In the summer of 1993, a wave of fear that had sporadically gripped New York City for three years found its way to a quiet corner of Highland Park. It was there, on July 20, that Joseph Diacone, a 40-year-old man, became the final murder victim of a serial killer who styled himself after San Francisco's infamous Zodiac. The series of random, brutal attacks had left New Yorkers on edge, and Joseph’s death was a tragic culmination of a killer’s deadly obsession.
Joseph, who was
reportedly homeless at the time, was in the park straddling the border of Brooklyn and Queens around 11:35 in the morning. In a sudden, violent encounter, he was shot in the head at close range. The attack was as senseless as it was swift, leaving another life extinguished in a string of crimes that seemed to have no clear motive beyond a twisted desire for infamy. Joseph's death was one of three fatalities attributed to the man who called himself "The New York Zodiac Killer."
The killer was Heriberto Seda, also known as Eddie, a reclusive and unemployed high school dropout who was deeply obsessed with astrology and the original Zodiac Killer. Beginning in 1990, Seda embarked on a violent spree, shooting and stabbing people he selected based on their astrological signs. He terrorized the city in two distinct phases, first in 1990 and then again from 1992 to 1993. Like his California predecessor, Seda taunted the police and the press, sending cryptic letters to the New York Post boasting of his crimes. In one letter sent in August 1994, he specifically claimed responsibility for the attack on Joseph Diacone, whom some reports identified as a Virgo, along with several others.
For years, the New York Police Department hunted the elusive killer. The attacks were difficult to connect at first, happening across different boroughs with long gaps in between. The killer used homemade firearms called "zip guns," which made ballistic analysis challenging. Investigators had a fingerprint from one crime scene and DNA from a stamp on one of Seda's letters, but no suspect to match them to. The case grew cold after the fall of 1993, and the city held its breath, hoping the killer's reign of terror was over.
The break in the case came not from the sprawling homicide investigation, but from a domestic dispute nearly three years after Joseph's murder. On June 18, 1996, Seda, then 28, got into a violent argument with his half-sister and her boyfriend in their East New York apartment. He shot his sister, and the ensuing standoff with police led to his arrest. While taking his confession for the shooting, an astute detective recognized that the symbols Seda used in his written statement matched those in the Zodiac letters.
This crucial observation unraveled the entire case. Seda's fingerprints were matched to the print found at one of the 1990 crime scenes, and his DNA was a match to the saliva on the stamp sent to the Post. He confessed to the string of attacks that had haunted the city for years. Investigators learned that Seda, who lived with his mother and sister, was inspired to kill after watching a television special about the original Zodiac Killer.
In 1998, Heriberto Seda faced justice for his crimes. Following a six-week trial in Queens, a jury found him guilty of three counts of second-degree murder, including that of Joseph Diacone, and multiple counts of attempted murder and weapons possession. He was sentenced to 232 years in prison, ensuring he would never again walk free.
The capture and conviction of Heriberto Seda closed a terrifying chapter in New York City's history. For the families of his victims, it brought a measure of resolution, but it could never erase the pain of their loss. Joseph Diacone, a man facing his own struggles, was tragically and randomly targeted, his life cut short by a killer's cruel fixation on death and notoriety. His murder remains a somber reminder of the vulnerability of life in the face of motiveless violence.
