This episode contains graphic descriptions of violence. Please be advised.

I'm kind of like an obsessive true crime enthusiast. Even more so now that I'm retired,

but when I was on the job, I really got into these cases.

That's retired Deputy Chief Joseph Herbert. He joined the NYPD in 1981. In his 36 years on the job,

he cracked a lot of cases in some of Brooklyn's toughest neighborhoods. He earned the department's

Medal of Valor in 1985, made detective in 1986. The summer of 1990, he followed the Zodiac

story in the papers and even got a chance to run down a lead for the investigation.

Whenever leads came in, that took them to different parts of the city. Sometimes they would

form out the lead to the local squad. So I was sitting in the eight-four squad and I get a lead

from the Zodiac test force. Someone had called up in the Clinton Hill area and they noticed

a large Zodiac design that covered many backyards. Herbert and his partner checked it out.

You know, we were excited to start participating in the Zodiac case and we went up on the roof and

the one showed us what she was talking about. And what it was is a very large circle, like maybe 30,

40 feet in diameter. Someone, probably an artist, had created a Zodiac and a circle, a Zodiac symbol

using nose papers. The backyard masterpiece might have been odd, but it was harmless. When you're

investigating a Zodiac killer and I'm sure they counted this in California was up with the

original Zodiac because people so interested in the astrology in the Zodiac. They bombard you with

leads. They meanwhile, but they consume your time. A few years later, Joseph Herbert would find

himself at the center of the Zodiac case. It would be time for him to set aside the true crime books

and dig into the case files. He had a serial killer to catch.

I'm retired Detective Sergeant Wally Zions and you're listening to Break in a Case, a true crime

podcast written and produced by the New York City Police Department and supported by the New

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