Copyright 1994 Southam Inc.
The Ottawa Citizen
December 16, 1994, Friday, FINAL EDITION
SECTION: NEWS; Pg. D12
LENGTH: 301 words
HEADLINE: Serial bomber usually launches dual attacks
BYLINE: SAN FRANCISCO EXAMINER
DATELINE: San Francisco
BODY:
Investigators and crime experts who have followed the career of the mysterious Unabomber are waiting nervously for the next shoe to drop.
"These things come in pairs," said Bob Bell, a Sacramento County homicide detective who has followed the Unabom case since a fatal attack there in 1985. "I'm really waiting for the next one ... I think it's part of his twisted game."
The Unabomber -- a suspect named for a series of attacks on university officials -- has a habit of following one attack with a second bombing within two months. He has followed that pattern three times since he began placing and mailing his homemade bombs in 1978.
Those who follow the case fear the Unabomber will strike again soon in the wake of the mail-bomb attack Saturday that killed advertising executive Thomas Mosser in his New Jersey home.
"I don't know what he's going to do, but I know he's going to keep doing it, and it will be a variation on the pattern," said Michael Rey-nolds, who spent 10 months tracking the Unabomber for an article published in Playboy magazine.
Federal investigators have not commented on the possible trend. But Lou Bertram, a retired FBI agent who worked on the case, said he expected another bombing soon.
In 10 attacks since 1982, the bomber has deviated from the pairs pattern only once. That was in 1987, the only time the alleged bomber was ever seen planting a device.
In that case, a secretary in a Sacramento, California, computer firm saw a man place what turned out to be a bomb in the company parking lot. An employee who tried to clear away the object was injured in the explosion.
The Unabomber did not strike again until last year. Bertram suspects that the intense hunt that followed the 1987 sighting may have disrupted the Unabomber's pattern.