Ideas About Z38

Theory by Timo P.

copyright © 2014 Timo P.
zodiackillerpuzzle@gmail.com

1. Similarities Between Fairfield Letters

 Fairfield letters posted Dec. 7, 1969 and Dec. 16, 1969 have a lot of suspicious similarities. Three sentences start same way.

More linking words. "Ok" could be in word  "look".

 Some of the words are misspelled like "trouble" is written "troulbe". Maybe because "be".

More misspelled words. "Then" is written "than". Both letters have one "than".

Z38 contains 38 symbols. I found it very bizarre that nine days after that, the Zodiac threatens to kill 38 people. It feels like he is trying to say that those symbols are victims.

2. Button Theory

The Zodiac insist in many letters that people need to wear Zodiac buttons. What if he means that some of the Z340 symbols represent victims and we need to cover them with buttons. All these letters are telling which one to cover. Z38 is revealing 38 Symbols. In the end Z340 could look like this. The remaining symbols form a message. How could you crack this kind of cipher without knowing which symbols belong to message?

3. Is There a System Behind Z38?

 

My guess is that basic idea is to find these Z38`s symbols from Z340. Each symbol is part of a word. This way we could get plaintext letter for every Z38`s symbol. If we know location of specific Z38`s symbol in related word, we get plaintext letter. For example if we find word "than" from cipher and last symbol of word is u. Then we know Z38`s symbol u plaintext letter is n.

 Dec. 7 letter has written the way that cipher part contains five lines and text part also contains five lines. Maybe there is a connection between these lines so that symbols in the first line of cipher are related to words in the first line of text part. Most of the words in Dec. 6 letter can be found also in "This State..." letter. So "This State..." letter could be a map to locate those words from Z340. If we only knew how to connect Z340 and "This State..." letter.

4. Five Symbols

There is a five lines wide area in the middle of  "This State..."- letter, where the Zodiac has drawn five symbols from Z340. It is interesting that because letter is written in lined paper, we know that there are five lines. Without lines this could not work. Both, the earlier and the next line, start with letter y. Two Z340`s y symbols are separated also by five lines. Five "This State..."- letter`s symbol are in the same order between these two y letters. 

 This way we can connect these two papers and we know for example where " you better print"- line locate in Z340. It is second line from up.  But now comes a problem. Text area of "This State..."- letter is too high now. We cannot map those lines.  There is something more to understand.

5. Rotation Symbol

This symbol is drawn next to five symbols. Big Zodiac symbol and four smaller ones around it.

 
My guess is that the symbol is associated with the letter posted nine days before. Also in that  letter we can find a big Zodiac symbol and one smaller one in the upper right corner. But where are the three missing ones?

What if this means rotation. We need to rotate Dec. 7 letter in four positions. This way we can find those three missing ones.

 Second option is that we need to rotate Z340, because the first and last symbols of Z38 are arranged so that they are also first and last symbols of Z340. Also there is one big Zodiac symbol under Z340.  We can understand this so that smaller one is meant to be in the upper right corner of Z340.

So this way symbol could illustrate rotation of Z340.

I believe the second option is correct and symbol means rotation of Z340. This is first rotation position. These two symbol Y are measuring points where we can count lines. Upwardly from the upper and lower from the lower.

This is second rotation position. Again Upwardly from the upper and lower from the lower.

Third rotation position

And fourth

 

6. The Will Be a Cop


This was not easy to find. I almost lost my sanity and nerves with this one. It was so close I did not throw all the papers in the trash can and stopped the whole insanity. The problem was I did not know how to read this thing and how the words have been hidden. Lets look word "the" . If we count five lines from upper Y, in "This State..."- letter, there is a word "the" in the middle of the line. Also if we count five lines from upper y in Z340, there are symbols  upside down T and  two +.  Look next step so you know why i think this is right.

If we count six lines from lower y, we find word " cop" from "This State..."- letter. If we count six lines from lower y in Z340, there are same symbols as in word "the". Upside down T and  two + .

 



Here all together. These two words are composed of the same symbols. In Dec. 7 letter, the Zodiac write " The Will Be a Cop". He means it literally. I did not expect this kind of solution. My theory was that if we find word "the" from Z340, these three symbols represent cops. Perhaps both theories are correct. I don`t know. We will see.

"The" and "cop" are both located in the third line of text area in Dec. 7 letter. If we look third line of Z38, there are two + symbols side by side. So this way we could get plaintext letters, he or op.I don`t know which one. Also we could find those  ++ symbols from Z340 that represent two victims.

7. Than


Here is "than", three lines from upper y. Upside down  u is now n.

Again we can find correct symbols from correct line. "Than" is in fourth line of text area. Also u and / are in fourt line of Z38. They are even same order and spacings are correct. Plaintext letters are n and t.