The Unabomber
The “Unabomber” terrorist Ted Kaczynski injured 23 people and killed three more using homemade bombs from 1978 to 1995. Kaczynski pled guilty to all federal charges including murder just after his 1998 trial began: though Dietz was unable to interview him before that for federal prosecutors, the psychiatrist did read his journals, interview those who knew him, and review all of the evidence gathered by investigators. Kaczynski’s writings, he said in an interview with The New Yorker magazine, “scream geek, not schizophrenic,” contrary to the defense team’s psychiatric evaluation of Kaczynski as a paranoid schizophrenic. “They’re full of strong emotions, considerable anger, and an elaborate, closely reasoned system of belief about the adverse impact of technology on society,” Dietz said. “The question always is: Is that belief system philosophy or is it delusion? The answer has more to do with the ideology of the psychiatrist than with anything else.”
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