The Son of Sam Conspiracy/The Ultimate Evil

This upcoming week marks the 41st anniversary of the Valentina Suriani/Alexander Esau murders in the Bronx.

It was a pivotal event in the SOS shootings, because it was the letter left at the scene to NYPD Captain Joe Borrelli that named, for the first time, the person responsible for the attacks as the "Son of Sam"

This has been mentioned by others in the past, but was the location and date suppose to be different based on some of the letter's information?

First, even though the prior four attacks were in the borough of Queens, the letter makes no reference to the Bronx.
The letter mentions Queens in two spots - "The wemon of Queens are z prettyist of all" and "To the people of Queens, I love you."
Yet, no mention at all of the Bronx where the eventual shooting took place (as well as only as few short blocks from the first shooting in the Bronx in July 1976)

Continuing further on in the letter, it states - "And I want to wish all of you a happy Easter."

Easter 1977 was on April 10th. The Suriani/Esau shooting was a full week later - April 17th.

It does look like an attack was planned to take place on or before Easter weekend in the borough of Queens (instead of the Bronx) based on the letter's info.

Interesting. I just read that part of T.U.E. and the author's mentioning that this looked like a shooting both postponed and relocated was, I thought, a bit of a stretch. Postponed yes, clearly it appears the letter writer anticipated delivery before Easter weekend. But I didn't take the references to Queens as definitive proof that the next hit was planned there, other than the general established pattern of four consecutive prior attacks in Queens. But more importantly, even if Terry was right on both counts, what did the postponement/relocation mean? The only explanation I could speculate is that a hit was minutes or seconds away from going down in Queens in early April, but was disrupted by the sudden appearance of an unexpected eyewitness or passing NYPD patrol car. In any case, it doesn't seem that any strong investigative leads could be generated from that scenario.

What I find highly intriguing is the close proximity between the two Bronx shootings, as well as the consecutive attacks in Forest Hills. Maybe it's nothing more than successful escapes from targeted hits made those locations ideal for random attacks in the same vicinity (although, if my memory of T.U.E. is correct, Terry believed BOTH Forest Hills attacks were targeted hits). Or maybe it was a way to taunt police, daring them to predict the next location...

The locations and proximities selected were always something intriguing about the case.

My own take is that the locations needed to have access to major roadways (for escapes) and I also believe were made to look connected and serial-related.

I also believe that the two back-to-back Forest Hills shootings were targeted or purpose hits.

The police may have been going down the right path and getting too close when they were investigating that German woman that Christine Freund had written a letter to. The letter accusing the woman of being involved with Christine's boyfriend John Diel.

Then, all of a sudden, Virginia Voskerichian is murdered a few short blocks away from where the Freund murder happened.

Before the Voskerichian shooting, police were alluding to that a connected serial shooter may be involved from the ballistics findings in the Freund shooting compared to the three prior unsolved 44 caliber shootings in the City (July 1976 - November 1976).

This may have led the people planning the shootings, to turn more towards a serial killer angle to get the police off the trail of the German woman's connections and associates in the Freund shooting.

By going back to Forest Hills and doing a shooting a few short blocks away from a prior shooting, the serial killer angle gains momentum. It looks like it worked because the police seem to drop any further investigation into the German woman and her contacts.