By Steve Neavling
The FBI has confirmed that a coded message from the Zodiac Killer has finally been cracked, more than 40 years after it was sent to the San Francisco Chronicle.
The cracked code, however, does not reveal any obvious clues about the identity of the serial killer, who has murdered at least five people in the Bay Area in California in 1968 and 1969.
The “340 cipher,” which was sent to the newspaper in November 1969, was solved by a code-breaking team from the U.S., Australia, and Belgium, the Chronicle reports.
The message reads, “I hope you are having lots of fun in trying to catch me. … I am not afraid of the gas chamber because it will send me to paradise all the sooner because I now have enough slaves to work for me.”
“Over the past 51 years, C.R.R.U. has reviewed numerous proposed solutions from the public — none of which had merit,” the F.B.I. said in a statement. “The cipher was recently solved by a team of three private citizens.”
In a separate statement, the FBI’s San Francisco Field Office said the cipher “was recently solved by private citizens.”
“The Zodiac Killer case remains an ongoing investigation for the F.B.I. San Francisco division and our local law enforcement partners,” the office said. “The Zodiac Killer terrorized multiple communities across Northern California and even though decades have gone by, we continue to seek justice for the victims of these brutal crimes.”
