“Speaking as a veteran homicide detective with forty-six years experience, it is now my considered professional opinion that Dr. George Hill Hodel was, in fact, the San Francisco serial killer known as ZODIAC. Further, the solving of the known 1970 Zodiac cipher, as presented here for the first time, is George Hodel’s signed admission and confession to having committed those crimes.”
Steve Hodel
Excerpt from Open Letter to Readers
September 15, 2015
Open Letter to my Readers
September 15, 2015
Dear Friends and Readers:
Today I present the latest evidence of what has now become a sixteen-year investigation into the life and crimes of my father, Dr. George Hill Hodel.
Most Evil II is my fourth book. Four books, but one investigation and one suspect.
To date, I have examined and linked my father to twenty-five separate serial crimes spanning twenty-six years (1943-1969.)
As the LADA secret police files and the hard evidence and forensics continued to build over the years, most have become convinced, “beyond a reasonable doubt.” Most recognize what law enforcement knew back then–that George Hodel was in truth the “Black Dahlia Avenger.” That he was LA’s 1940s “Lone Woman Murderer,” and had sadistically slain a dozen women and taunted the police with his “catch me if you can” crime scene notes and mailings.
With the discovery of the LADA secret Hodel Black Dahlia Files, I was led into, darker deeper waters. As I continued to examine those original 1940s secret police files, I discovered that not only did they confirm, that Elizabeth Short, the “Black Dahlia,” had known and been a girlfriend of George Hodel, but, more. They revealed that in 1946 (while George Hodel was temporarily doctoring for the United Nations in China) Elizabeth had traveled to Chicago. Why? Official reports suggest her reason had been to obtain information on the recently headlined, “Lipstick Murders”; three horrific, sadistic killings that had been committed in Chicago in the months immediately prior to George Hodel leaving the country.
As I followed the evidence, it led me first to Chicago, then, out of the U.S. to Asia, to Manila, Philippines where a copy-cat Black Dahlia murder occurred in 1967. A surgical/torture murder where the young woman’s body was posed in a vacant lot, just one mile from my father’s then residence. Information discovered in that crime directed me back stateside and pointed me north to the San Francisco Bay Area and to an examination of the serial crimes committed by a suspect calling himself, “Zodiac.”
All of that linkage was presented in Most Evil: The Further Serial Murders of Dr. George Hill Hodel.(Dutton, 2009)
While I believe I had made a “compelling case” that George Hodel could very well have committed the San Francisco crimes and reinvented himself from “Avenger” in the 1940s to “Zodiac” in the 1960s, I also knew, unlike the LA serial killings, I had not “made my case.” The known evidence while compelling still remained–circumstantial.
Unlike my BDA investigation, I could not make the claim, “Case Solved.” In my closing chapter of Most Evil, I made a plea for law enforcement to obtain a confirmed sample of Zodiac’s DNA (still not done) and to make a comparison to my father’s DNA. (I am now in possession of his full DNA profile.)
I ended MOST EVIL by informing my readers that, “The Investigation Continues.”
Now, six years later, I present that follow-up Investigation to that book, along with a new claim.
Based on my new findings as revealed in Most Evil II, supported by the evidence, M.O., and crime signatures found in my previous three books, I offer the following:
Speaking as a veteran homicide detective with forty-six years experience, it is now my considered professional opinion that Dr. George Hill Hodel was, in fact, the San Francisco serial killer known as ZODIAC. Further, the solving of the known 1970 Zodiac cipher, as presented here for the first time, is George Hodel’s signed admission and confession to having committed those crimes.
Throughout these many years, you, my readers, have always remained the triers of fact–my jury. I ask you once again to resume that role and dispassionately review the new evidence and judge for yourself.
Most Respectfully Yours,
Steve Hodel
Los Angeles, California
September 15, 2015
See Rare Bird Books MOST EVIL II Publication Announcement and currently scheduled Author Talks – HERE.
French High School Teacher Solves 1970 Zodiac Halloween Card Cipher- Identifies Killer
Excerpts from Most Evil II – Chapter 10
…
Just as I was closing down my computer, it happened.
The sound of an incoming email. I glanced at my inbox and noted it was from France. I clicked on the new message:
Dear Sir,
Have you ever noticed that Zodiac’s signature was acompound of two ogham “letters”? The letter on the leftside is for “H” and the letter on the right side is for “L.” The Irish name of the first “letter” is “beithe,” that means “flash,” “flame,” and the other is called “uath,” the old-Irish word for “scare.” The dots remain mysterious.
I read your first book shortly after it was published, and it deeply changed my mind upon the real meaning of XXth century (namely, in the fields of ideology and culture).
Best regards from France.
—Y. P.
…
Zodiac Halloween Card Deciphered (See decryption details in Chapter 10)
Fig. 10.8
The credit for this remarkable discovery must go to “Y. P.” in Paris, France. I recently wrote and asked him if I might have permission to credit and use his real name, which he has just granted. “Y. P.” is M. Yves Person, and to add a further ironic twist to our ongoing investigation, he teaches literature at a high school in the suburbs of Paris.*
Yves Person, Paris, France 2015 
Fig 10.9
Note- *Many readers will recall that after the US military and intelligence experts were unable to solve Zodiac’s original 1969 three-part cryptogram, a married couple, Donald and Bettye Harden,“cracked the code” after studying it for just one weekend. Their solution was confirmed by the Vallejo Police Department and published in the San Francisco newspapers. Donald Harden, like Yves Person, was also a high school teacher. Harden taught history and economics at North Salinas High School in Salinas, California.
Most Evil II presents two major headlines
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