Troy Houghton: The Minuteman

rand wrote:

It barely touches the Y. I think that's being extremely picayune. I didn't go through letters to get any of the letters for Troy H. The lines are not PERFECTLY straight. Why assume that Z would be PERFECTLY straight? They're not slanted, though. If someone was reading what people are writing without seeing what I did, they'd think that I drew lines wildly slanted to get the result I wanted. I didn't. But anyway, it's fine. I appreciate that you took the challenge and came up with a suspect.

I don't care if people think TH was Z. I've provided so much evidence. Some people read some of it and not other parts. No comment, for instance, on the many pages I posted regarding the JFK-Lancaster letter and its connection to the MM and TH. But, again, that's fine. I know Z was TH. Someday, I hope, the truth comes out. But if we have to wait for LE to figure this out and confirm Z's identity, it'll probably never happen. I can't understand for the life of me how a person like TH was never brought up (much less investigated) until I did so roughly 8 months ago. If LE wants to solve this crime, then all they have to do is investigate TH as a suspect.

THE KEY, IMO, IS THE HALLOWEEN CARD. Z TELLS US HE WILL CLUE US IN TO HIS IDENTITY. THE CLUES MATCH TH. HE WAS A NOTORIOUS FLASHER. THE CARD IMAGE THAT Z PAINSTAKINGLY PUT THERE IS OF A FLASHER. NO ONE SAW THIS BEFORE I FOUND TH. WHEN YOU HAVE THE RIGHT GUY, HE ILLUMINATES THE CLUES AND MAKES SENSE OF THEM. TH DOES THAT. NO OTHER SUSPECT OTHER THAN TH WAS A FLASHER. NO OTHER SUSPECT OTHER THAN TH SHOT THE TIRES OUT OF A CAR. NO OTHER SUSPECT OTHER THAN TH BELONGED TO AN ORGANIZATION THAT USED A CROSSHAIR FOR A LOGO. AND ON AND ON.

HEY Rand...I just thought I'd tell you that I have noticed...

" No comment, for instance, on the many pages I posted regarding the JFK-Lancaster letter and its connection to the MM and TH. "

My comment is that...my completely different research unrelated to the Zodiac has shown me that you have a valid argument about this link between JFK-Lancaster letter and connection to MM and TH.

Now I can't say TH was the Zodiac...but I have found some odd connections in other research that point to links between CIA/FBI/MM/SAO and other political groups of the period.

Which is why I am following your research...so keep digging.

MSneuropil what is "SAO" ?

Theforeigner wrote:

MSneuropil what is "SAO" ?

Special Army Organization

Quote :

Secret Army-USA


The SAO, it seems, grew out of the demise of the Minutemen. According to a recently discovered document entitled "History of the Secret Army Organization," it all began one morning in February 1970, when a group of six Minutemen leaders from four states met secretly in Northern Arizona to discuss the crisis that the arrest and imprisonment of two top Minutemen leaders and the assassination of a third had brought on the organization. Although some of these men had met before in their roles as Minutemen group leaders, others were meeting for the first time." These men agreed that "the Minutemen as a national coordination organization of militant rightwing groups had effectively been destroyed by the procommunist elements inside the Justice Department," and they further agreed that the need for a coordinating organization was greater than ever "in view of the increased revolutionary activity by communists in the United States." The new organization was the Secret Army Organization, and it would save America from its leftward drift under Nixon's regime.

1972

Sorry in my last post I attempted to put a link to a page that describes how the MM/SAO/FBI linked ...other reading caused me to add the CIA link....

Anyway here is my attempt to put the LINK:

SAO/MM/FBI linkage

http://crca.ucsd.edu/~esisco/friendlyfire/A1972.html

rand wrote:

Regarding TH links to FBI and CIA, I have lots of information on this and there are some long stories which I will post later today. TH claimed to have worked with the CIA in Guatemala, running guns for anti-Castro groups -- but I'll get to that later. Here's some links that Seagull came up with:

there is evidence that the FBI did support the Minutemen and they didn't distance themselves too quickly. It is mentioned in various books about Cointelpro. A link to an exerpt from one book:

It is in the section titled "Cointelpro's Main Targets" #7 White Hate Groups (1964-1971)

http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Third_World_US/COINTELPRO60s_WAH.html


Another link about Cointelpro which speaks of former Minutemen members forming a new group in San Diego, Houghton's "territory", with the FBI's blessing.

"Secret Army Organization"

http://www.rapcointelpro.com/The%20Real%20COINTELPRO.htm

A link to a more detailed description of the "Secret Army Organization".

http://www.start.umd.edu/start/data/tops/terrorist_organization_profile.asp?id=4258

Follow the links to the two main players in this group, FBI informant Howard Barry Godfrey and Jerry Lynn Davis.


Independent Press-Telegram
Long Beach CA
June 24, 1973

Rightist group

FBI Tied To 'Secret Army'

by Steven V. Roberts
New York Times Service

San Diego- A leader of a right-wing, paramilitary organization that harassed young leftist here for more than a year says that the group was partly organized and financed by an informant for the FBI. Law enforcement officers and others familiar with the situation corroborated his account.

The informant, Howard Barry Godfrey, participated in a shooting, as well as several firebombings and burglaries, while receiving regular payments from the FBI for his services, it was said.

This account was provided this week by Jerry Lynn Davis, the former Southern California coordinator for the Secret Army Organization, a well-armed outgrowth of another right winged group, the Minutemen.

In another development this week, two members of the SAO reportedly recognized a photograph of Donald H. Segretti, the young lawyer accused of organizing a Republican espionage campaign last year. According to The Door, a local radical newspaper, the two rightists identified the man in the photograph as "Donald Simms," whom they met in the summer of 1971 at a shooting range frequented by members of the SAO.

The two men reportedly said that "Simms" was present at a discussion among the right-wingers about the Republican convention, originally scheduled to be held in San Diego in August, 1972, before it was moved to Miami Beach. "Simms" did not participate in the discussion but an unidentified companion did, according to The Door's sources.

Segretti, who has been indicted for distributing false campaign literature in Florida, often used the name "Donald Simmons" in recruiting espionage agents. It is also known that Segretti and the SAO, at different times, both discussed the idea of abducting radicals who might disrupt the convention. But so far there is no firm evidence linking the Republican agent to the SAO.

The SAO, however, is an interesting story in itself. It bears directly on the question of the FBI's attitude towards left-wing dissenters and the use of informants who also become activists.

Davis spoke to a reporter after is release from jail last Thursday, where he had been held pending his sentencing on a charge of possession of explosives, A 31-year old construction worker, Davis had pled guilty and was granted probation.

According to Davis's account, the SAO was formed in 1971 to train guerrilla soldiers who could organize a resistance movement should the U.S. be conquered by a foreign power. Howard Godfrey was one of the six founding members, and contributed the money used to print the group's recruiting literature.

Godfrey told his friends, and in some cases later testified in court, that he participated in a long string of violent actions against San Diego's rather small, but vocal community of left-wing radicals.

In one case, he admitted breaking into the offices of the Street Journal, a left-wing newspaper, and destroying several thousand dollars worth of printing equipment. In another he said he burglarized the Message Information Center, and stole their records.

Law enforcement agents say Godfrey also performed several other burglaries and firebombed two cars belonging to radical sympathizers.

According to his own court testimony, Godfrey was riding in a car on Jan. 6, 1972 when another SAO member fired a shot into a house occupied by young leftists that shattered the elbow of a girl named Paula Tharp. Miss Tharp and other residents of the house were then active in planning demonstrations at the Republican convention.


Regarding this: The attempted assassination of San Diego Univ. Prof. Peter Bohmer, by a "Secret Army Organization" of ex-Minutemen formed, subsidized, armed, and protected by the FBI, was a part of these operations;

I believe that this is precisely what TH did. He went underground and headed the MM's SAO.

Here's a good link about SAO: http://crca.ucsd.edu/~esisco/friendlyfire/A1972.html

Barry Godfrey is the FBI informant who carried out the bomb threat according to Bettie Houghton's orders in this story:

THE POSTMARK FOR THIS LETTER IS APRIL 30, 1967. THIS IS VERY INTERESTING BECAUSE THAT IS PRECISELY WHEN TROY HOUGHTON WOULD HAVE LEFT SAN DIEGO BY CAR TO DRIVE TO MISSOURI TO TESTIFY AT MOWER'S TRIAL IN EARLY MAY. TROY THEN SIGNED DOCUMENTS FOR HIS APPEAL IN MISSOURI ON MAY 11, 1967. HE THEN DISAPPEARED ON MAY 21, 1967.



Here's Bettie Houghton's letter to Harry Jones from August 1967 telling him that she last heard from him on May 21, 1967:





NOTE THAT THE "BATES HAD TO DIE" LETTERS WERE THE LAST SENT REGARDING THE CJB MURDER.

RAND said- "NOTE THAT THE "BATES HAD TO DIE" LETTERS WERE THE LAST SENT REGARDING THE CJB MURDER"

Not if we consider the PATRICIA HAUTZ letter as coming from the same letter writer. That came in Nov1 ,1967. You are saying he left southern CA by November 1,1967. But in earlier posts, you had compared the name HAUTZ to HOUGHTON, indicating that he changed his last name a bit in the letter.

By the way, just my personal opinion, but Troy's cursive signature looks NOTHING like the cursive writing on the Riverside Envelope, or the Lass Xmas card (I think the author of both those writings are one and the same)

MORF: I think you're missing the forest for the trees with all these potshots, but it's fine. Being contrary and skeptical is a necessary part of screening any POI.
Okay, my responses to your observations.

1) It is the last letter that we believe was Z's regarding the case. Because there is a Patricia Hautz that went to school with CJB, we can't say that it was Z who wrote the letter. If it was, however, it is interesting to me that Hautz is close to Haughton.

2) You say TH's cursive looks nothing like Z's cursive. First of all, what Z cursive handwriting? Second, it's just a signature and you know that means absolutely nothing. Look at the other cursive writing -- it looks nothing like TH's signature.

Though I think cursive comparisons mean nothing here (because we don't know that we have any Z cursive handwriting), the comparisons I've made are very interesting IF the Patricia Hautz letter was, in fact, from Z.

Here is TH's other cursive handwriting:


HAUTZ ENVELOPE: NOTE THAT THE T IS NOT YET CROSSED: IT WOULD BE CROSSED AFTER COMPLETING THE WORD (VERY DISTINCTIVE). HOUGHTON DOES THE SAME THING IN THE ABOVE EXAMPLE




IF SOMEONE COULD PROVIDE A BETTER PICTURE OF THIS ENVELOPE, YOU'D SEE THAT THERE IS A LITTLE CURL ON THE 3 (VERY DISTINCTIVE), JUST LIKE THE CURL ON HOUGHTON'S 3 ABOVE.
(THERE IS A GOOD PICTURE OF THE ENVELOPE IN GRAYSMITH'S BOOK, ZODIAC UNMASKED




HAUTZ R WITH CURL






BATES LETTER TH



HOUGHTON TH



I'M ALSO NOT SURE WHETHER OR NOT THIS IS TROY HOUGHTON'S CURSIVE. I SIMPLY DON'T KNOW. IT'S NOT HIS SIGNATURE, OF COURSE. IT WOULD BE HOW HE WRITES HIS NAME WHEN HE WANTS IT TO BE READ.



AND FINALLY, ANSWER THIS QUESTION HONESTLY. IF I SHOWED YOU ANY OF THESE PRINTED DOCUMENTS AND CLAIMED THAT THEY WERE TROY HOUGHTON'S HANDWRITING, WOULD YOU HAVE SAID THAT THEY LOOKED LIKE ZODIAC'S HANDWRITING OR EVEN THE HANDWRITING OF ONE AND THE SAME PERSON?

MSneuropil wrote:

Theforeigner wrote:

MSneuropil what is "SAO" ?

Special Army Organization

Quote :

Secret Army-USA


The SAO, it seems, grew out of the demise of the Minutemen. According to a recently discovered document entitled "History of the Secret Army Organization," it all began one morning in February 1970, when a group of six Minutemen leaders from four states met secretly in Northern Arizona to discuss the crisis that the arrest and imprisonment of two top Minutemen leaders and the assassination of a third had brought on the organization. Although some of these men had met before in their roles as Minutemen group leaders, others were meeting for the first time." These men agreed that "the Minutemen as a national coordination organization of militant rightwing groups had effectively been destroyed by the procommunist elements inside the Justice Department," and they further agreed that the need for a coordinating organization was greater than ever "in view of the increased revolutionary activity by communists in the United States." The new organization was the Secret Army Organization, and it would save America from its leftward drift under Nixon's regime.

1972

Thanks MSneuropil

In Zodiac Unmasked, Graysmith makes the following claim (pp. 23-24):

Twelve days before [the Stine murder], there may have been a dry run for the Stine shooting. At 11:00pm, September 30, 1969, Yellow Cab driver Paul Hom snagged a fare at Mark Hopkin's Hotel. The passenger asked to be driven to Washington and Locust Streets, three blocks before Washington and Cherry Streets. At the destination, he asked Hom to continue along Washington to Arguello Boulevard, then proceed north into the Presidio for several hundred yards. Abruptly, he pulled a long-barreled revolver and robbed Hom of $35 in cash. The cabbie, forced into the trunk, pleaded with the robber to spare his life. Later he was released unharmed by M.P.'s. After Stine's murder, Captain Marty Lee, basing his conclusion on an 'amazing similarity of M.O. between criminals in two cabby cases,' said he believed the robber to have been Zodiac. The Chronicle thought so too. "One of the luckiest men alive," it reported, "taken for a ride by Zodiac but lived to tell about it." One discrepency could not be explained. Hom's robber was only twenty-four, "135 pounds with black hair and eyes," and dressed in "blue denim jacket and dark slacks." But Zodiac was undeniably a stocky, older man. Did he have a young accomplice who had scouted out the scene for him, rehearsing the Stine killing? Was that where the answer lay?"

Sept. 30th is Troy Houghton's birthday.

I have a good idea who that might have been: Raithby Roosevelt Husted, who, I'm fairly sure, was related to Lt. James Husted of Vallejo PD (the man who investigated the case and fingered ALA as Zodiac, though his partner didn't agree at all).

Can you place RAITHBY HUSTED in Vallejo? If he IS related to Husted in the PD, and he has the initials R.H. (like in the Bates Desktop), and looks in the photo like a lighter younger Z, perhaps you are looking at the wrong guy. Maybe you should be considering R.H. as a suspect?

The picture is from 1961.
He lived in San Bruno by the SF airport.
He got married in Santa Cruz on March 9, 1969

California Marriage Index, 1960-1985
about Raithby R Husted
Name: Raithby R Husted
Age: 25
Est. Birth: abt 1944
Spouse Name: Marilyn J Downing
Spouse Age: 26
Date: 9 Mar 1969
Location: Santa Cruz

Husted was a member of the Seventh-day Adventist Church. Cecelia Shepard was a member of the Seventh-day Adventist Church.

Husted claimed to be an assassin for the MM. He then betrayed them, testifying in court against DePugh, Peyson, and Houghton. But the story is very complex. Right before his testimony, Raithby Husted signed a statement for DePugh and his lawyers at the Moonlight Motel saying that he had been "brainwashed" by the FBI. His testimony, however, did not mention this. In The Minutemen, Harry Jones questions Ray about this:

It was several months later [late 1966] before Husted's strange behavior at the Moonlight Motel was explained, either to me or the Minutemen.

"Why did you do it?" I asked.

"I thought I could get back into the Minutemen," he replied. "Maybe not as far as I had been, but get back into it and still supply information, which I'm convinced I could have done, but our fine federal governemtn (and there was an unmistakeable note of resentment in his voice here) had other ideas."

So it seems obvious that Husted is truly repentant and desperately wants to make amends with the Minutemen organization for his damaging testimony. He also fears for his life [this is documented in the book as well]. Indeed, Houghton's conviction was eventually overturned in 1968, partly because of Husted's testimony. Here's what Jerry Brooks (a MM) said of Husted's testimony (quoted in Jones,The Minutemen, p. 353):

"When I saw Raithby Husted at the Federal building shortly after the grand jury testimony in the summer of 1966...he told me that he had been threatened and coerced into making a statement that was false, and that some federal agents had drugged him and he had been physically mistreated, including a beating, and made to sign a statement. I saw agents beating Raithby Husted in the Federal Building in Kansas City the day he returned from giving a sworn statement to Mr. DePugh and shortly before he was to testify before the grand jury...He said also that he was told to perjure himself and was told the precise testimony to give before the grand jury."

Here are two pages of background on Raithby Husted from Harry Jones, THE MINUTEMEN






But I'm sure I've got the right guy in TH. There is no doubt in my mind. Husted would have been the guy that Troy would have looked up in the Bay Area for any kind of favor. Raithby wanted to get back in the good graces of the MM after testifying against them. He also feared for his life.

Prior to 1968, Zodiac was murdering people down in southern California. Troy Houghton lived in San Diego before he disappeared on May 21, 1967.

Cheri Jo Bates was murdered the night of a big Minutemen bust in NYC. The stories appeared together on the front pages of Southern Californian newspapers the next day. Troy Houghton and Robert DePugh had left Missouri and gone on a speaking tour. The day of CJB murder, they were in LA giving a speech. The poster below lists people that DePugh will talk about. There is NO DOUBT that Troy accompanied DePugh on this day. TH was the West Coast regional coordinator. He was the man in California. Notice the correction on the poster (which very well could have been done by Troy Houghton himself, since he didn't have a secretary): BLUE FELT TIP PEN!


(Thanks to Seagull, who found and owns this poster)

This is a very bad reproduction. But trust me, it looks exactly like Zodiac's blue felt pen:



It also reminds me of the Patricia Hautz cross out:



The BATES HAD TO DIE letter was sent on April 30, 1967. The next day, Nikki Benedict (thought at the time to be a Z murder and still unsolved) was murdered in a similar manner to Bates. Troy Houghton would have been leaving by car from San Diego to Missouri to testify at Mower's trial and do some paper work for his appeal. He had been convicted in February of flashing two young teenage girls at a mall in Cheyenne, WY. The Confession letter re the CJB murder said that he would be stalking your girls now. Troy was stalking young girls and flashing them. Was he murdering them too? Note that Nikki Benedict's mother, Julie, was a news editor for the Independent newspaper of San Diego county. Troy would have figured prominently in that newspaper, and not for good reasons.



Then there is the Swindle murders (the Honeymoon murders) in San Diego. Very Z-like as well.

Rand asked me to repost this photo in the hopes that it comes out better, and color is better:

Thanks, Morf. Unfortunately, it's still not much better. Trust me, though, the blue ink of the pen looks just like the one used by Z (esp. the Belli letter). It's a small point but one that, like many others, is consistent with what we know about Z's MO.

Below is an excerpt from this 1968 article that appeared in the Arizona Republic newspaper about Mark Monday's experience as an infiltrator of the Minutemen:


Note in the left-hand column that Monday says he received a letter in felt pen. Also note on the right-hand column the reference to Gilbert and Sullivan.



Monday sent me a xerox copy of a 1967 formal communication that he received from the MM. Here it is:

Rand...do you know who wrote and mailed the last letter/directive? Perhaps I missed it.

And refresh my memory...the couple that was being watched in the "test" Mr. Monday described was the Moores. Is this the couple that in past writing presented said that they were leaving the MM and TH tried to talk them out of it?

Correct, MS. I believe that the directive was written by either DePugh, Mary Tollerton, or Cindy Melville. I'll check it out. Here is more on Mark Monday and Everett Moore (note his background as a scientist/engineer and that he lived in Paradise Valley):







Another photo of Moore



Interesting that this story and picture of Moore appeared on the same page as a story about a slain cab driver:

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Good news! I asked Jessica Edgar, who works for the National Archives at Kansas City, to request to have the Haughton's appeals case delivered to their facility and it officially arrived today. Jessica told me that she hopes to take a look at it tomorrow to see if provides any clues that would help to answer our/my questions.

IF TH was alive and turned himself in for the crimes that he supposedly went underground for....

Would he even be put into jail after all this time? And if so...would it be very long at all??

I doubt he would have spent much more time than DePugh did...so either he is dead...seriously not thinking of his best interests...or he is comfortable in a new identity and has enough resources.

I'm thinking about old age and MEDICARE. How would he get it if he didn't have a new SS # and a work history of come sort? Even with state medical...there could be a problem in these days of computer data. It would be hard for him to get any medicaid card too. Of course he might be a Canadian citizen these 30+ years

Personally, I believe Houghton is dead. Precisely when he died, however, is something to truly ponder.

I think he died sometime between 1988-1991. He had an enlarged heart as early as the mid-1960s, and he was in bad health in general. As for the time he would have done in jail, well, he won his appeal in absentia. But then he had the conviction in WY of indecent exposure, and other pending trials to come. In addition, the court cases had put him in substantial debt. How was he going to repay his lawyers?
My theory is that TH became addicted to murder, going hog wild by late 1966. He had very good reason, if he was a serial kiler, to remain underground. And he was also "undergound" as leader of the West Coast MM strike team, which DePugh was constantly talking about (not so secret a secret). These were the teams that were to start murdering people on the infamous MM assassination lists if Depugh was jailed. So staying underground suited TH's lifestyle. And, after all, the Minutemen were asking members if they were willing to give up their families forever to serve the cause:

TROY HOUGHTON'S BIRTH CERTIFICATE



TH's FATHER'S DEATH CERTIFICATE

BOTH TROY HOUGHTON AND Z ALSO WROTE THE NUMBER 2 THIS WAY:

Z:





TROY HOUGHTON:




ALSO, COMPARE HOUGHTON'S 4 with Z's 4 on the car door above