Handwriting

Unabomber suspect Theodore J. Kaczynski may be required to provide additional handwriting samples to federal prosecutors seeking to authenticate journals seized when he was arrested last year at his Montana cabin. Over objections by Kaczynski's lawyers, U.S. Magistrate Gregory G. Hollows on Thursday indicated that he is leaning toward requiring the former UC Berkeley mathematics professor to provide a limited number of writing samples.

Federal prosecutors said Wednesday they have a "bona fide need" for new handwriting samples from Unabomber suspect Theodore Kaczynski, beyond the scores of letters to his brother already in the government's possession. The U.S. attorney's office said it needs newly written examples of Kaczynski's printing and writing to compare with materials seized at his Montana cabin, where Kaczynski was arrested April 3.

Please note an inaccuracy in the otherwise excellent Jan. 26 story on handwriting, "Write of Passage." You state incorrectly that the Zaner-Bloser Co., which publishes handwriting materials, has this year dropped loops from its cursive handwriting texts. Although Zaner-Bloser did indeed drop certain ornamental loops from some cursive capitals, there are still a multitude of loops (and other complications) remaining in both the lower and uppercase of Zaner-Bloser cursive (as well as Scott-Foresman D'Nealian and similar models)

Red stimulants work much better than the same medicine in a green pill, and blue tranquilizers are more effective than yellow ones. Physicians' handwriting is no worse than that of other executives. Smoking causes baldness. Blowing up too many balloons can be hard on your lungs. Those who attend concerts live longer.

It was 55 years ago and in another country: Argentina, where I was raised. Each fall, there was the gleam of the school year starting, with crisp textbooks, clean binders and a new book bag. There was quiet apprehension--will the fourth-grade teacher be harsh or gentle, sour or cheerful; will she look nice? What will her handwriting be like? Her handwriting, yes.

When the police found Ghislaine Marchal's body sprawled in the basement of her hilltop villa here on the Cote d'Azur, the identity of a prime suspect was hard to miss. Written in blood on a wall were the words: Omar m'a tuer (Omar to kill me). And, lo and behold, the wealthy widow's gardener was named Omar Raddad. Had someone tried to frame the gardener? Or had the 65-year-old victim, dying from a dozen stab wounds, summoned the strength to identify her killer?

Handwritten changes to the manuscript of the novel "Primary Colors," the wildly successful satire of the 1992 Clinton campaign by an author known only as "Anonymous," appear to match the handwriting of Newsweek columnist and CBS commentator Joe Klein.

Responding to a court order, murder suspect Diana J. Haun gave police and prosecutors a handwriting sample Thursday in the investigation of the kidnap-slaying of Ventura homemaker Sherri Dally. At the same time, the victim's husband, Michael Dally, also identified as a suspect by law enforcement sources, voluntarily spent three hours with investigators, police said.

Better take that baseball signed by former President Ronald Reagan off the mantelpiece and give it a good look. The owner of a Canoga Park pawnshop and a former U.S. Secret Service agent have been indicted by a federal grand jury for allegedly selling phony presidential memorabilia--hundreds of baseballs, bats, even denim jackets supposedly autographed by Reagan and other Presidents and First Ladies--some of which eventually made their way onto the Home Shopping Network.