Richard Hoffman has been publicly accused of being the Zodiac Killer by his own grandson, Jeremy Foy, a former police officer who laid out the theory in TikTok videos in August 2024 and in the Netflix documentary This is the Zodiac Speaking, released that October.1Tribune. Man Claims Zodiac Killer Was His Grandfather in New Netflix Documentary Hoffman was a Vallejo, California police officer during the late 1960s. He died on March 2, 2011, at age 68. No law enforcement agency has endorsed Foy’s theory, opened an investigation based on it, or tested Hoffman’s DNA against Zodiac evidence, and the case remains officially unsolved.
Who Is Accusing Hoffman
Jeremy Foy is Hoffman’s grandson and a former police officer who now posts on TikTok. He has stated he is “100%” certain his grandfather was the Zodiac. His claims reached a wider audience when they were incorporated into This is the Zodiac Speaking.1Tribune. Man Claims Zodiac Killer Was His Grandfather in New Netflix Documentary Foy has described Hoffman as “abusive, controlling, manipulating, and also unfaithful.”2Grunge. Former Cop’s Bizarre Claim About the Zodiac Killer’s Identity
What the Evidence Against Hoffman Actually Is
The strongest piece of Foy’s case is a claimed personal link between Hoffman and Zodiac victim Darlene Ferrin, who was shot and killed at Blue Rock Springs Park in Vallejo on July 4, 1969. Ferrin’s companion Michael Mageau survived and told investigators she had identified the approaching gunman as a jealous lover named “Richard.” Foy says Hoffman was having an affair with Ferrin, was the first officer at the scene, and “showed up uninvited” to a party at her home. He also says Ferrin was “scared to death” of a Vallejo officer she was seeing, and that Hoffman first denied ever having “laid eyes” on her before later admitting he knew she worked at a local restaurant.3Mirror. Bloke Reckons He’s Solved the Zodiac Killer Case
Beyond the Ferrin connection, Foy points to spelling errors in Hoffman’s official police reports that he says match errors in Zodiac correspondence, singling out the misspelling “untill” for “until.” He also argues Hoffman resembled the Zodiac composite sketches, had a fondness for holidays that fits the July 4 and near-Christmas timing of two of the attacks, and worked in an unmarked car in plain clothes.2Grunge. Former Cop’s Bizarre Claim About the Zodiac Killer’s Identity Separately, podcaster Kris Collins has alleged that the initials “RH” appeared beside a poem found under the desk of 1966 Riverside murder victim Cheri Jo Bates. Some researchers have linked the Bates killing to the Zodiac, but Riverside police have said the two cases are unrelated.3Mirror. Bloke Reckons He’s Solved the Zodiac Killer Case
Where the Case Against Hoffman Breaks Down
The spelling-error argument has drawn direct scrutiny. The research site Zodiac Killer Facts compared the misspellings in Hoffman’s July 5, 1969 police report with those in the Zodiac letters and found that “untill” is the only misspelled word appearing in identical form in both. That particular error is common enough to appear on standard lists of frequently misspelled words. The Zodiac letters contain at least 20 spelling errors; Hoffman’s report contains 14. The patterns otherwise diverge: the Zodiac writer repeatedly added extraneous “e”s to words like “haveing,” “fireing,” and “caseings,” errors not present in Hoffman’s writing. The analysis concluded the overlap does not show the letter writer had seen Hoffman’s report or that Hoffman wrote the letters.4Zodiac Killer Facts. The Hoffman Report
The remaining strands of the theory are subjective. Resemblance to a composite sketch is unreliable. A grandson’s description of a grandfather’s character does not tie a person to specific crimes. The holiday-timing observation could fit countless people. No agency has publicly acknowledged Foy’s claims or opened a file on them.
Hoffman Is Not an Official Zodiac Suspect
Arthur Leigh Allen, a Vallejo schoolteacher, remains the only person police have ever formally named as a Zodiac suspect. He was investigated from 1971 until his death in 1992. In 2002, a partial DNA profile developed from saliva on stamps used on Zodiac letters was compared against Allen and excluded him. That partial profile is incomplete and can be used only to exclude people, not to identify the killer.5SFGate. Zodiac Killer DNA Profile Evidence
In 2018, Vallejo police submitted two envelopes containing Zodiac letters to a private lab in the hope that advances in DNA technology and genealogical tracing might yield a usable profile. No breakthrough has been publicly announced.6KATV. DNA Match Sought to Zodiac Killer After Break in Other Case Other physical evidence, including a car door from the Lake Berryessa attack and a bloody glove from the Paul Stine murder, remains in storage, but earlier testing was unproductive.7San Francisco Chronicle. Zodiac Murder Case: Police Taking Another Look There is no public indication that Hoffman’s DNA has ever been collected or compared against any of this material. The FBI continues to list the Zodiac case as open.8ABC7 News. The Zodiac Killer 340 Cipher
The two Zodiac ciphers that have been solved did not help. The 408-character cipher was cracked in 1969, and the 340-character cipher was solved in December 2020 by an international team of codebreakers. Neither contained a name.9Wolfram Blog. The Solution of the Zodiac Killer’s 340-Character Cipher
Who Richard Hoffman Was
Richard Lee Hoffman was born on September 23, 1942. He served as a Vallejo police officer during the late 1960s, and according to Foy worked in an unmarked car in plain clothes. Little else about his career or personal life has been publicly reported outside of Foy’s accusations.3Mirror. Bloke Reckons He’s Solved the Zodiac Killer Case He died on March 2, 2011, and was buried after a graveside service at Harbor Lawn-Mt. Olive Memorial Park in Costa Mesa, California.10Dignity Memorial. Richard Hoffman Obituary
Because Hoffman is dead, no charges can ever be brought and no court will ever rule on whether he was the Zodiac. Even if DNA or other evidence someday pointed at him, prosecutors would have nothing to prosecute. In the context of a different proposed Zodiac suspect, a Los Angeles County prosecutor said authorities are “not in the business of stamping something closed where there’s no prosecution involved.”11East Bay Times. Michael Connelly Says Same Killer Committed Black Dahlia, Zodiac Murders For now, the accusation against Hoffman sits where several other family-driven Zodiac theories have landed: public, circumstantial, and unverified.