Officials: Ex-inmate accused of sending poison to California prison

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — An Eastern European man who authorities say sent a Christmas card to the Unabomber has been indicted on charges of mailing packages of a potentially deadly poison to a California state prison, officials said Friday.

A U.S. grand jury in San Francisco indicted Vladislav Victorvic Timoshchuk on Thursday on charges of mailing two envelopes containing ricin to Pelican Bay State Prison in July.

One was addressed to the warden and came with note warning in all capital letters that it was “laced with deadly ricin powder.” The other was sent to a purported prison gang member and called on officials to release that inmate.

Timoshchuk, 34, was once a California inmate and was deported to Belarus after his release. From 2016 into 2018, officials at Pelican Bay intercepted mail from Belarus to members of a prison gang, including to the inmate who recently was sent the ricin.

In 2017, the Anaheim Police Department investigated a threat demanding the release of that same inmate if authorities wanted to avoid the “execution” of a school student each day until he was released.

Last year the federal Bureau of Prisons intercepted a Christmas card from Belarus to Theodore Kaczynski, the Unabomber.