Zodiac Killer Allegedly Identified by Team of Independent Investigators (UPDATE)

UPDATED 10/7, 10:20 a.m. ET: Riverside PD’s Ryan Railsback tells TMZ that Gary Francis Poste is not the Zodiac killer. He says that if there was evidence that Poste was responsible, his police department would have presented that evidence at the time. 

Frank Falzon—a former San Francisco PD homicide investigator—also says Poste isn’t the Zodiac, and says his name never came up as a suspect in the original investigation.  

He says the Case Breakers used “circumstancial evidence” to come to their conclusion. 

See original story below.

A team of independent investigators are alleging they’ve uncovered the identity of the Zodiac Killer.

The team, known as the “Case Breakers,” claim to have pinned down the string of infamous murders to a man named Gary Francis Poste. In 2018, Poste died. The original source of the Case Breakers’ claim is (unfortunately) a Fox News piece published Wednesday.

According to that report, the team spent years digging up forensic evidence and photos taken from Poste’s darkroom. One of those images, the team said, revealed a scar on Poste’s forehead that they say matched scars seen on a previously released sketch of the California serial killer.

Other clues cited by the team included code-cracked letters that pointed to Poste, including one that utilized the letters of Poste’s full name. The claim of having identified the killer, however, isn’t without its doubters. The group says they believe the killer is also the person responsible for a murder that took place hundreds of miles away from the general area where he’s known to have killed multiple people.

Per their official website, the Case Breakers are a “40+ member national task force of crack investigators” who boast law enforcement, military, forensic, academic, legal, and investigative skills. See here for a full list of Case Breakers members.

Complex has reached out to multiple law enforcement agencies, as well as the California Department of Justice and the Case Breakers group itself, for additional comment. This post may be updated.

While the killer claimed to have killed more than 30 people, his confirmed number of murders in the Bay Area in the late 1960s is five. Last year, another one of the killer’s ciphers—previously left unsolved for decades—was reported to have been cracked.

The media attention surrounding the Zodiac Killer has persisted for decades, having resulted in everything from an acclaimed 2007 film by David Fincher to the more recent prevalence of a Ted Cruz-focused meme.