he was disabled.

He walked with a limp.

Every day, every night.

I never looked at him.

-You're in pain all the time?
-All the time.

[Michael]
I picked up the phone

and I called the reporter
and I asked her.

I practically begged her.

Please don't put this
in the newspaper.

The next morning,
this letter

was on the front cover
of the Post.

And from that it morphed
into television news.

When's your birthday?

The answer to that
seemingly harmless question
could be a death sentence.

And I was pissed.

What made citizens
of the city fearful.

I work at night
and I take a different route.

They can come up on anyone
at any time.

Back in those days, you know,
the famous pickup line

in every singles bar
in New York City.

"Hey, what sign are you?"

You know, if somebody
asked you your sign,

people were shaking
in their boots, dialing 911.

I started talking
about my sign,
and then it hit me.

You know, why is this man
so interested in my sign?

And then I thought about
the Zodiac man.

It was like holy [bleep].
We have a serial shooter

on the loose in New York City.

And he's claiming that

he's gonna shoot
twelve, altogether.

So we have nine to go.

[reporter] He goes by
the name of Zodiac.

He speaks with a gun
and has authorities baffled.

It's petrifying.
It really, really
is petrifying.

I hope they really get him.

I can't understand
why people are afraid

because we still
have to go to work.

We still have to go to church.

Take our kids to school.

We take a chance.

You're walking down
the street,

you don't know
who's behind you.

And when you say
serial killer,

we all know that
they can be anywhere.

He's really challenging
the police department.

You know, that he's saying,
"Hey, come on and get me."

We want the citizens
of New York to know

that we are working
around the clock on this.

Detectives from
the major case squad

brought a calendar in.

They told me, "Hey, look,

these are all on a Thursday."

And they pointed out to us
shootings one and two

were 21 days apart.

And then Proce,

with 63 days,
three multiples of 21.

This is the definition
of a pattern.

We were having this meeting
on a Wednesday

and tonight after midnight,
would have been

another 21-day cycle,
and we felt very strongly

that this guy was
going to be out there

and he was gonna
shoot somebody else.

I was given an all star team.

The best detectives
to flood that area
of the Brooklyn-Queens border.

To take him off the street
that night

while he was on the prowl.

And Louis Savarese

was the cream of the crop
from Brooklyn North Homicide.

He was a no nonsense guy.

Tattoos from head to toe.

[Louis] I got like, about
300 tattoos on my back.

The cases I was involved with,

cases that happened
around the world.

I got John Wayne Gacy
on my back.

David Berkowitz,
Timothy McVeigh...

It's just something
that's part of my life.

But I never had to work
the serial killer case.

Putting them in jail
is the best thing I could do.

So I'll do my best to do that.

I enjoyed doing it.

There was a pettern,
every 21-day cycles.

If he kept up
with his pattern,
he would be out there

looking for another victim
to shoot.

We hit the canvas,
we hit the streets.

Then we hunted in Queens
for the shooter.

We were very confident
that this guy sticks
to his pattern.

We're gonna bag him

that night.

We stopped, questioned,
and frisked dozens

and dozens of people.

To no avail.

6:30 am, I got a phone call

from the detectives
in Manhattan.

That the reason why
we didn't have any action
in the Brooklyn-Queens area

was because the Zodiac
had shot someone

in Central Park
and left a note.

The victim's name was
Larry Parham,

a homeless man sleeping
on a park bench.

The New York Zodiac threw us
the ultimate curveball

by getting on the subway
and going to Central Park.

We didn't quite know
what to make of it.

You know, hearing this
for the first time...

it's, um...

I always thought
that he sensed our presence

in the Brooklyn-Queens area.

And that's why he went
to Central Park.

I think his urge was so strong
he couldn't bring himself

to just go home
without a trophy that night.

He was amped up.

He wanted to shoot somebody.

He was winning the battle
at that point.

He's right. [chuckles]

Central Park was
a little bit of an awakening.

He's intelligent.
He's seeing the police
flooded in the area.

"I don't want to get caught.
So let me get the hell
out of here."

And that's what he did.

He got over on us, yeah.

You know, it was
a good move on his part,
but it's a chess game.

He played his pawn well.

This is the sketch
that Larry Parham
gave us in Central Park.

We called it
the Al Roker sketch
because it was a Black man,

balding, heavyset.

Is it him
at that point there?

That's the only sketch
we've got.

It could be,
we don't know.

You take it
with a grain of salt.

He's probably
laughing his ass off.

We have no clue
what you look like.

This guy is going to be
emboldened by it.

"They have no idea who I am."

[Zodiac speaking]

[Michael] He's shot now,
four people.

That means
there's eight more victims
that are going to be shot.

[reporter] What everyone is
speculating again is

when or if,
the gunman will strike again.

Detectives say
he has been striking
in multiples of 21 days.

[Michael]
This case was the headline
in all the New York tabloids,

on the 6 o' clock news,
the 11 o' clock news
every night.

So we were under
a lot of pressure
to make an arrest.

You're trying
to figure this guy out

every step of the way.

But in the final analysis,
you're looking for a madman.

You can try to outsmart him,
but you can't think crazy.

You can guess crazy.

But you can't be crazy.

We were able to get
a latent print with two,

but there was no match
to the prints we had on file,

and someone leaked the fact,

and it was published
in The Post.

I was worried
he was gonna read that

we have a print on the letter.

[Louis]
The fingerprint is out there
on the news and in the papers.

So now what I would do if
I was him, I would disappear.

They have my fingerprint.
It's time to chill out.

After the Parham shooting,
we were going out
every 21 days

in the Brooklyn-Queens area.

And we were out there
by ourselves

because the Zodiac
became dormant,
he stopped writing.

He stopped shooting.

He just stopped all activity.

They disbanded the task force
at that point.

It was an empty feeling,
and we were told
the game was over.

Hey, wait a minute.
We're not finished here.

We still have work to do.

He has a taste for blood.
He was hunting prey.

This guy would kill again
if given the opportunity.

[Michael] It was
a very difficult decision
to leave the NYPD.

But this guy was dormant.

Never knew if he was
ever gonna come back.

So I left the department.

And two years later, in 1994,

I see this thing in the Post.

It's on the front page.

"This is the Zodiac."

[reporter] Until now,
there's been no sign
of the Zodiac

since he terrorized this city
in the summer of 1990.

He struck four times
back then,

killing one,
and then he disappeared.

But now he claims
he's back to kill again.

So this is a copy
of the letter.

He documents
five additional crimes.

Of the five listed,
we were able to confirm four

and of those four,
two were homicides

and two were
nonfatal shootings,

all in Highland Park.

The two homicides
were Patricia Fonte,

and Mr. DiAcone,
who was shot in the neck.

And then
we identified Mr. Weber,

who was shot
right across the street

from where
Mr. DiAcone was murdered.

And then Diane Ballard
was the fourth victim
that we were able to confirm.

[Diane] I was the last victim.

The doctor told me
that I got four shards

of bullets
in the back of my neck.

We're not gonna operate
because it could permanently
paralyze you.

You go through months,
maybe sometimes years

of being scared
or being cautious,

things you used to do,
you don't do no more,

places you used to go,
you don't go no more.

It was just a sad situation.

I guess we're all
wondering why.

Why this happened to us.

[producer speaking]

[Zodiac speaking]

[scoffs]

Yep, he sounds proud,
like he's glad somebody

asked him what's going on

so he can get a chance
to tell 'em.

That makes him feel big.

That makes him feel...

that he's somebody.

He's a coward and he knows it.

[Zodiac speaking]

That's exactly
what we figured.

You know,
it's amazing listening
to him talk about it now.

He needed the attention.
That was his motivation.

I think the fact
that he had continued

shooting people
and killing people,

and not communicating
with the media
bothered him a lot.

He's not getting
any attention for it.

So I think that had to
eat him up on the inside.

[Zodiac speaking]

In Highland Park,
all of his attacks except one,
were run up from behind,

one shot to the back and flee.

Patricia Fonte,
it was a lot different.

She was stabbed 100 times.

A total different
modus operandi.

It's much more personal,
much more brutal.

I'm telling myself why.

We kind of knew
sex wasn't his motivation

because there's no indication
of rape or anything like that.

We didn't really know
what his motivation was.

[Zodiac speaking]

That's crap. I mean,
he stabbed her 100 times.

I don't know why he's not
taking credit for it,

but he did it,
and there's no doubt
in my mind.

So that told you
a little bit more about him.

It shows you that he has
the capacity to to be
more violent.

[Louis] He's more vicious
than what we really thought.

If he did that,
is he gonna be more violent?

What's the next one
gonna be like?

[Zodiac speaking]

He's right.

He's right. [chuckles]

I'm not gonna dispute that.

He's right.

He got over.
I'd be the first to say
he got over.

He got over twice.

He screwed the city,
screwed me,

screwed the tax payers,

screwed the politicians,
screwed everybody.

I didn't think
he was stopping.

He's still playing his game.

He was on a mission
to hurt people,

but he was gonna do it
until either he gets caught,

or he kills all the people
he wants to kill.

You have to have
the frame of mind that,

you know,
he's still out there.

He's still active
and he's coming back.

It might be six months,
it might be six years.

He's coming back.

[Joseph]
When they disbanded
the task force,

they had just started up
recruiting for a new hostage
negotiation course,

and I always wanted
to be a negotiator.

So I signed up for that
and I was selected.

On June 18th, 1996,
it was a Tuesday.

Just before noon,
I received a phone call.

I was in my office,
at my desk.

[siren wailing]

An individual had already
shot his sister

once in the rear end.

He was holding
the sister's boyfriend hostage
in the back bedroom.

-[siren wailing]
-[helicopter hovering]

[officer on PA]
Everybody off, please.

[siren wailing]

When I first arrived
at the hostage situation,

I was informed
that an individual

by the name of
Heriberto "Eddie" Seda

had fired multiple shots
at various uniformed officers
who responded to the scene.

[Heriberto speaking]

[gunshots]

[Joseph]
And I start talking at him.

"Eddie, my name is Joe.

Listen, enough blood
has been shed.

Your sister's gonna be okay.

Let's end this now."
And so forth and so on.

I think he really
regretted shooting her,

and he was concerned
about how serious
she was injured.

He says,
"Okay, I'm gonna surrender."

[Heriberto speaking]

And then all of a sudden,
he mentions bombs.

"What should I do
with my bombs?"

[Heriberto speaking]

He said that he was
going to blow up

a movie theater
in New York City.

Can you imagine the the damage
that this guy would do?

They get on the phone
with the bomb squad.

And bomb squad says,
"All right.

Just get everybody
out of the apartment."

They opened the door,
he's standing there,
and they handcuffed him.

They handed him to me.

So with that, I escort him
out of the building
into a waiting radio car.

And we drove him into
the 7-5 station house.

I had no idea
that he was the Zodiac killer.

I was talking to him
on the way into
the station house.

And then when I get in there,

he wrote out
a two-page statement,

and on the bottom
of the second page,

he draws an upside down cross.

[Heriberto speaking]

When Eddie put the symbol
of the cross

and the three sevens.
I feel that he was

trying to say that,
you know, it's me,
but you don't know it's me.

And he tried to
get over on us again.

To say, you know,
you're not going to catch me.

And I'm reading the confession

and right away I recognize
the handwriting.

I guess that just shows
I'm standing here.

This is the Zodiac killer.

But I can't prove it.

I had to formulate
a game plan

on how to prove
that he's the Zodiac killer.

[Joseph]
This is the second page.
It was a two page confession.

I distinctively remember
when I read this

that my blood pressure
went down about
30 or 40 points.

I kind of relaxed
in my inside,

and the reason for that was
I knew that it was him,

but I also know that I had
a lot of work to do.

You got
the fingerprint evidence.

But there's a risk
you can still lose the case.

I had to prove in court
and to my superiors
that he was a Zodiac.

I called Lewis Savarese,
and we devised a plan

that we would put up
crime scene photos
on the wall

to let him know that
we know he's the Zodiac.

We brought him into the room,

and we were watching
his reactions.

His demeanor was very,
very calm.

No aggravation at all.

We start the interview.

And, you know,
"You're Zodiac."

"No, I'm not.
I don't know what
you're talking about.

I go to church on Sunday,"
and whatnot.

I read the Bible."

I believed during the course
of investigation

that notoriety was
one of his motivations.

I said, "Eddie,
you're in the big leagues now.

Everybody knows
who John Wayne Gacy is."

Everybody knows
who Jeffrey Dahmer is."

I said, "Everybody's
gonna know who
Heriberto "Eddie" Seda is.

He's the Zodiac.

After a while, he starts
turning his head

and he's looking
at the pictures
that we posted behind him.

And you could tell he was
kind of like admiring
his handiwork.

[Louis] He was looking
at the pictures.

And I noticed this vein
in his neck started popping.

I said to myself, this is him.

He did it.

Eventually, he said,
"Okay, I did it."

And then we went down the list
of all the victims

that he had taken credit for
in his letters.

[Louis]
Everything he said was
right on the money

and everything was
right in order,
how he did it.

At that point there,
you could see it on his face.

He was relieved.

Believe it or not, he was,
after the confession...

Phew! Like, it's over.

I said, "Louis, we got him."

But when you're trying
to identify his motivation,

he never said
what his motivation was,

and it was a total mystery.

You want to know
what's driving him,
you want to understand him.

But he never explained
that to us, you know.

[Heriberto speaking]

It's very interesting,
you know,

to listen to this now,
32 years later.

I don't know how,

in his sick and twisted mind,

he equates that into,
you know,

making up
for not being accepted
into the United States Army.

But that just goes to show you

he's a very,
very sick individual.

And that's who
we were dealing with.

[Heriberto speaking]

Yeah, I agree
with that statement.

And you know what?
If he would probably just

kept killing
without the letters,

he could probably
have killed 30 people.

But for some reason,
he wanted to broadcast it.

He's right, you know.
[chuckles]

He's right. If I wasn't there
to recognize the handwriting,

there's a very
real possibility
he'd still be out there today.

[Heriberto speaking]

I do not accept this apology

because let me
ask you something, Seda.

If they let you out today,
what would you do?

The same thing.

You know it, and I know it.

I will always have
the bullets in the back
of my neck,

but I still carry on.

I can't sit around
the rest of my life crying

because I got shot
by a serial killer.

Life goes on.

[Joseph]
It was a good day
for New York City.

And then the next day
I went to work,

and I caught
two fresh homicides.

So, you know, I didn't have
too much time to enjoy it.

We just went back to work.

I got the Zodiac tattoos
because of the case.

This tattoo was on the letter
that he had signed
and sent out to the Post.

And then on this arm here,
I put the Zodiac
with the two dates

from 1990 to 1996.

In a way,
I did feel bad for him.

Knowing that he's going
to do life in prison

and over why?
To prove a point,

to scare people?
Was it worth it?

But he had to be put away.
He couldn't be on the streets.

Of course,
you couldn't take a chance.

You won't do it again.

You have certain cases
that affect you forever.

That stays with you forever.

This is one of them.

I always thought of him as...

a psycho.

Underachiever.

He was a lonely guy

who wanted to be recognized
for something.

If he wasn't
gonna be recognized
for something admirable,

he might as well be recognized
for something infamous.

♪♪

I have an uncle that's
a serial killer.

I know I'm innocent.
I didn't do it.

My partner and I look at each
other and we go "Oh [bleep]".

We blew it.

He never stops playing the game.

Here I am -
catch me if you can.