Chapter 7

The Zodiac Ciphers

July 30, 2010

Early in the investigation, Cameron approached a colleague he had known for 20 years. Neal Best is a 54-year-old recluse with an IQ higher than most. He had lived in China, studied the language, and had spent a great deal of time studying Egyptian and Greek mythology. On any given day he could be found at Morning Light Coffee Shop, studying another language. Neal had an unfortunate accident. A few years back, he had fallen asleep at the wheel, struck a family of 5, resulting in the death of a 12-year-old girl. It destroyed him emotionally and he was treated harshly by the justice system. Having taken a life, he fell into a great depression. Neal had been placed in the local jail, appeared on the news and was publicly humiliated. In the end, he was given 5 years of probation. When the facts of Neal’s case were laid out, the punishment did not fit the crime. Cameron helped Neal get off probation early.

Cameron approached Neal for help. The Zodiac had sent countless puzzles and letters to the media and police over the years. Some of the Zodiac’s puzzles were said to be based on Egyptian mythology. Neal had studied this area for years and had read the Egyptian Book of the Dead many times. He hadn’t studied the Zodiac killings and preferred not to engross himself in murder, but he was always into puzzles—especially those based on ancient mythology.

Cameron told Neal a few important facts about his suspect, Edward Edwards. In his book, Edwards wrote about his fascination with Egyptian history and science fiction. He also wrote about collecting “slaves for his afterlife.” Neal was immediately engrossed. He knew what the Zodiac was referring to—mirrored worlds—life and afterlife. The Zodiac had bragged about killing slaves for his afterlife. Eternity is what the Zodiac sought and killing people for their perceived sins was his way there. Cameron asked Neal for his help with the Zodiac killer’s 13-character identity cipher. The name Edward Edwards contained 13 characters and if Cameron was right on Edwards, the answer to the puzzle should be Edward Edwards.

Zodiac Killer’s April 20^th, 1969 Identity Cipher

On August 1, 2010, Neal sent Cameron his findings in an E-Mail.

From:	nealweemsbest [nealweemsbest@peoplepc.com]
Sent:	Sunday, August 01, 2010 11:44 AM
To:	Cameron, John
Subject:	Re: FW: ZODIAC CIPHER DATED 4/20/1969

When John Cameron approached me with the 13-symbol name of the Zodiac, I was excited to solve it. Assuming John’s research was correct and the Zodiac was indeed Edward Wayne Edwards, then it would be a process of solving the riddle from two directions simultaneously. It soon became obvious that this was the essence of the puzzle from the start, that the Zodiac code was only solvable once a suspect name was available. The writings sent to newspapers and police agencies were found to be teeming with clues as to the solution, but until the central Zodiac blueprint was discovered, the clues were only random bits of madness.

I started with a few very lucky and extremely helpful clues that were just dropped in my lap. 1) John mentioned that Edward, in his book, admitted to a keen interest in ancient Egyptian religion. This is a subject that I’ve been fascinated with since the early 1980’s. I have read “The Book of the Dead” in the original, many times. 2) Just prior to working on the cypher, I talked to my mother on the phone, and she told of a children’s book, very artistically illustrated, that had the letter Z pointing in the wrong direction. 3) The solved 3-part cypher mentioned carrying souls to the other side in the afterlife. 4) In his novel, Ed strongly points out that his foremost desire is to be the absolutely most evil criminal. 5) The Zodiac is an egomaniac. He is about Me-Me-Me. 6) Ed’s IQ is very high and I have studied TV shows concerning the spiritually evil criminal. 7) I noticed that the Zodiac was into symbols concerning basic centrality. I have studied this area for years, although not from the evil point of view. 8) Two faces were on all the envelopes he sent, not two postage stamps, but two faces.

The Zodiac Solution.

1. It is all about his name, about his name ringing through history, even into the afterlife. (“My name is —-”)

2. It is about the conflict between good and evil. (Zodiac vs. SFPD)

3. It is about mirror worlds. (this world and the afterlife)

4. It is about gaining power through the death of others. (Satanic spirituality)

5. It is about being found out at the right time. (The letters are full of clues)

6. It is about proving how smart he is. (cryptograms)

Questions.

1. Is it a coincidence that an egomaniac has a first and last name so similar?

2. Is it possible that the killer played mystic games with his own name?

3. Is it possible that the killer made sure enough clues were available for the solution to the puzzle?

4. Is it a coincidence that parallelisms are found everywhere you look in the letters?

5. Is it possible the killer is far more intelligent than suspected?

6. Is it possible that the dual conflict in the killer would evidence itself in all his thoughts?

Facts and Clues.

1. The Zodiac crossed the words slaves and paradice.

p
a	Draw a circle around this and it is the zodiac symbol.
r
slaves
d
i
c
e

2. The symbols in his long cryptograms were often letters in their mirror-image.

3. The symbolic logic of evil is similar to that of religious mysticism.

4. The Zodiac used the zodiac symbol to substitute for the letter d.

5. The solution is not one a supercomputer can devise.

6. The name Edward Edwards has 13 letters, but the letters are certainly scrambled.

7. Centrality’s doorway to the afterlife in Egyptian religion is represented by the ankh symbol, which in Western cultures is the infinity symbol, which is two mirrored S’s overlapping. S is the odd letter in the 13 letters of the name. S should be the central letter.

8. A small case r looks like a small case n.

9. An M is an upside-down W.

10. The previous puzzles used e as an e.

11. Not all of the symbols in his coded name which looked like circles with figure-eights inside were actually the same.

One looked like a figure-eight or infinity symbol, but the others had what looked like face-to-face D’s.

12. The Zodiac was meticulous in scribing his symbols. Such errors may have been intentional.

13. The Zodiac displayed bi-polar personality traits.

14. The Zodiac made sure he used a zodiac symbol in his name, although he had hundreds of others to choose from.

15. Later, after solving the master-diagram, I learned that Ed chose aliases such as Rose, Love, Day, which are symbols and high ideas representing centrality, as does the zodiac symbol. The Chinese character for “day” is in fact an adaptation of the zodiac symbol.

16. Ed is a Gemini. The Twins.

17. The Zodiac had attacks of violent proportion in which his good side would be in battle against his evil side.

18. The Zodiac buttons were important to him, not the word ZODIAC, but the symbol.

19. Much of a person’s writing does not necessarily represent a person’s deep thought when that person is a liar and an extreme control freak.

20. A master manipulator will have a splendid finale worked out in detail even before the show begins.

This is a brief summary of a few of my thoughts.

Questions?

I hope this helps someone,—-

Neal Weems Best.

The Identity Cipher coincided with the anniversary of the Deer Lodge Prison riot that Edwards had lived through. Neal maintained this crypto could never have been solved without knowing the writer’s name but once he had the name EDWARD EDWARDS, it was easy to see how the transition was made. Edwards had taken letters from his name and made his own symbols with the letters in mirror image. Mirrored worlds represented life and afterlife and the Zodiac killer was killing slaves for his afterlife.

The Zodiac cipher symbols were the letters in Ed Edwards’ name in mirror image.

After Neal solved the first identity cipher he was able to solve the last 18 characters from the Zodiac’s first cipher.

“I’m Edward E-Vexed IQ Hath You Greater Than I”

Edwards used many letters from his own name in mirror image to create the symbols used in the Zodiac ciphers. Edwards’ portrayed himself throughout life as two people representing the mirrored worlds. He was the family man and the killer. The Zodiac was killing slaves for his next life. The central letter in the identity puzzle was mirrored “S’s” which represent the figure eight or the sign of eternity. The Catholic Church uses the Zodiac sign throughout its churches. The priest wears it on his cassock. Edwards was abused in the Catholic orphanage and took everything from the Catholic Church and turned it into Satan.

Neal’s knowledge of Christianity, Egyptian history and Greek and Chinese mysticism helped him solve the Zodiac’s ciphers. Edwards had studied some of the same areas while housed in Deer Lodge Prison, Montana, from 1956 until 1959 and he wrote about it in his book.

Edwards had placed his “Identity” in the puzzle just as he had said, and was taunting everyone with his superior IQ. Edwards was told throughout his formative years that he was stupid, when in fact he was a genius. His IQ was registered at 132 when he was 17. He used his intelligence to create “Crimes of Recognition” to feed his desire to be loved.