Unabomber Ted Kaczynski, 83, “died by suicide” in North Carolina federal prison cell
- Kaczynski was found dead in his cell at a federal penitentiary in North Carolina
- According to sources familiar with the situation, he died by suicide
Domestic terrorist “Unabomber” Ted Kaczynski “died by suicide” in his cell at federal prison, according to insiders familiar with the situation.
Kaczynski was found dead in his cell at a federal prison in North Carolina around 8 a.m. He was 81 years old.
While the official cause of death was not released, sources say he committed suicide, reports The New York Times.
Ted Kaczynski (pictured) was behind a 17-year string of mail bombs that killed three and wounded 23 others
After being disgraced by 16 bombings during his 17-year reign of terror, Kaczynski received a life sentence without the possibility of parole when he was finally caught in 1996.
Kaczynski was captured after a year-long manhunt led him to a primitive cabin in the woods of western Montana where he built the explosives he used to kill three people and injure 23 others between 1978 and 1995.
He had been transferred to the North Carolina federal prison’s medical facility after spending two decades in a supermax federal prison in Colorado.
Kaczynski was a Harvard-educated mathematician who later retired to the Montana wilderness after believing that technology would spell the end of civilization.
He carried out a sinister plan to detonate explosives at universities and airports, which he often mailed to his victims.
Years before the 9/11 attacks and the anthrax shipments, the Unabomber’s deadly homemade bombs changed the way Americans shipped packages and boarded airplanes, and in July 1995 even virtually shut down West Coast air travel.
He published a 35,000-word manifesto entitled “Industrial Society and Its Future,” in which he asserted that modern society was plagued by the increasing role of technology in everyday life.
While the fear he fomented prompted the Washington Post and New York Times to make the painful decision to publish the manifesto in September 1995, it ultimately led to his downfall.
Kaczynski’s brother David and David’s wife Linda Patrik recognized the bizarre belief system in the tape and tipped off the FBI.
The tip led to the end of the country’s longest-running manhunt, and in April 1996, authorities found him in a 10-by-14-foot log cabin outside of Lincoln, Montana.