Zombie process

[yeehaa]

lately i've been seeing
$this->bbcode_second_pass_code('', 'Tasks: 55 total, 1 running, 53 sleeping, 0 stopped, 1 zombie')
in my Top.

so i did "ps waux" and found that
$this->bbcode_second_pass_code('', 'root 25800 0.0 0.0 0 0 ? Zs 19:01 0:00 [run-parts] <defunct>')

Did a search on google and saw some posts about cron jobs calling a script file with a "." in their name could cause this.. i just have one cron process.. for root and all the users i created..
$this->bbcode_second_pass_code('', '[root@alarm ~]# crontab -l
15 7 1,15 * * /root/backupscpt')

any ideas? the zombie process goes away after a restart and comes back within 24 hours..