Troy Houghton: The Minuteman

That's a good idea, but I doubt any of them with knowledge would ever run across it. Harry is a huge skeptic about most everything. He thinks TH was murdered by DePugh, but he doesn't know. It's something he's been trying to prove for 40 years (like we've been trying to solve the Z murders). So we have different motivations: I'm trying to prove TH was alive, he's trying to prove TH was murdered.

I think from what I have read it seems DePugh probably didn't have TH killed...at least not for the reason that he might testify against him in a court of law. That does not mean he was not later disposed of if it became known that he went off the deep end and could do alot of harm to not only the Minutemen but also to any agency he may have given info or obtained info from. Now add some serious political intrigue and possible ties to an assassination, that would be worth taking TH out to save their necks. DePugh only got 6 or was it 8 years for the gun charges? I realize they stated death to traitors...but I don't know if they could prove TH was a trader to the movement. Would DePugh risk life in prison for murder when they could have simple let others groups to the killing of TH?

I still wish I knew if a person could pick up a CIA issued gun from some gun dealer and just how he came to have a CIA issued gun. Maybe it is more common than one would think.

Any chance of any FOIA releases concerning Troy Houghton? I don't have a clue how one drafts such requests...I just know I have been reading FOIA releases about 1 scientist for 2 years now and it trickles in one batch at the time, in whatever order they want to send it and the critical info keeps getting held back...but TH should have the reams of evidence this scientist has.

Is there anyway to simply establish IF Troy Houghton is in the data base at all and in what areas ? And would a FOIA have to be made out for each branch of LE that potentially had contact with TH? For instance say...FBI, ATF, SS, or even NSA...would 1 broad request search a whole database and give us areas of interest?

There's information on this thread, I believe, for sending FOIA requests. It's pretty simple and the FBI has loads of stuff on Houghton.
I don't know how this escaped me, but isn't TH holding a gun in his right hand in this photo? Or is that a microphone or something to do with tape recording?



Also notice the shortwave receiver behind his head on the shelf.

Something that I find rather interesting: the Wingwalker or chucker boots were issued in 1966 under government contract and distributed to Navy and Air Force installations on the West Coast. TH disappeared in early 1967; he lived in San Diego, home of Navy and Air Force installations and he got supplies from these places (the shortwave receiver in the picture, for instance). The crime was committed in Sept. 1969, and Z was wearing 1966 boots. That strikes me as interesting. TH disappears in early 1967.

TH left San Diego for MO in late April or early May 1967. He disappeared after that. Nikki Benedict was killed in San Diego county at that time in a similar manner to how CJB was murdered. In both cases, a small knife was used.



Notice from the autopsy report that Nikki had the letter "H" written on her left hand:

http://thezodiacmansonconnection.com/autop_benedict.html

It says on the left palm are:

271

277

278

H

And next to the "H" another marking, perhaps a letter, but can't be made out.

Did she write this on her hand, a note of some kind?

Or did the killer write it? If so, what does it mean?

TROY HOUGHTON HANDWRITING



Compare numbers with:




Compare G in CREIGTON with G in GUN

Sorry but totally different IMO.

How so? What's totally different?

It's not totally different... but it's not totally similar, either. Wish we had more material.

rand wrote:

How so? What's totally different?

By totally different, I mean that I see several discrepancies in writing style - more differences than matches. For a start, Z's number 2's are more like curvy and snakelike whereas Houghton's are sharper - a curve with a straight baseline. His number 3's are totally different and although we have only one number 8 from Z - it is different to all of Houghton's. Z's letter E's have a shorter middle bar whereas Houghton's have a distinctly longer middle bar. The letter R's are different as is the letter I.

In summary I would say that almost every number/letter is formed differently with only about 5% of letters/numbers being similar - even my own writing has a 50% match to Z's! As such I would never declare the handwriting as being the same man based on a 95% non-match. I must point out that this wouldn't rule him out in my book but I wouldn't consider it as positive evidence.

PS: I agree with Nacht that it would be nice to see a larger sample to make a more informed comparison.

NOTE THE DISTINCTIVE CURL AT THE END OF THESE LETTERS

ZODIAC: APRIL 30, 1967, BATES ENVELOPE



TROY HOUGHTON



NOTE HOW SIMILAR HOUGHTON LOOKS TO A. LEIGH ALLEN AND THE COMPOSITE. IT WOULD BE EASY TO MISTAKE HOUGHTON FOR ALLEN.

This card was sent by Troy Houghton to a Minutemen recruit in 1966.



It strikes me as very significant that Houghton used Greeting Cards for purposes other than greetings; and we know that Z used Greeting Cards for purposes other than greetings.

I wonder how common it is for men to use greeting cards to send to other men back in the 60's?? Surely there are some posters here who lived thru the 60's as I did. Think about it...did your male friends or family send greeting cards?

I don't think any men in my family would have looked for greeting cards to send to anyone other than a girl or wife...especially in a what was considered a traditional type home where the wife generally had the duty of such things as that. Do we know if it was Troy's handwriting on that card and envelope?

I know it sounds sexist with the way the world is now, but I know my late husband would have never shopped for or sent a greeting card to anyone other than his wife or mother back in the 70's.

I don't think it was very common, esp. for reasons that have little or nothing to do with what we associate with greeting cards.
The handwriting on the picture of the card is that of the FBI. I think I have the envelope somewhere. I'll post it when I find it.

Okay, I've done some research on this. Cook, to whom the Minutemen greeting card was sent, says that it was mailed from San Diego, Calif. in February. Here's the documentation on that (see bottom paragraph):

There is no doubt that Troy Houghton sent the card, since he was the person in charge of everything in San Diego, California. Cook also mentions his dealings with TH.

The problem is that the envelope in which the card was mailed is postmarked "Dallas":



Thoughts anyone? Perhaps this is a different greeting card? The date (Feb. 1965), however, suggests it must have been the same Greeting Card. Maybe the card was sent in a batch from San Diego to the Dallas Minutemen HQTs for recruitment purposes. And so the San Diego address would have been printed on the inside of the card where the signature would be.

If TH was Z, why did he write a letter about the movie Badlands? I think the citizen letter was a clue. The term "a citizen" suggests a American revolutionary era figure. The stamp is of Madison. Paul Revere's ride was to save Madison.
What is the clue behind Badlands?
Again, I believe it is Minuteman.
The Minutemen Nuclear Missiles were based among other places in the Badlands of South Dakota. Authorized as Badlands National Monument on March 4, 1929, it was not established until January 25, 1939. Under the Mission 66 plan, the Ben Reifel Visitor Center was constructed for the monument in 1957-58.
It was redesignated a national park on November 10, 1978. The park also administers the nearby Minuteman Missile National Historic Site.
This is from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Badlands_National_Park

Here is an excerpt from this site:
http://www.blackhillsbadlands.com/home/thingstodo/parksmonuments/nationalparks/minutemanmissilenatlhistoricsite
From this seemingly isolated patch of Midwestern prairie [South Dakota's Badlands], United States Air Force officers could have launched intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM) at targets in the Soviet Union. With the simple turn of keys, nuclear missiles would have been exchanged with the Soviet Union, making real one of the greatest fears of the 20th Century, nuclear war.

The newest profile of Zodiac by Michael Walter of the esteemed Vidocq Society is featured on Mike Rodelli's website, http://www.mikerodelli.com/index.html.
Walter concludes that Z was a power-assertive killer. Here is an excerpt:

"A power-assertive is self-indulgent, grandiose, and narcissistic, and he craves complete control over both people and things in his life. He has an insatiable appetite for stimulation, examples of which might be an obsession with drugs, fast cars, partying, skydiving, and/or womanizing, etc. He eschews emotion and views normal human interactions and feelings of love as signs of weakness and vulnerability, which he cannot allow in his life because vulnerability undermines his sense of power. He has a huge ego and is deathly afraid of “not being important.” He has a need for “glory and recognition.” He is jealous of intimacy, which he fears and has to destroy. He has a “winner take all” attitude towards life and business would also tend (due also to his aloofness and feeling of “being apart” from other people) to prefer to compete in individual sports, examples of which might be judo, skiing, golf, karate, track and field, etc.). His murders are considered “recreational,” in that he does not need to kill. He chooses to kill. And for that reason, he can stop killing if it suits his needs. This would explain Zodiac’s seemingly problematic behavior after October 1969 and the murder of Paul Stine, which is widely believed to have been his last."

This new profile perfectly fits Troy Houghton. TH was an egomaniac who needed to be in control of all situations ("I am in control of all things"). Read this interview with TH that appeared in LOOK magazine, and you'll see precisely what I mean.
Consider this: As he's being interviewed, Houghton is taping the interview. Imagine that! He won't allow the interviewer to be the only one taping the interview; he must do it as well to make sure that what he is not misquoted, etc.



Here's the entire article. Note that Poppy, the interviewer, mocks him as melodramatic (a characteristic of a narcissist). He also points out that the transcript of the interview is over 100 pages long!!! Houghton loved to hear himself talk (sound familiar?)





Houghton also had "an insatiable appetite for stimulation" and was most definitely a womanizer. He was twice convicted of indecent exposure. And here is a discussion of his womanizing:

BY GUN, BY FIRE, BY ROPE, BY KNIFE

Note that the by gun, by fire, etc. figure forms a tH for Troy Houghton.


The eyes in the card are separated into clusters and are of distinctly different sizes. This is not random, in my view, Z did it deliberately. The skeleton's arms and legs are positioned for a reason as well. I claim that Z put a pumpkin over the skeleton's genital region on the front and then added a skeleton in garrish pose on the inside without the pumpkin to depict the image of a "flasher": TH was convicted of flashing/indecent exposure twice. More generally, the purpose of the card, as it plainly says on the front, is to provide clues about his identity.

The message, I believe, is BY GUN, BY KNIFE, BY ROPE, BY FIRE, BY TROY
BY TROY

Stine murder: October 11, 1969.

Why October 11th? It was Columbus Day weekend, but not Columbus Day.
The reason Z chose Oct. 11, IMO, is that it had special significance for the Minutemen, esp. the CALIFORNIA MINUTEMEN. October 11, 1966 was the day that Johnson signed the executive order that allowed for Martial Law, the emergence of a US DICTATORSHIP, and the COMMUNIST TAKEOVER OF THE UNITED STATES. READ THIS STORY FROM THE CALIFORNIA PATRIOT (THE CA PAPER OF THE MINUTEMEN), circa 1968:

On the outside of this 1978 envelope (where the return address should be), “Zodiac” wrote in backward letters: “CIA” with the letter C reversed

Original 1978 envelope booked in LAPD custody


HOUGHTON HAD EXTENSIVE CONTACTS WITH THE CIA.

I thought about the possibility the writer meant "CIA". One Z suspect (TK) participated in CIA experiments that were quite cruel.

But if you hold that up to a mirror, I think it says "A I C", or maybe meant "A 1 C", which could mean "Airman 1st Class", or something else, or maybe nothing.

What do you make of the "ALL GOOD CHILDREN GO TO HEAVEN" reference, which is also a line from a Beatles song?

Other than that Z was a Beatles fan, which we know, I think AGCGTH refers to his Slaves in Paradice.

rand wrote:

BY GUN, BY FIRE, BY ROPE, BY KNIFE
The eyes in the card are separated into clusters and are of distinctly different sizes. This is not random, in my view, Z did it deliberately. The skeleton's arms and legs are positioned for a reason as well. I claim that Z put a pumpkin over the skeleton's genital region on the front and then added a skeleton in garrish pose on the inside without the pumpkin to depict the image of a "flasher": TH was convicted of flashing/indecent exposure twice. More generally, the purpose of the card, as it plainly says on the front, is to provide clues about his identity.

The message, I believe, is BY GUN, BY KNIFE, BY ROPE, BY FIRE, BY TROY
BY TROY

I'm reposting this because it's gotten buried and I think it's more compelling than the silence it has received. My reason is this: if any of the eye clusters or the big eye were not in the positions that Z put them, I could not have gotten TROY. And Z put BY GUN, BY ROPE, BY KNIFE, BY FIRE, so it seems consistent with his logic that he would say: BY (his identity) on the card. Moreover, the skeleton's arms and legs seem clearly to have been positioned to form the image of a "Y."

RAND said- "I'm reposting this because it's gotten buried and I think it's more compelling than the silence it has received".

We cant bump threads because they are not getting the attention you desire. You have to remember, what is interesting to me may not be of any interest to you, and vice versa. I am sure many here on this forum, including myself, posted info that they though was pretty interesting but got little response. Just keep plugging away at it.

I do agree with you about this Halloween card, that there are clues to Zodiac's ID hidden there.