Kaczynski Brings Trial To Standstill Accused Unabomber Complains About Defense Team, Presence Of His Brother In The Courtroom

With his tearful mother and younger brother watching from the front row, accused Unabomber Theodore Kaczynski brought his trial to an abrupt halt Monday by demanding to air complaints about his attorneys and possibly his brother’s very presence in the courtroom.

Apparently caught off guard, U.S. District Judge Garland E. Burrell Jr. immediately ordered Kaczynski and his court-appointed defenders into a closed-door session.

After meeting with the defense in private for 4-1/2 hours, Burrell announced that he is delaying the trial until Thursday, hoping to resolve the Montana recluse’s apparent rift with his attorneys.

The former University of California at Berkeley math professor took center stage Monday even before the jury could be seated to hear opening statements. About 8 a.m., Kaczynski, 55, sporting a neatly trimmed beard, a cream-colored sweater, striped shirt and blue pants and carrying a manila envelope, strode purposefully to the defense table. The table was covered with legal pads and several packs of Lifesavers.

Kaczynski, who has pleaded not guilty to murder-by-bombing charges, seemed to look past his 80-year-old mother, Wanda, and younger brother David, whose arm was draped over their mother’s shoulder in comfort.

It was a dramatic moment that riveted the courtroom.

Neither had seen Theodore for at least a decade, if not longer. It was David, 47, a social worker in upstate New York, who played the crucial role leading to his brother’s arrest. David tipped off the FBI that his brother’s views paralleled the Unabomber’s anti-technology manifesto published in 1995 in The New York Times and The Washington Post.

It was unclear whether Theodore knew his estranged relatives would be spectators in the courtroom. However, The Associated Press quoted an anonymous source saying the closed-door meeting was in part sparked by Theodore’s objections to his brother being in the courtroom.

In a halting voice, the defendant drew the judge’s attention. “Your honor,” Kaczynski said, speaking for one of the few times in open court, “before we begin I’d like to read something I’ve written. It’s very important.

“I haven’t stood up because I’m under orders from the marshals not to stand up,” declared Kacyznski, who until now had only given brief responses in courtroom appearances.

Burrell, appearing surprised, said that since his courtroom was jammed with 100 or so spectators, he wanted to quickly ask the defense into his private chambers for a confidential discussion.

Reporters and spectators milled about the courtroom, with David and Wanda Kaczynski the focus of attention in the high-security setting of the John Moss Federal Building a few blocks from the state Capitol.

Across the courtroom aisle were the wife and 18-year-old son of Gilbert Murray, a timber industry executive who was slain in a 1995 Unabomber blast at his Sacramento office.

There was no public contact between the families, with some of the victims or intended victims occasionally casting a wary eye toward the two Kaczynskis.

Also in the audience were Yale University computer scientist David Gelernter, wearing a black glove on a hand injured in a 1993 Unabomber blast, and University of California, San Francisco, geneticist Charles Epstein, also maimed in a 1993 attack.

After the court session Monday, FBI chaplain Mark O’Sullivan, speaking on behalf of Murray’s widow, Connie, and her family, said Kaczynski’s words “caught everyone off guard.”

He said they were disappointed and frustrated that the trial was delayed but they would patiently wait for the proceedings to unfold.

The unpredictability of the proceedings illustrates the defense lawyers’ dilemma - how to handle a client they believe is mentally ill but who refuses to allow a mental defense.

Federal prosecutors, who were barred from the private meeting, did little to hide their dismay over the turn of events. “We want this firmly and finally resolved before this jury is sworn,” lead prosecutor Robert Cleary told Burrell.

Outside the courtroom, one prosecution source acknowledged that, even before court convened Monday, the government had been worried that Kaczynski - who faces the death penalty - might pull something “squirrelly.”

The primary dispute seems to revolve around Kaczynski’s relationship with his attorneys, Judy Clarke and Quin Denvir. It was strained when the defenders sought to mount a mental-defects defense.

Burrell scheduled the jury to reassemble for the trial Thursday morning.