But what is the true significance of those guns?  Ownership of several pistols is not prima facie proof of evil intent.  Four of the five guns Zeigler kept in the store had been there for a year and a half or more, and they were no secret.  Indeed, choosing to commit murder in a place where one is known to have kept weapons is yet another instance in which Zeigler, according to the state's theory, seems to have deliberately chosen to create suspicion.

Let's examine some of the implications of the state's theory about the handguns.

Assume that Zeigler did ask Frank Smith to buy hot guns, and that he believed that two RG revolvers were untraceable, and that he wanted to commit murder.  Those two weapons, the RG revolvers, were most useful to him if he used them to kill his first three victims: Eunice, Perry Edwards, and Virginia Edwards.  Ballistics tests would show that the "robbers" had used these two unknown guns.  This would be even more credible if he disposed of the two guns. (He must have had the chance to do so, according to the state, since he apparently got rid of the rubber gloves and the Dunaway raincoat.)  The absence of those guns would strongly suggest that one or more of the robbers had escaped with the murder weapons.  In fact, if Zeigler did dispose of those two weapons, they wouldn't even have to be untraceable.

In any case, it would be crucial that he kill his first three victims with the two RG revolvers, not with any of the six weapons that could be traced directly to him.

The ballistics results do show that one of the RG revolvers killed Eunice, and that one or both inflicted the original gunshot wounds in the Edwardses.  But then in spite of the fact that one of the "unknown" guns was still perfectly functional, Zeigler must have decided to use a third weapon to inflict the shots that killed each of the Edwardses. He decided to use a gun of his own: not even one of the store guns, but one that at some point he must have brought in from the truck—the Securities .38.  That gun couldn't have been in the store by accident. Someone had to have brought it there.

Thus, according to the state's theory, Zeigler deliberately introduced to the murder scene a weapon that could be traced directly to him, the presence of which could not be explained.  Then he must have deliberately chosen it to commit two murders.  And he must have done so after days of forethought and planning.

Furthermore, since at least eight empty cartridges from that gun were found, it must have been fired until empty, and reloaded, then fired at least twice more, and then emptied again.  (There were no spent cartridges in the gun when Edward Williams turned it over to the police.)

Why should Zeigler use one of his own guns to kill?  And of all the guns he owned, why that one, the one he would least be able to explain?  If he insisted on killing his in-laws with one of his own weapons, why not one of the five that were