Potential Unabomb Juror Asks Kaczynski: ‘Did You Do That?’

SACRAMENTO — A prospective juror who claimed to know nothing about the Unabomber case sat with her mouth agape Monday as she heard the charges against Theodore Kaczynski, then stared at him and gasped, “Did you do that?”

Kaczynski stared at the woman but showed no reaction.

The woman had just been asked by Kaczynski’s lawyer, Judy Clarke, how she would feel about imposing the death penalty on a person who mailed bombs with the intent of killing the recipients. The woman then turned to Clarke and repeated her inquiry, saying: “Is that what he’s done?”

The unusually combative jury candidate repeatedly asked the lawyers for explanations, rather than giving answers. She was allowed to remain on the tentative jury panel despite her declaration that “I don’t want to be on this case.”

“I don’t know anything about it. I don’t want to know anything about it,” she said.

The woman said she purposely insulates herself from all news.

“I don’t want the knowledge, the garbage,” she said. “It’s garbage coming through the television.”

Kaczynski, 55, a former math teacher turned Montana hermit, is alleged to have spent nearly 18 years in the wilderness constructing explosive devices and sending them through the mail to protest the dominance of technology in modern society. He is charged in the deaths of two Sacramento men and the wounding of two San Francisco Bay Area academics.

Kaczynski was identified as the most likely suspect by his brother, David, who has since come into conflict with the government over Atty. Gen. Janet Reno’s decision to seek the death penalty if Kaczynski is convicted.

David Kaczynski’s lawyer said Monday his client has left his home in upstate New York and is driving to Sacramento.

“He’s on his way, driving 3,000 miles cross-country to save his brother,” said attorney Anthony Bisceglie of Washington, D.C.

As the third week of jury selection began, qualification of prospective jurors slowed to a crawl as, one-by-one, panelists acknowledged that they could not give the defendant a fair trial.

“I have my mind pretty well made up that this person is guilty,” said one prospect, who said he couldn’t change that opinion.

By day’s end Monday, 36 prospective jurors had survived the first round of questions.