Theodore “Ted” Kaczynski, known as “The Unabomber,” has died in federal prison, a Bureau of Prisons spokesperson told The Associated Press on Saturday.
Kaczynski was found dead in a federal prison in North Carolina around 8 a.m. The cause of death was initially unknown.
After spending two decades in a superfederal prison in Colorado following a series of bombings targeting scientists, he was transferred to a medical facility at a federal prison in North Carolina.
Kaczynski was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole after being arrested in 1996 at the cabin where he lived in western Montana. He admitted to carrying out 16 bomb attacks in different parts of the country between 1978 and 1995, killing three people and injuring 23.
In 1971, Kaczynski moved to an isolated cabin with no electricity or running water near Lincoln, Montana, where he lived as a hermit and learned survival skills to support himself. After witnessing the destruction of the wilderness around his cabin, he concludes that living in nature has become impossible and decides to fight against industrialization and its destruction of nature through terrorism. In 1979, Kaczynski was the subject of the longest and most expensive investigation in FBI history until his arrest. Before his identity was revealed, the FBI used the case identifier UNABOM (University and Airline Bomber), leading the media to dub him “Unabomber”.
In 1995, Kaczynski sent a letter to The New York Times promising he would “avoid terrorism” if his manifesto was published in The New York Times or The Washington Post, saying his bombings were extreme but important to concerns. concerning the erosion of human life. freedom and dignity are guaranteed by modern technologies that require large-scale organization. The FBI and Attorney General Janet Reynolds lobbied for publication of the article, which appeared in The Washington Post in September 1995. When Kaczynski’s brother David read it, he recognized the prose style and reported his suspicions to the FBI. Kaczynski, who was arrested in 1996, claimed to be sane and tried to fire his public defenders because they wanted him to avoid the death penalty for insanity. He pleaded guilty to all charges in 1998 and was sentenced to eight consecutive life sentences without the possibility of parole.
