Who was Ted Kaczynski? The 'twisted genius' who went rogue to become 'Unabomber'

Ted Kaczynski, the widely described "twisted genius" who came to be known as the 'Unabomber' when he carried out a 17-year spree of mysterious bombings, died on Saturday at the age of 81.

Kaczynski’s activities baffled the FBI for years,killed three people and injured 23 othersduring a mass mail-bombing spree between 1978 and 1995 andevadedcapture for almost 20 years.

He made and sent many of his bombs while living in a forest cabin in rural Montana. On Saturday, he was found unresponsive in Butner, North Carolin, and was pronounced dead at a local hospital.

"He is dead," Kristie Breshears, a spokesperson for the Federal Bureau of Prisons, was quoted as saying by Reuters.

Ted Kaczynski attended Harvard University and was a loner since childhood. He targeted academics, scientists and computer store owners and tried to blow up a commercial airliner in a self-driven terror campaign for 17 years between 1978 and 1995.

He targeted what he believed were the evils of modern technology.

Ted Kaczynski: How did he come to be known as Unabomber?

Kaczunski frustrated police, whohad no clues to the killer's identity,for years anddubbed his case UNABOM, for University and Airline Bombings, and that in turn earned him the moniker 'Unabomber'.

A breakthrough came when Kaczynski released a 35,000-word manifesto entitled "Industrial Society and Its Future" published in the media in September 1995.

Ted Kaczynski: How was he caught?

Kaczynski’s whereabouts were tipped off by his younger brother. He tipped off the police that the ideas of the 35,000-word manifesto sounded like those of Kaczynski.

Agents arrested the 'Unabomber' at his cabin in April 1996.

After rejecting his lawyers' attempts to have him plead insanity, Kaczynski pleaded guilty to all federal charges relating to the bombings in 1998 and a California court sentenced him to four life terms plus 30 years in prison.

Described by the FBI as "a twisted genius who aspires to be the perfect, anonymous killer," Kaczynski was sent to ADX Florence, a "supermax" prison in Florence, Colorado. He was transferred to the North Carolina facility in 2021.

Theodore John Kaczynski was born on May 22, 1942, in Chicago to working class Polish-American parents. He was a bright, quiet child who graduated from high school aged 15 and won a scholarship to Harvard University where he studied mathematics.

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"He wasn't exactly gregarious, but he was extremely articulate," Dale Eickelman, Kaczynski's friend in his early high school years, told the Daily Southtown newspaper in Chicago after Kaczynski's arrest.

"I remember Ted was very good at chemistry.I remember Ted had the know-how of putting together things like batteries, wire leads, potassium nitrate and whatever, and creating explosions" at the age of 12 and 13, Eickelman said.

Ted Kaczynski: Product of Harvard’s infamous stress experiment?

Kaczynski is deemed a polarising figure in the United States’ scientific community. It is not exactly known what led him to pursue the bombings. But his supporters say that Ted’s participation in an infamous science experiment at Harvard may have been one reason.

There, psychologists subjected volunteer students, including Kaczynski, to hours of extreme verbal and emotional abuse as part of an attempt to measure how people handled stress. The experiment, now regarded as unethical, lasted three years.

(With inputs from agencies)

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