Benicia -- -- Just inside Benicia's city limits, tucked in one of the winding coils of Lake Herman Road, is a small turnout that was once a scene of bloody carnage.

"Nothing has changed here," said Tom Voigt, founder of www.ZodiacKiller.com, as he surveyed the gravel floor, the pristine rolling hills and the shadowy face of Mt. Diablo across the fields and waterways.

It was in that picturesque turnout that the mysterious Zodiac killer -- perhaps Vallejo's most notorious son (if the unknown killer is actually a male) -- began a killing spree that gripped the Bay Area in fearful paranoia during the late 1960s and early 1970s.

Attacks attributed to the elusive Zodiac killer spanned at least Solano, Napa and San Francisco counties. The alleged serial killer sent encrypted messages to several newspapers, including the Times-Herald.

By the time the high-profile case faded with the public hysteria, at least five people were killed and two wounded. Authorities remain perplexed at the mysterious killer's identity.

And it's that mystery that drives Voigt, 44, who was just 1 year old when the slayings began.

"God, I hope they ID him in my lifetime," said Voigt, standing just on the other side of barbed wire fence and a "No Trespassing" sign that has been graffitied with the Zodiac's infamous cross-hair symbol.

The case remains open in the Vallejo Police Department, which maintains an active Zodiac crime tips link on its website.

Voigt, who lives in Portland, Ore., regularly makes trips to the Bay Area to chase the clues he thinks could lead to the unmasking of the Zodiac killer. His current "tour" ends today A sleuth at heart, Voigt finds himself regularly trying to separate credible tips from off-the-wall ideas.

One woman recently contacted him to tell him she had obtained a ceiling tile blown off by Hurricane Ike. In it, she could see the face of Jesus, the devil -- and the Zodiac killer.

"I've met some really interesting people; I've met some certifiably insane people," Voigt said.

Voigt -- a tall man with thick-rimmed glasses, a backward Giants baseball cap and a scruffy and salted beard -- hopes to preserve all the data and clues relevant to the case on his website just in case ("God forbid") the Zodiac killer cannot be found before Voigt dies.

His website averages about 5 million hits a month -- a number that dramatically jumped to nearly 40 million immediately after the 2007 Jake Gyllenhaal flick "Zodiac" came out. Some of ZodiacKiller.com's regular visitors are from Iceland, Voigt said.

"They've never left Iceland, but they can tell you everything about the Zodiac killer," he said, demonstrating the lure of the case years after first slayings.

Voigt, like so many countless others, remains convinced the Zodiac case will be solved one day.

"The Zodiac could still be alive. That could be him driving down right now," he said, watching a car disappear behind a turn in the road.