On April 3, 1996, the news media reported that Unabomber suspect Theodore Kaczynski had been arrested.
The Unabomber used mail bombs during the previous 17 years to kill three people and injure 29.
In 1995 he agreed to desist from terrorist activities if the Washington Post or The New York Times published a copy of his manifesto.
On September 19th, 1995, the publishers of the Times and Post issued a joint statement explaining why they decided to publish his manuscript. Although the full document only appeared in the Post, both newspapers shared the cost.
The Unabomber trial began in November 1997. Kaczynski plead guilty in exchange for life in prison.
This story excerpt comes from the April 4, 1996 edition of the Seattle Times:
“LINCOLN, Mont. — For years, locals called him ‘the hermit.’ Yet, in an odd sort of way, the man now suspected of being the Unabomber seemed to fit in just fine with the people of Lincoln, Mont.
When Ted John Kaczynski, 53, was taken into custody yesterday for his possible connection to deadly bombings since 1978, many residents of this rural town were surprised to learn his real name.
For at least 10 years, they knew him only as ‘the hermit’ — the disheveled, silent man who lived in a one-room cabin and rode his clunker bicycle into town every few weeks.
….Bob Armstrong, a retired salesman, said ‘nobody seemed to know much about him,’ commenting only on the fact that he was always on a bicycle and ‘dressed real ragged.’ ‘I find it hard to fathom,’ he said, that Kaczynski might be a serial bomber….”
Page one news from the Salina (Kansas) Journal:
Here is the September 19, 1995 statement by the publishers of The Washington Post and New York Times:
Statement by Donald E. Graham and Arthur O. Sulzberger Jr.:
“For three months The Washington Post and The New York Times have jointly faced the demand of a person known as the Unabomber that we publish a manuscript of about 35,000 words. If we failed to do so, the author of this document threatened to send a bomb to an unspecified destination ‘with intent to kill.’
From the beginning, the two newspapers have consulted closely on the issue of whether to publish under the threat of violence. We have also consulted law enforcement officials. Both the Attorney General and the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation have now recommended that we print this document for public safety reasons, and we have agreed to do so.
Therefore, copies of the Unabomber’s unaltered manuscript are being distributed in today’s Washington Post. The decision to print was made jointly by the two newspapers, and we will split the costs of publishing. It is being printed in The Post, which has the mechanical ability to distribute a separate section in all copies of its daily paper.”
— “Statement by Papers’ Publishers”
Washington Post’s 1995 special report about the manifesto
and the Unabomber trial
(The special report includes the manifesto.)
The following CNN video describes how the capture of the Unabomber relied on information from Theodore Kaczynski’s brother. (See Also: The network’s 1997 online special report.)
