Arthur Leigh Allen | |
|---|---|
 Allen during a 1991 interview | |
| Born | December 18, 1933 |
| Died | August 26, 1992 (aged 58) Vallejo, California, United States |
| Occupation(s) | Teacher, mechanic, cashier |
| Known for | Zodiac Killer suspect |
Arthur Leigh Allen (December 18, 1933 - August 26, 1992) was an American teacher, mechanic, cashier, and convicted child molester, who is best-known for being the only publicly-named suspect in the Zodiac Killer case.
Allen was born in Honolulu, Hawaii on December 18, 1933. He grew up in Vallejo, California, and had a strained relationship with his mother. [1] From 1951 to 1953, he worked several jobs, including as a lifeguard and a sailmaker. At the age of 19, he applied to join the Vallejo Police Department, but he was rejected. In 1957, he enlisted in the Navy. [2] In the early 1960s, he moved to Atascadero, California where he worked as a teacher and later as a mechanic. [3] He died from a heart-attack on August 26, 1992. [4] He was played by John Carroll Lynch in the 2007 David Fincher film Zodiac . [5]
Allen had been interviewed by police from the early days of the Zodiac investigation and was the subject of several search-warrants over a twenty-year period. In 2007, true crime author Robert Graysmith noted that several detectives described Allen as the most-likely suspect. [6] In 2010, SFPD investigator Dave Toschi stated that all the evidence against Allen ultimately "turned out to be negative". [7] In the 2024 documentary This Is the Zodiac speaking, allegations were made by a family who were friends of Allen which, if true, would reinforce his culpability; this includes Allen admitting to being the Zodiac before his death in 1992. [8] [9]
On October 6, 1969, Allen was interviewed by Detective John Lynch of the Vallejo Police Department. Allen had been reported in the vicinity of the Lake-Berryessa-attack on September 27. He told Lynch that he had been scuba-diving at Salt Point State Park that day. [10] Graysmith reports that a Vallejo police officer pulled Allen over for speeding and noticed a bloody knife in his car on the day of the attack. Allen dismissed it, saying, "I used that to kill a couple of chickens". [11]
In 1971, Allen's former friend, Donald L. Cheney, reported to Manhattan Beach police that Allen had spoken of his desire to kill people, used the name Zodiac, and secured a flashlight to a firearm for visibility at night. Cheney said this conversation occurred no later than January 1, 1969. [12] [13] Allen was interviewed again on August 4, 1971, this time by Detective Mulanax of the Vallejo Police Department and Inspectors Toschi and Bill Armstrong of SFPD. [14] In September 1972, the SFPD obtained a search-warrant for Allen's residence. [15]
In 1974, Allen was arrested for lewdness with a nine-year-old boy. After pleading guilty he was sent to Atascadero State Hospital for pre-sentence evaluation and treatment. On May 13, 1977, Allen was given a suspended prison sentence and five years of felony probation. He completed probation successfully in 1982. [16] Allen's arrest and sentencing could provide a potential reason for why the Zodiac's communications stopped in 1974. [17] The Vallejo Police Department served another search warrant at Allen's residence in February 1991. [18] Two days after his death in 1992, they served another warrant and seized property from his residence. [19]
On August 16, 1991, Michael Mageau identified Allen from a photo lineup of 1968 driver's licenses as the man who shot him in 1969, saying, "That's him! It's the man who shot me!". [20] In contrast, police officer Donald Fouke, who (with officer Eric Zelms) possibly saw the Zodiac fleeing the Paul Stine murder scene, said in the 2007 documentary His Name was Arthur Leigh Allen that Allen weighed about 100 pounds more than the man Fouke saw, and that Allen's face was "too round". [21] [22] Allen and the Zodiac did, however, both wear shoes sized 10.5. [12] Nancy Slover, the police dispatcher who received the call from the Zodiac after the Mageau-Ferrin shooting, said in the documentary that Allen did not sound like the man with whom she spoke. [22] Allen also owned and wore a Zodiac Watch, a brand that uses a logo similar to the killer's 
symbol. [12] [21]
The letter sent to the Riverside Police Department from Cheri Jo Bates's killer was printed with either Elite or Pica typeface on a Royal typewriter; during the 1991 search of Allen's residence, police seized a Royal typewriter with Elite type. [23] Shortly before his death, Allen wrote a letter to Rita Williams, a reporter from San Francisco station KTVU who had just interviewed him. The letter contained grammatical mistakes similar to those of the Zodiac letters. [24] : Ep. 2 Williams firmly believes that Allen was the Zodiac. Retired police handwriting expert Lloyd Cunningham, who worked on the Zodiac case for decades, stated in 2009, "They gave me banana-boxes full of Allen's writing, and none of his writing even came close to the Zodiac. Nor did DNA extracted from the envelopes [on the Zodiac letters] come close to Arthur Leigh Allen". [25]
In 2002, Cydne Holt of the SFPD crime lab developed a partial DNA profile from saliva on stamps and envelopes of the Zodiac's letters - especially the stamp on the November 8, 1969, card - for the ABC News program Primetime Thursday . [26] [27] [28] A partial DNA profile cannot "point to just one person", it "can only rule someone in as a possibility or exclude them if it isn't a match". [29] The SFPD compared this partial profile to that of Allen and Cheney. Since neither test result indicated a match, the two were excluded as the contributors of the DNA. [30] [31] [28] Allen's fingerprints also did not match those lifted from the Stine murder. [12] In 2018, Tom Voigt, a veteran Zodiac internet sleuth, stated that the partial profile's efficacy was dubious, as he had learned the DNA was "collected from the outside of the stamp" on the November 1969 card; "No genetic material was obtained from behind the stamp, or the seal of the envelope, or anywhere else that would have most certainly belonged to the Zodiac". Voigt claimed that this had been confirmed by Holt as well as an unnamed retired SFPD inspector, and that this discovery reaffirmed Allen's status as a viable suspect. [26] [27]
A three-episode documentary, This Is the Zodiac speaking, aired on Netflix in 2024. In the film, Allen's former students fondly recall his interest in cryptology. They remembered him playing records like "Tom Dooley", about a woman's murder, and "I've got a little List" from The Mikado . He also brought dead animals into the classroom. Numerous allegations are also made by former acquaintances, members of the Seawater family, that greatly inculpate Allen. [8] [9] [32] Zodiac researcher Michael Butterfield was skeptical of the documentary's allegations. [32]
In the 1960s, Allen was friends with Phyllis Seawater and often looked after her children. He took them on small trips, including one to Tajiguas Point in Santa Barbara County on June 3, 1963. The day before, an unsolved shooting had occurred at that beach. According to their account, after Allen and the Seawater children arrived at Tajiguas Point, Allen left them in the car and went down to the beach alone. When he returned about an hour later, he appeared to have blood on his hands. He cleaned up and sped away with the children. The next day, the bodies of Robert Domingos and Linda Edwards were found on a nearby beach. [8] [9]
Three years later, on October 28, 1966, Allen took two of the older Seawater children, Connie and David, to Riverside, California. They stayed in a motel, and David slept through most of the trip. Cheri Jo Bates was killed near Riverside City College on October 30. The following morning, Allen hurried the children out of the motel, and Connie recalls him molesting her in the car as they headed home. [8] [9] The Seawater children initially thought it was ludicrous that Allen could be the Zodiac. In 1991, Connie directly asked Allen if he was; he said if he told her, he would have to kill her. In 1992, David thanked Allen for being so nice to them when they were young. Allen started sobbing and confessed to drugging them and molesting Connie. Alarmed, David asked Allen if he was the Zodiac, to which he allegedly responded, "It was me". [32] The release of David Fincher's film about the Zodiac case in 2007 prodded the Seawater family to re-examine their memories of Allen.
A possible Zodiac cipher from 1973 was decoded for a 2017 History Channel show. On August 1, 1973, a letter was mailed to the Albany Times Union in New York. The return address was the 
symbol. The writer promised to kill again on August 10. A three-line-code in the letter was supposed to reveal the name and location of the victim. FBI cryptanalysts deciphered the code as "[redacted by the FBI] Albany Medical Center. This is only the beginning". No murder matched the details in the letter, and the handwriting was not a definitive match for Zodiac's. [33] In the letter, the History Channel show revealed that Zodiac named his next victim as "Connie Henly" and her location in Albany, New York, thus rendering the full deciphered code as "Connie Henly, Albany Medical Center. This is only the beginning". Phyllis Seawater's maiden-name was "Hensley", and at the time the letter had been sent, Connie was living in New York State, just a few hours from Albany. Allen had previously fallen out with Connie for not leaving her family for him. The Seawaters also found a cache of Allen's letters to their mother, which include extensive discussions of the Zodiac. [32]
I am satisfied that Dave Toschi, Bawart, Capt. Conway and Lt. Jim Husted of Vallejo PD were right and that the Zodiac was Arthur Leigh Allen