Crimes of the Times

Could the Black Dahlia and Zodiac killings share a common motive? Amateur sleuth Alex Baber, along with two former LAPD detectives, believes the murders were committed by the same individual nearly 20 years apart. In this episode, a former FBI profiler breaks down the psychology behind both cases, examining where they diverge and where they might overlap.

Marvin Margolis was a promising early suspect in the Black Dahlia murder, but he managed to slip through the cracks. So who was this man of many pseudonyms? In this episode, we’ll explore what Margolis did during and after the Dahlia investigation, and a key piece of evidence that potentially links both the Dahlia and Zodiac cases.

The identity of the Zodiac Killer has remained a mystery for decades, but new developments may finally point to an answer. At the center is the infamous Z13 cipher, a 13-character code sent to the San Francisco Chronicle that has long defied experts. Self-taught codebreaker Alex Baber used artificial intelligence and exhaustive analysis to narrow millions of possibilities down to a single name. As his theory gained traction, former detectives and intelligence experts began testing its credibility. The result is a provocative possibility: the name hidden in the cipher may also belong to the man behind another infamous California murder — the Black Dahlia.

On this season of Crimes of the Times, Los Angeles Times journalist Christopher Goffard explores criminal cases that have left a mark on California history. This season’s stories include new developments in the Black Dahlia and Zodiac cases, the snitch scandal that rocked Orange County, the plight of the Japanese American woman known as Tokyo Rose, and the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy.

LA Times Studios producers are excited to share a new podcast from our friends at Pushkin -- Valley of Shadows -- A new true crime podcast that digs into a nearly 30-year old secret buried in the California desert. On June 11, 1998, Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Deputy Jon Aujay set out for a run in California’s Devil’s Punchbowl park — and never came back. Aujay has yet to be found. The Sheriff’s Department rules Aujay’s disappearance a suicide, but friends, family, and fellow deputies insist the story doesn’t add up. Instead, they believe Aujay may have stumbled into the Mojave Desert’s criminal underworld — where outlaw biker gangs crank out methamphetamine and local cops operate on both sides of the law. Through exclusive interviews, revealing wiretaps, and buried police files, journalists Hayley Fox and Betsy Shepherd explore one of Southern California’s most mysterious missing person cases. In Valley of Shadows, they ask: What is the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department hiding? Find Valley of Shadows wherever you get podcasts.