Alleged meeting arranged between Melvin Belli and the Zodiac

[Theforeigner Profile]

Here is a newsreport I found yesterday published, Oct 10, 1984, on the 15 year anniversery of the Paul Stine murder.
Among other things, it tells about an alleged meeting arranged between Melvin Belli and the Zodiac.
It is mentioned in connection with the "Please help me" Dec 20, 1970 letter, so therefore I post it here.

I have never heard of this meeting before.

http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=y2 ... lejo&hl=en

The Bulletin - Oct 10, 1984

Quote:

"He (Melvin Belli) agreed to meet the man one night outside St Peter's and St Paul's Church in the predominatly Italian North beach neighborhood."





The address of that church is :

St Peter's and St Paul's Church
666 Filbert Street
San Francisco, CA

Anyone know anything about this?



Odd detail; apparently a scene in Dirty Harry was shot at this church :

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sts._Peter ... _Francisco

The church is prominently featured in the Clint Eastwood movies Dirty Harry (the Church, and nearby Dante Building, are the scene of sniper attacks by the "Scorpio Killer")

[AuthUser Profile]

TF,

Good find. No, I've never seen this article and I've never heard of the attempted meeting outside the churches.

Auth

[aquiman Profile]

I wonder if that potential meeting could be verified by someone other than Belli?

[Lucifer's Angel Profile]

I know it's Graysmith we're talking about here, but didn't one of his books describe such a meeting being arranged?

[smithy Profile]

Yes, I've read this before, yellow GS page 117 in my copy. Sam didn't show up.

"Instead of the Fairmont, Belli suggested the steps of the Old St Mary's church in Chinatown as a meeting place. But Sam named another location of his choice: Daly City, in front of the St Vincent de Paul Thrift shop, 6726 Mission Street at 10:30 that morning".

FWIW.

[Theforeigner Profile]

OK so it was in the yellow book, thanks Smithy:).



Here is a post I posted over at Morfs:


Yea I know about the Fairmont Hotel meeting.

And there was ALSO an arranged meeting with "SAM" at an address in Daly City.

Here is the address from a Oct 22, 1969 newsarticle in Times (San Mateo, California)

"Vincent de Paul's Thrift Shop in the 660 block of Mission St" (Daly City)


Here is decription of the episode (not from the newarticle, but from the net):
Belli spoke with "Sam" off the air, arranging for a secret meeting.
It was to take place that morning at St. Vincent de Paul's Thrift Shop. After forty-five minutes of waiting, Belli went home alone. The patrolman who spoke to the Zodiac the night before was apprehensive about the voice he heard on the Dunbar show. He had doubts that it was the same man. In truth, they had no proof this was really the Zodiac.


Interesting that in TWO different meeting agrements the locations were 2 churches and both had "St Paul" in them, as in the apostel St Paul?

It is IMO VERY difficult to understand WHO in all this phonecalls and meeting arrangents were the real Zodiac?
because it seems like the REAL Zodiac called in late at night and asked for belli and the other lawyer to be on a show.
BUT when the show is on it turn out to be a FAKE Zodiac who calls in.
THAT is VERY odd because HOW would the faker know that the REAL Zodiac had called in the night before and demaned to be on the TV show?????

The reason I belive that the original caller, who called the police at night, was the real Zodiac, was because I´v read that the LE belived it was the REAL Zodiac.



Sure seems to be a LOT of arranged meetings

[MrBungle Profile]

I'd have to think that Weil was the one who ordered that Belli appear. It's too coincidental that the real Zodiac would do so and there just happened to be some psycho ready to call in.

[DebS Profile Website]

When the Dec. 20, 1969 letter to Belli was announced in the Dec. 28, 1969 edition of the SF Chronicle there were three instances in the article where Belli offered to meet Zodiac.

The Associated Press quoted Belli in Minich Germany, as offering to meet confidentially with the alleged killer at any time to help him.

Then again in the caption at the beginning of where the article continued.

Belli willing To Meet Killer Any Time

And towards the end of the article.

Belli said that if Zodiac fears meeting him in California - because of murder warrants against the killer in this state - "we can meet elsewhere. Say in Nevada. Or anywhere in the world for that matter."

The church was not mentioned specifically in this article but as the article TF linked was written in 1984 more detail could have been revealed in the ensuing time. Bottom line is that Belli did have a history of saying he would meet with Zodiac, whether it was the impostor or not and the offer went beyond the time of the Dunbar show.

[para_owl Profile YIM]

I will do my usual speculating and say that I think it's plausible for both parties. If Z was ever caught or turned himself in I would think that Belli or someone of his stature might want to take on the case for the spotlight and/or pure difficulty factor much like the so called "dream team" did for the juice. Z's perspective is much tougher. I think the only way he would turn himself in is if he knew the investigators were days away from arresting him. So, if he turned himself in, then in his mind he would be beating them to the punch and he would probably be in a position to plea bargin and avoid the death penalty. If the meeting ever did happen, then this is yet another unseen scene that would give some insight in to the case. It would be too good to be true, and it does look like something a novelist would come up with, but then again if the meeting ever happened Z could have just messed with Belli and Belli really couldn't or might not want to say anything about the encounter.

--Will.

[speedy1 Profile]

Yeah I had heard of this supposed meeting before as well. I recall apparently Belli offered to meet but no one showed.