Murder of Cheri Jo Bates

In August 2021, the RPD's cold case unit published an update regarding the handwritten correspondence, stating that the author of the letters claiming responsibility for Bates' murder had been identified via DNA analysis in 2020, and had admitted writing the correspondence. According to the update, the author had initially—and anonymously—contacted investigators in 2016, explaining the correspondence had been a distasteful hoax. This individual expressed remorse and apologized for the hoax, saying that he had been a troubled teenager at the time and that he had written and mailed the letters as a means of seeking attention.

In October 2021, a group of retired police officers, intelligence officers and journalists claimed to have solved Bates' murder, which they claimed was linked to the Zodiac murders and that the perpetrator in both cases was a man named Gary Francis Poste. Among the evidence cited as the basis for their claims was the fact that Poste was a painter by profession, which would explain the paint-spattering upon the Timex watch found at the crime scene; that Poste was receiving medical treatment at March Air Force Base for an "accidental" gunshot wound at around the time of Bates' death; that this location was fifteen minutes from the site of Bates' murder; and that Poste had brown hair, which could be a match for that found under Bates' fingernails.

In a letter dated March 13, 1971, the Zodiac Killer claimed to the Los Angeles Times that he was responsible for the murder of Bates, stating: "I do have to give [the police] credit for stumbling across my Riverside activity, but they are only finding the easy ones. There are a hell of a lot more down there."

San Francisco Chronicle journalist Paul Avery followed the Zodiac murders from the date of the perpetrator's first definite killings. In November 1970, Avery received a letter from an anonymous source informing him of the similarities between the murders committed by the Zodiac and the murder of Bates four years previously. The letter urged Avery to investigate the similarities in greater detail. Although the RPD remained unconvinced of his conclusions, both Avery and a handwriting expert named Sherwood Morrill stated on November 16 that the handwriting scratched on the desk at RCC and the letters sent to The Press-Enterprise and Bates' father in 1967 were "unquestionably" written by the same individual who had later written the Zodiac letters. By this date, the Zodiac claimed to have killed fourteen victims, although only five murders and two attempted murders committed between December 1968 and October 1969 have ever been conclusively attributed to this individual.

Furthermore, the fact that the perpetrator subsequently sent correspondence to the police and press, including details of the murder withheld from the public, is reminiscent of the Zodiac Killer. In addition, the RPD have also noted similarities between Bates' slaying and the general modus operandi of a fatal attack upon a young couple committed at Lake Berryessa in September 1969—an attack conclusively ascribed to the Zodiac Killer.

On April 30, 1967, The Press-Enterprise printed a further update on Bates' murder. The following day, both the RPD and Bates' father received handwritten letters from an unknown individual, who had scrawled the message, "Bates had to die. There will be more" on a single sheet of paper. This letter was also considered by police to have been a distasteful hoax, although at the bottom of each letter was an indecipherable number or letter which was either a "2" or a "Z".

The murder of Cheri Jo Bates occurred in Riverside, California, on October 30, 1966. Bates, an 18-year-old college freshman, was stabbed and slashed to death on the grounds of Riverside City College. Police determined the assailant had disabled the ignition coil wire and distributor of Bates' Volkswagen Beetle as a method to lure her from her car as she studied in the college library. The murder itself remains one of Riverside's most infamous cold cases, and has been described by some locals as a murder which "stripped Riverside of its innocence".

On the morning of October 30, 1966, Bates and her father attended Mass at the St. Catherine of Alexandria Catholic Church before the two shared breakfast at a local restaurant. In the early afternoon, Bates opted to visit the college library to both study and to work on a research paper. She is known to have twice phoned a close friend named Stephanie Guttman (at 3:00 and 3:45 p.m. respectively), asking whether she would like to accompany her to the library to study and retrieve books, although on the occasion of the second phone call, her friend refused. Bates is believed to have left her house to visit the library sometime between 4:30 and 5:00 p.m. Her father returned home in the evening to find a note taped to the family refrigerator reading: "Dad—Went to RCC Library."

On November 4, 1966, Bates was laid to rest at the Crestlawn Memorial Park in Riverside. Her parents, older brother and several hundred other mourners were present at this service.

Officially, Bates' murder remains an unsolved case, and the theory she was a victim of the Zodiac Killer (which has been strongly disputed by the RPD) has never been proven. Despite several suspects having been investigated and eliminated from the inquiry since 1966, the current investigator assigned to the case, Detective Jim Simons, has stated one individual still remains of interest to the investigation, although because tests conducted upon the mitochondrial DNA of the hair and blood samples found at the crime scene did not match those of this suspect, insufficient physical evidence exists to link this individual to the crime. Investigators who conducted DNA profiling were, however, able to determine that her murderer was a Caucasian male.

Shortly before Bates left her home, she phoned a co-worker at the Riverside National Bank inquiring as to whether she had seen a term paper bibliography she (Bates) had misplaced. When her co-worker replied she had not, Bates replied: "Now I'll have to start all over on my note cards." A subsequent eyewitness report given to Riverside investigators indicated Bates drove her Beetle in the direction of RCC at approximately 6:10 p.m. This eyewitness also claimed her vehicle was closely followed by a bronze 1965 or 1966 model Oldsmobile.

Following her graduation from Ramona High School, Bates enrolled at the Riverside City College (RCC) and found part-time employment at the Riverside National Bank. Her savings, plus wages from this part-time employment, helped pay for a 1960 lime green Volkswagen Beetle, a vehicle she was proud to own. Bates lived alone with her father at 4195 Via San Jose, her parents having divorced in 1965. Her mother also lived in Riverside, and her brother, Michael Bates, served in the United States Navy.

It has been hypothesized that Bates may have been an early victim—perhaps the first victim—of an unidentified serial killer active in Northern California from the late 1960s to the early 1970s known as the Zodiac Killer, and that this unidentified individual may have originated from Riverside and later moved to the San Francisco Bay Area. One of the potential clues supporting this theory was the discovery of a set of lower case initials (r h) inscribed below a macabre poem scratched into a desk at RCC. This poem was discovered by a custodian six months after Bates' murder and contains graphic references to repeated assaults upon young women with a bladed weapon. The desk in question was in the college storage area at the time the poem was discovered, although the custodian informed police the desk had been on the library floor at the time of Bates' murder. Police photographed the inscription and added this piece of circumstantial evidence to the case file.

Cheri Josephine Bates was born in Omaha, Nebraska, on February 4, 1948. She was the younger of two children born to Joseph and Irene (née Karolevitz) Bates. The Bates family relocated to California in 1957, where her father found employment as a machinist at the Corona Naval Ordnance Laboratory. Bates was a graduate of Ramona High School, where she had been a varsity cheerleader active in the student government, and an honor student. Described as a "sweet, outgoing girl" by acquaintances, she held aspirations to become a flight attendant.

Former Los Angeles police investigator Steve Hodel, in his book Most Evil, has claimed that his father, George Hodel, was responsible for the murder of Bates. This claim has been viewed with little credibility, not least because—among other cases—Hodel has also claimed that his father was the Zodiac Killer, the Lipstick Killer, and the perpetrator of the 1947 murder of the Black Dahlia.