Is Paul Doerr the best Zodiac Killer suspect that's ever surfaced?
Sep 26, 2022 · 17 mins read
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Part 1
Paul Doerr – the Zodiac Killer suspect developed by author Jarett Kobek (in his remarkable book How to Find Zodiac) – is the best Zodiac suspect that's ever surfaced. Here’s an absurdly long thread outlining why...
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It's not any one data point that sells Paul Doerr (b. 4/1/1927, d. 8/2/2007) as Zodiac, but rather, all of them combined that make it appear probabilistically impossible Zodiac was anyone other than Doerr.
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Let's start with Doerr's favorite pastimes: writing letters to the editor (mostly to zines), which he'd been doing since his youth. To the extent his letters—and the many mimeographed zines he made himself—are archived digitally, they offer a wealth (understatement) of info.
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In issue no. 9 of his zine PIONEER, Doerr describes a formula for a homemade ANFO bomb. It is virtually identical to Zodiac's bus bomb formula, and features the same crucial omission (a starter). And both Doerr and Zodiac knew this bomb must be kept dry.
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In a 1974 letter to GREEN EGG—his favorite zine—Doerr admits having killed people. (And in his zine PIONEER, he advocates killing your enemies.)
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In a letter to TIGHTBEAM (no. 65 Winter 1970), Doerr complains about rising postage costs and proposes using only 1¢ stamps—which postal workers must cancel by hand—to spite the post office. On 12/20/69, Zodiac sent a letter to attorney Melvin Belli using six 1¢ stamps.
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In April 1972, Doerr wrote a letter to the editor of the SF Examiner making reference to methods of torture, and people as animals and slaves.
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In a letter to VONULINC, Doerr informs readers that "a letter to sf examiner, sf will reach it without street address." All of Zodiac's mailings to the EXAMINER and other recipients were sans street address.
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Doerr was a role-playing fantasist (who was into Dungeons and Dragons in his 60s) who liked to play dress-up—the below photo was likely taken sometime between 1969 and 1972—and attended renaissance festivals, where an executioner's hood would not appear out of the ordinary.
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In fact, there was a renaissance faire happening in the Bay Area the day of the Lake Berryessa attack.
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