The serial killer letters

This does not mean that their letters lack value in any way. To the contrary, denials of guilt are every bit as informative as admissions of guilt. You can decide for yourself who you choose to believe. I think you will agree with me that they are simply remarkable. After all, they are unedited, first-person accounts of incredible life experiences that most of us know nothing about, and situations and circumstances we cannot even imagine.

When I asked each of my correspondents for permission to publish their letters, some of them were furious, refusing because they thought I had misrepresented myself. In all fairness to me, I had no intention of publishing their letters until far into the project, although I guess none of them believed this.

Others refused because they said they had written to me alone, not to the rest of the world. I simply omitted their names and whenever necessary, I changed identifying information. The letters of those men who agreed to let me share their thoughts with others are printed exactly as I received them, word for word. Even the punctuation and emphases underlining, etc. I cannot begin to express how very grateful I am to these men for allowing me this window into their hearts and souls.

I am especially appreciative to those who made the extremely difficult effort to speak openly and intimately about experiences that are painful, embarrassing and ugly. It is my opinion that every one of them succeeded in communicating their stories with a depth and impact never before achieved.

I thank them for that. Skip to content Read the Preface of I am writing to you because I am interested in finding out what happened to you—how you ended up in prison. Right now I am corresponding with several incarcerated men who have been convicted of murder. Others admit their guilt. I know that there are innocent men in prison and guilty men. Those who are innocent are suffering for crimes they did not commit.

And maybe the guilty men also suffer because they have to live with themselves. And many of them, both guilty and innocent, are facing death, living isolated on death row with no one to talk to.

If I wished, I could pay a visit to your city every night. At will I could slay thousands of your best citizens, for I am in close relationship with the Angel of Death.

Cryptography from the Zodiac Killer. Image via: Unsolved Mysteries. We already talked about the letters that were sent out on behalf of the Zodiac Killer, but what was even more fascinating, and creepy, in this case was that the Zodiac Killer sent out letters that were completed coded. They were mailed to three major Bay Area newspapers that were with a single cipher. The author of the letters threatened the newspapers that he would go on an all-night killing spree if they did not make his coded messages the front page of their papers.

Fretting for their life, the newspapers made sure the coded letters were on the front page of all of their newspapers, but no one could figure out what the message said. Finally, a week after being published, a school teacher decoded the message:.

These are by far some of the most unsettling messages people have ever seen. They made news instantly when word spread of these threatening letters and people tried to personally solve the case but came up with no suspects. To this day, the authors who wrote these letters are unknown and the cases for the killers have gone cold. Sign in. Forgot your password? Get help. Password recovery. If you enjoyed this story, please share it on social media! Check nearby libraries Library.

Share this book Facebook. Last edited by IdentifierBot. August 10, History. An edition of The Serial Killer Letters The serial killer letters: a penetrating look inside the minds of murderers , Charles Press. Borrow Listen. Download for print-disabled. They tell you the reasons why a certain person could be the killer, but they avoid telling you the reasons they so obviously are not.

The first three Zodiac Killer letters were almost identical and were sent to three major publications across the Northern California region.

These Zodiac Killer letters all contained one-third of a code which formed a single message when added together. Another letter was sent at a later date which teased the police with a declaration that if they solved his previous cryptogram then they would know who he was.

The code was later solved, but for a few symbols. We mentioned the issue with the many Zodiac Killer suspects above. It made the news at the time, as all of these new Zodiac Killer suspect claims do. But three years later a DNA analysis was taken and proved to be negative, thus ruling Jack Tarrance out. New Zodiac Killer suspects will always make for good reading, but because this crime occurred just 50 years ago, the people being fingered for the crimes are often alive or have first generation family who are alive.

One of the best stories about the Zodiac Killer is in the film Zodiac , which was directed by David Fincher. This American film is based on a non-fiction book by Robert Graysmith, which is also worth reading.

Who Was the Zodiac Killer?