Utah
Unabomber, who died Saturday, attempted 4 bombings with ties to Utah
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SALT LAKE CITY — Theodore “Ted” Kaczynski, more commonly known as the “Unabomber,” died in federal prison Saturday at age 81.
Kaczynski received four life sentences plus 30 years for committing 16 bombings between 1978 and 1995, which killed three people and injured 23 others. Four of those bombings have ties back to Utah.
University of Utah, 1981
On Oct. 8, 1981, a University of Utah student who worked as a maintenance worker found a homemade bomb Kaczynski had planted outside a Milton Bennion Hall classroom. A bomb squad from Fort Douglas defused the bomb.
The FBI met with University of Utah professor Harold Bauman three times to try to determine if Kaczynski had been in one of Bauman’s classes, but Bauman didn’t recognize him.
“Investigators said they are certain that the Unabom subject was either enrolled at academic investigations in the Chicago, Salt Lake City or Berkeley area, or had some ties to universities there,” the FBI said in a statement.
University of Utah and Brigham Young University, 1982
On May 5, 1982, in Nashville, Tennessee, Vanderbilt University professor Patrick C. Fisher received a package in the mail containing a bomb. The return address belonged to a University of Utah professor and was mailed from Brigham Young University, but was later identified as having been sent by Kaczynski.
Fisher’s secretary, Janet Smith, opened the package and was injured by the bomb’s detonation. She received severe wounds to her face and shrapnel wounds to her body.
University of Utah, 1985
On Nov. 15, 1985, University of Michigan professor James McConnell received a letter, as well as a package containing a bomb but disguised as a thesis manuscript, at his home in Ann Arbor, Michigan. The items were supposedly from Ralph Kloppenburg, a doctoral candidate at the University of Utah.
According to the University of Utah’s registrar’s office, no Ralph Kloppenburg ever attended the university. Kloppenburg was an alias used by Kaczynski.
McConnell’s research assistant, Nicklaus Suino, opened the package and received burns and shrapnel wounds from the explosion. McConnell also received temporary hearing loss from the explosion.
Salt Lake City computer store, 1987
On Feb. 20, 1987, two employees at CAAMs Inc., a computer rental store in Salt Lake City, saw Kaczynski put a wooden device in an empty parking space in the parking lot behind the store.
Later that morning, store owner Gary Wright picked up the box, thinking it was trash to be thrown away. When he did so, it detonated, throwing him about 22 feet, he told KSL.
Wright received severe nerve damage to his left arm, and underwent a dozen surgeries to recover from the damage caused by the bomb’s shrapnel.
“I feel lucky to at least be telling the story,” Wright said in 2020.
Wright eventually became friends with Kaczynski’s brother David, who had reached out to apologize on behalf of his family, and the two later traveled the country to share a message of forgiveness.