Arthur Leigh Allen's house

This is the house where Arthur Leigh Allen lived.

It is located at 32 Fresno Street in Vallejo, California.

Allen, who died in 1992, is a suspect in the Zodiac serial killings.

During the murders, he was living at this address with his parents, Ethan and Bernice.

He returned to Fresno Street after being fired from his job as an elementary school teacher due to allegations that he sexually molested a student.

In March 1968, he began working part-time as a gas station attendant.

He reportedly started drinking heavily and gaining weight.

Police reports indicate he had a habit of driving to rural areas, parking there, and drinking alcohol. He was also known to carry guns in his vehicle.

The first known Zodiac killings took place at Lake Herman Road in December 1968, roughly nine months after Allen was fired. The site is six miles east of this house on Fresno Street.

Zodiac victim Darlene Ferrin worked at an IHOP on Tennessee Street, which is a two-minute walk from this location. Allen allegedly told a friend that he was "fond" of a waitress at the restaurant.

During the investigation into Ferrin's murder, the police learned that she occasionally associated with a man called Lee.

Because this "Lee" has never been identified, it is speculated that the man was Allen, who went by his middle name, Leigh (and spelled it as "Lee").

Allen later lived in a trailer in Santa Rosa, but this house on Fresno Street was where he was living when the attacks began.

At 12:40 a.m. on July 5, 1969, the Zodiac Killer anonymously called the police to take credit for the murders of Darlene Ferrin and Michael Mageau. The call was made from a payphone on Tuolumne Street.

Allen died of a heart attack on August 26, 1992. At the time of his death, he was 58 years old and living in a trailer park in Santa Rosa. Reports suggest that he had diabetes and a cardiac condition.

Allen's father, Ethan, died in 1971, followed by his mother, Bernice, in 1989.

Although Allen's handwriting bore no resemblance to that in the Zodiac letters, there is considerable circumstantial evidence linking him to the killings.

His mother reportedly gifted him a Zodiac watch in December 1967. It had the same cross-circle symbol that the Zodiac Killer used in his letters. This symbol also appeared on the disguise that the killer wore during the Lake Berryessa attack. Allen continued to wear this watch long after he became a suspect.

One of his friends claimed that Allen spoke to him about an idea for a novel. Its premise was allegedly centered on a killer called "Zodiac," who would target random victims in lovers' lanes and taunt the police. He reportedly found the idea of hunting people fascinating.

During an interview, he told the police that one of his favorite books was "The Most Dangerous Game," a short story about a man who is being hunted by a Russian aristocrat on a remote island. One of the Zodiac's letters stated that killing humans was more fun because "man is the most dangerous animal of all to kill."

Allen also misspelled certain words the same way that the Zodiac Killer did. For example, they both wrote "Merry Xmas" as "Mery Xmass."

His alibi for the day of the Lake Berryessa attack could not be verified. Allen told the police he originally planned to go to the lake that day but chose to go to Salt Point Ranch on the coast instead. When asked if anyone could confirm his whereabouts on that date, he claimed he had spoken with a couple and an elderly neighbor. However, none of these people could be contacted to confirm his story. The police were unable to trace the couple in question, and the neighbor had died shortly after the conversation supposedly took place.

Footprints from the crime scene at the lake belonged to a size-10.5 military boot, which matched Allen's size. The survivor of that attack, Bryan Hartnell, stated that the killer's voice and body shape were the same as Allen's. During a police interview, Allen admitted to having bloody knives on the day in question. However, he claimed that he had used them to kill a chicken.

In 1992, the survivor of the Blue Rock Springs shooting, Michael Mageau, picked Allen's face out of a photo lineup. By that stage, too much time had passed for it to be considered strong evidence.