(2 of 3)
The Unabomber's first four attacks were in Illinois and included a 1979 explosion in the cargo hold of an American Airlines flight en route from Chicago to Washington that caused 12 injuries from smoke inhalation. The only known sighting of him took place in 1987, when he left a concealed bomb outside a Salt Lake City computer store. A witness there helped police fashion their composite sketch of a white man now in his late 30s or early 40s, nearly 6 ft. tall, with fair hair, a thin mustache and glasses. Then the bomber vanished for more than six years, leading some authorities to speculate that he may have been in prison or a psychiatric facility. In June 1993 he re- emerged when a bomb injured Charles Epstein, a geneticist at the University of California at San Francisco. Two days later, Yale computer scientist David Gelernter was seriously wounded in the blast from a package sent to his New Haven office. The same day as the Yale attack, the New York Times received a letter that predicted both bombings, saying, "We are an anarchist group calling ourselves FC. We will give information about our goals at some future time." (Eleven of the bombs have contained metal parts, designed to survive the explosion, inscribed "F.C.")
Though investigators have been sifting the evidence in search of some sort of pattern, one of the more disturbing aspects to the case is, in fact, the lack of a real pattern. Only about half of the packages have been mailed to specific individuals; the others have been left outside for curious passersby to find. In 1985 Hugh Scrutton was killed when he stepped out the back door of his RenTech Computer Rental store in Sacramento, California, and picked up a crumpled paper bag lying on the ground.
The number of victims involved with high technology prompted some speculation that the bomber might have lost a job to automation -- and that F.C. might stand for "f--- computers." But not all of the bombs have these initials, just as not all of the targets have received an advance call or letter telling them to expect a package. (The FBI has denied reports that Mosser received such a call the day before his death.) And although Y&R has such companies as Digital Equipment and Xerox as clients, investigators are not convinced that Mosser -- who was recently cited in the New York Times for his promotion -- was targeted for a computer-related reason.
The most information has come from the bombs themselves. Bit by blown-up bit, FBI investigators have pieced together a psychological profile of their prey. They can tell by the handmade wooden boxes and by the tiny, handcrafted screws that he is a meticulous, even compulsive, man. He spends hours, they say, cutting, filing and whittling little bits of metal and wood, removing any hints of their origin. According to retired FBI bomb expert James Ronay, the bomber also assembles and disassembles the whole thing several times before he is through. He has "an uncontrollable urge to fool with this thing as much as possible," Ronay explains. "And ultimately you put it down and have it kill somebody -- that's your ultimate gratification. He's leaving a little of himself at each crime scene."