He’s the ghost that never quite left California.
Between 1968 and 1969, a man who called himself "Zodiac" terrorized the San Francisco Bay Area, murdering five known victims and claiming to have killed dozens more. He sent taunting letters to newspapers. He wore a hooded executioner’s garb. He spoke in ciphers. Then, he vanished.
Naturally, the internet is obsessed. People want a definitive answer to a haunting question: is the Zodiac Killer still alive?
If he is, he’s a very old man.
To understand why this is even a possibility, you have to look at the timeline. The canonical victims—David Faraday, Betty Lou Jensen, Darlene Ferrin, Cecelia Shepard, and Paul Stine—were attacked over fifty years ago. At the time, witnesses described the killer as a white male, likely in his late 20s or early 30s. Some reports leaned toward 35 to 45. If the Zodiac was 30 in 1969, he would be 87 today. If he was 40, he’d be 97.
It’s possible. People live to 90 all the time. But the window is closing fast.
The DNA problem and the search for a living suspect
For a long time, the investigation was stuck in the mud. We had fingerprints that didn't match anyone and descriptions that were frustratingly generic. But then, Golden State Killer Joseph James DeAngelo got caught via investigative genetic genealogy (IGG). Suddenly, every cold case amateur and professional detective had the same thought: can we do this to the Zodiac?
The answer is complicated.
In 2018, the Vallejo Police Department sent several Zodiac envelopes to a private lab to try and harvest enough DNA for a profile. You'd think it’d be easy. He licked the stamps, right? Not necessarily. Back then, some people used sponges or water. Also, DNA degrades. For decades, these letters weren't kept in climate-controlled vaults; they were handled by detectives, filed in dusty cabinets, and contaminated by well-meaning clerks.
Basically, the evidence is "dirty."
If a clean profile ever emerges, the answer to whether the Zodiac is still alive will likely come from a cemetery or a nursing home. Most experts, like former cold-case investigator Paul Holes, have expressed cautious optimism about DNA, but they also acknowledge that the Zodiac might have been "cleaner" than other killers, leaving behind very little of his own genetic material on the stamps he licked.
Arthur Leigh Allen: The favorite suspect who died too soon
Ask any true crime buff about the case, and they’ll mention Arthur Leigh Allen. He’s the guy John Douglas, the famous FBI profiler, and Robert Graysmith, the author of Zodiac, both centered on.
Allen had the right watch (a Zodiac brand). He wore the same shoe size as the killer at the Lake Berryessa scene. He lived near the scenes. He was a convicted child molester with a dark, erratic personality. Honestly, he fit the profile like a glove.
But he’s dead.
Allen died of a heart attack in 1992 at the age of 58. If Allen was the guy, then the answer to "is the Zodiac Killer still alive" is a firm no. However, DNA tests in 2002 compared Allen's genetic material to a partial profile from a Zodiac stamp, and it didn't match. Neither did the fingerprints. Does that clear him? Not entirely, because of the contamination issues mentioned earlier, but it certainly took the wind out of the sails for those convinced he was the one.
Gary Francis Poste and the Case Breakers
In recent years, a group called the Case Breakers made headlines by claiming they identified the Zodiac as a man named Gary Francis Poste. They pointed to scars on Poste’s forehead that they say match the police sketch of the Zodiac. They also claimed to have found "coded messages" in the Zodiac's ciphers that revealed his name.
The FBI hasn't bitten.
Poste died in 2018. If he was the killer, he lived a long, full life in the Sierra foothills, far away from the prying eyes of the law. But the Riverside Police Department and the FBI have remained skeptical of the Case Breakers' findings. There’s a lot of "evidence" that feels like it’s being forced to fit a narrative rather than leading to a conclusion.
It's a pattern in this case. Everyone has a "guy."
- Ross Sullivan: Worked at the library near the site of the Cheri Jo Bates murder (a possible Zodiac victim). He looked just like the sketch. He died in 1977.
- Lawrence Kane: A man who worked at the same hotel as one of the victims. He died in 2010.
- Richard Gaikowski: A journalist with suspicious connections to the letters. He died in 2004.
Notice a trend? Almost every "primary" suspect is already in the ground.
Why we might never know for sure
There is a distinct possibility that the Zodiac was never on the police radar.
He could have been a "one-and-done" sort of criminal who got his kicks, felt the heat, and simply stopped. Or maybe he went to prison for something else and died behind bars under a different name. This happens more often than you’d think in cold cases. When you look at the question of whether the Zodiac is still alive, you have to consider the "quiet" suspect—the man who lived next door, never got arrested, and took his secrets to a suburban grave in the 1990s.
The Z340 cipher, which sat unsolved for 51 years, was finally cracked in 2020 by a team of private citizens. It didn't contain a name. It just contained more taunting: "I hope you are having lots of fun in trying to catch me."
That’s the core of the frustration. The killer didn't want to be caught; he wanted to be a legend.
The reality of a 2026 search
If we assume for a moment that he is still breathing, where would he be? He’d be a nonagenarian. He’d likely be in a care facility. He wouldn't be the terrifying figure in the hood anymore; he’d be a frail man in a wheelchair.
The search today isn't really about a man-hunt in the traditional sense. Nobody is expecting a high-speed chase. It’s a forensic hunt. Detectives at the San Francisco Police Department and the Napa County Sheriff's Office still keep the files open. They are waiting for a familial match in a genealogy database.
If a 30-year-old man in Ohio uploads his DNA to a site to find his cousins, and that DNA shows he’s the grandson of a man who lived in Vallejo in 1968, that’s how this ends.
But time is the enemy. Every year that passes is a year where more physical evidence degrades and more potential witnesses pass away. The people who saw him at Lake Berryessa or on the streets of Presidio Heights are also aging. Memories fade.
Actionable steps for the true crime enthusiast
If you’re looking to follow the latest legitimate developments on whether the Zodiac is still alive, don't just follow TikTok rumors. Stick to the sources that have been grinding on this for decades.
- Monitor the DNA updates: Keep an eye on the Vallejo Police Department's official statements regarding their contract with labs like Othram or Parabon NanoLabs. These are the companies that actually solve these things.
- Study the Z13 cipher: This is the short, 13-character code that preceded the phrase "My name is..." It remains unsolved. If you’re a math whiz, that’s where the answer is literally written.
- Check the FBI Vault: The FBI has released hundreds of pages of Zodiac files under the Freedom of Information Act. Reading the raw reports gives you a much better sense of the suspects than any documentary will.
- Visit Zodiackiller.com: Run by Tom Voigt, this site has been the central clearinghouse for police reports and suspect data for over 25 years. It’s the most comprehensive database available to the public.
Ultimately, the answer to the question is the Zodiac Killer still alive is statistically "probably not," but forensically "maybe." We are in the final decade where a living arrest is even biologically possible. After that, the Zodiac will transition from a cold case suspect to a historical mystery, much like Jack the Ripper.
We are waiting for a name. Whether that name belongs to a living person or a headstone is up to the DNA.