Ted Kaczynski's Montana Cabin Under Scrutiny -- FBI Working Piece By Piece

WASHINGTON - FBI agents have begun removing pieces of Unabomber suspect Ted Kaczynski's primitive Montana cabin and shipping them back to Washington for analysis at the bureau's laboratory.

As federal agents scour the country in an attempt to place Kaczynski in places associated with Unabomber attacks, scientists have begun an exhaustive forensic investigation which they believe will be critical in linking Kaczynski to a nearly 18-year bombing campaign that left three people dead and 23 injured.

The forensic work mounts as the FBI continues a tedious search of Kaczynski's 10- by 12-foot cabin in Montana, where they detained him April 3 after several weeks of surveillance.

Using X-ray machines, agents are swabbing areas of his remote cabin for chemical residues, taking apart Kaczynski's work area, lifting sections of the floor and snatching every piece of his clothing for shipment by rental truck or plane to the FBI laboratory in Washington or storage sites in Helena, Mont.

Experts in chemicals, explosives, fibers, adhesives, wood, tools, stamps, DNA, paper wrappings and typewriters will soon begin comparing items seized at the cabin with the wealth of evidence which has been amassed during nearly two decades of chasing the serial bomber.

From the tiny cabin, agents already have confiscated a partially constructed pipe bomb and a live bomb like that used in a recent Unabomber attack and are dissecting what they believe is a small

explosives factory.

FBI and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms agents have discovered bomb-design schematics, a host of chemicals, batteries and electrical wire and numerous tools associated with bomb production, court documents show.

But forensic examination is meticulous work, sometimes involving a series of tests to reach conclusive results. Based on a preliminary test, law-enforcement officials thought they could link one of two typewriters seized from the cabin to that used by the Unabomber in writing his anti-technology manifesto published by The Washington Post last fall.

Additional testing at the FBI lab has yielded conflicting results, officials said this week, noting the tests will continue.

Attorney General Janet Reno yesterday condemned press leaks concerning the case, saying they are premature and could hurt the investigation.

The department yesterday named a six-member "Unabomber suspect" team headed by Robert Cleary, a top assistant U.S. attorney for New Jersey. He will report to Merrick Garland, principal associate deputy attorney general who headed the probe of the Oklahoma City bombing.