SAN FRANCISCO - An unusual online auction of Unabomber Ted Kaczynski's personal items ended Thursday, yielding about $190,000 for his victims and their family members.
The Unabomber set off explosions over the years that killed three and injured 23 across the country.
Kaczynski's personal journals fetched $40,676; the iconic hooded sweatshirt and sunglasses depicted in sketch artist renderings brought $20,025, and his handwritten "manifesto" brought $20,053. Other popular items: $22,003 for the Smith Corona typewriter used to write manifestoes sent to newspapers and later seized from his cabin, and $17,780 for his autobiography.
The manifesto laid out Kaczynski's belief that modern technology was eroding human freedoms and that his bombings were necessary to spark a revolution. The pursuit of Kaczynski became one of the longest and costliest investigations in the FBI's history.
The auction was a culmination of a seven-year legal battle designed to block Kaczynski from regaining ownership of the property seized from his remote Montana cabin during a 1996 raid. He was sentenced in 1998 to life in prison.
Kaczynski, representing himself in court, demanded return of the property so he could donate it to the University of Michigan, his alma mater. But because Kaczynski was ordered to pay his victims $15 million, the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ordered the property auctioned.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
