For the past 50 years, the identity of the Zodiac Killer has remained one of the most baffling unsolved cases in American true crime culture. With countless suspects emerging and fading into obscurity, the serial killer terrorized the Northern California Bay Area in the late 1960s, inspiring countless podcasts, books, and even a 2007 broadcast. Zodiac The movie starring Jake Gyllenhaal Mark Ruffaloand Robert Downey Jr.

For those unaware of the cold killer, the Zodiac Killer is an unidentified serial killer who terrorizes Northern California. He is famous for his cryptic letters, his taunting of authorities with symbols and codes, and his alleged claims of several unsolved murders. The Zodiac Killer also claimed to have killed 37 people, but only five murders and two attempted murders have been attributed to him. Despite extensive investigation, the identity of the Zodiac Killer remains a mystery except for Arthur Leigh Allen, a former elementary school teacher and convicted sex offender who is the prime suspect in the case but has never been officially identified as the Zodiac Killer.

After decades of mysteries, Netflix has acquired a three-part docuseries that will shed light on the unsolved murder case of the Zodiac Killer. This is the talk of the zodiac. The program offers a new perspective on the case with never-before-seen interviews and clues.

Zodiac Speaks: A Documentary on the Famous Unsolved Case

Directed by Ari Mark and Phil Lott of Netflix documentary This is the talk of the zodiac provides new perspectives on the decades-old unsolved case. The three-part series revisits the case with new interviews and evidence from people who knew Arthur Leigh Allen.

Lott shared the following about the Zodiac documentary series: Diversity,

The series follows Allen’s conversation with local TV reporter Williams and investigative reporter Robert Graysmith before his death in the early ’90s. The interviews also include interviews with Allen’s former students and surviving friends of Zodiac victims.

But the most important aspect of the docuseries lies with the Seawater family, which reveals a chilling connection to Allen. The suspect was an important figure in their childhood as he took them on trips and took care of them. In the trailer for the documentary series, David Seawater said: “We realized we were at all the murder scenes before the murders.” He points out details that even the authorities have not seen or heard.

Is David Fincher’s Horoscope Based on Facts?

David Fincher’s 2007 Zodiac It was praised for its compelling portrayal of the Zodiac murders that caused terror in the San Francisco Bay Area. Although the film did not perform well, grossing only $85 million on almost the same budget, its long running time and ongoing questions about its credibility were the reason behind its commercial failure.

Interestingly, Zodiac The film is adapted from Robert Graysmith’s book Zodiac, written in 1986. The book describes in detail the cases, evidence, clues, and Graysmith’s own theories regarding the identity of the killer. Although he finds most of the facts accurate, critics have long opposed his investigative approach and speculative conclusions and questioned the reliability of the facts.

Moreover, while shooting the movie, David Flincher He realized that the unsolved case of the Zodiac Killer was surrounded by conspiracy theories, rumors, unfounded suspects, and speculation, and he did not want to make a film based on theories. To ensure the story was realistic, Flincher consulted survivors of the Zodiac murders as well as investigators and family members of the suspects. He even hired a forensic linguistics expert from California State University to encrypt the letters of the Zodiac and the languages ​​used within them.

Zodiac Code Z340 Still Unsolved?

The Zodiac Killer became famous for sending cryptic passwords to the media and sharing details of his murders through puzzles. Popular passwords include Z408, Z340, Z13 and Z32. Z408 was easy to decipher and revealed a disturbing message about his excitement for murder. But the Z340 baffled experts for over 50 years until it finally broke through in 2020.

On November 8, 1969, the killer mailed a 340-character cipher known as the Z-340 Cipher, but this cipher could not be cracked by amateur and professional cryptographers. It wasn’t until December 12, 2020 that three men, Virginia software developer David Oranchak, Belgian computer programmer Jarl Van Eycke, and Australian mathematician Sam Blake, finally cracked it.

It contains 63 unique symbols divided into three parts to describe the Z340 password. The first two chapters consisted of nine lines, and the third chapter consisted of two lines. Oranchak then used a computer program written by Eycke called AZ Decrypt, which examined 65,000 different permutations of the password.

They then used a clever method of moving to crack the Zodiac’s cipher by starting in the upper left corner and moving down one letter and two spaces to the right, repeating this pattern until they reached the edge of the cipher. After finishing a line, they would start the process again, starting from the second letter on the top line. This approach helped code crackers rearrange jumbled letters and reveal the hidden message inside the cipher.

With a final adjustment, the first part of the password was finally readable. However, the second and third parts remained mixed. To solve these, they noticed that some words in the second part were written backwards, and they also noticed a mistake Zodiac made. By fixing the error, they were able to crack the remaining parts of the password and reveal the following secret message:

Oranchak, Eycke, and Blake shared their findings with the FBI’s Crypto Analysis and Racketeering Records Unit on December 5, 2020.

Who Were the Other Zodiac Killer Suspects?

While Arthur Leigh Allen was the only prime suspect focused on in the Zodiac Killer case, there were other potential suspects that authorities were investigating and believed could be responsible for the murders.

Rick Marshall, whose real name is Joe Don Dickey, was also one of the prime suspects on the police’s radar. Marshall lived in and around the Bay Area for 40 years before passing away due to complications from Parkinson’s disease. At the time of the Zodiac murders, he was working at a silent movie theater and served in the Navy. He became a suspect after making a questionable statement on amateur radio in 1976. Moreover, the police found it interesting that one of the Zodiac killer’s letters was sent on his birthday. But there is no other evidence linking him to the crimes.

Another suspect was Richard Gaikowski, who looked very similar to the police sketches. He became a suspect after one of the Zodiac murders occurred less than five miles from his home. When asked where he was at the time of the murders, he claimed he was abroad, but passport records later revealed this to be a lie.

The fourth suspect among Allen, Gaikowski, and Marshall was Lawrence Klein, also known as Larry Kane. Kane had an extensive criminal history and became a suspect when a victim’s sister claimed that he had been stalking her sister for months leading up to the murder. Furthermore, Kathleen Johns, a potential Zodiac kidnapper, claimed that Kane was her kidnapper.

What Happened to Arthur Leigh Allen?

Born in 1933, Arthur Leigh Allen already had a troubled past when the Zodiac investigation began. He was hospitalized in 1975 for sexually abusing children, raising doubts about his claims of innocence. Moreover, he was dishonorably discharged from the Navy in the 1950s.

Allen died of heart failure in 1992, but his story didn’t end there. In 2007, a documentary called His Name Was Arthur Leigh Allen was released, examining his life and his connections to the Zodiac case. Despite numerous doubts, sufficient evidence has never been found to prove Allen was the true Zodiac Killer.

This is the talk of the zodiac It’s streaming on Netflix.