DB Cooper may be in FBI's sights

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In Seattle, he demanded and got $200,000 and four parachutes and demanded to be flown to Mexico.

Somewhere over southwestern Washington, he jumped out the plane's tail exit with two of the chutes, and was never seen or heard from again.
The FBI today announced that it has a new suspect in the case who they are hoping to link to a tie Cooper left on the plane and cigarette butts in an ashtray using DNA testing and fingerprints.

There have been more than 1,000 suspects over the past four decades, but the FBI have described the new lead as 'looking like our most promising one to date'.

'We do actually have a new suspect we're looking at,' said FBI spokesman Ayn Dietrich as she revealed the twist in the investigation.
'It comes from a credible lead who came to our attention recently via a law enforcement colleague,' she said.



Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2020687/DB-Cooper-FBI-new-suspect-40-years-fugitive-parachuted-hijacked-plane.html#ixzz1Tk2mIgkg

They haven't said if the suspect is alive or dead.

Not a hint, that I detected.

I hope it's not dys...

pretty sure he woulda told me if he was.

Dys? I wish we had him here to comment on the story.

Somebody's been sayin' for almost 40 years that he's dead. Now the FBI wants to claim he's alive? I suspect they put about the rumor that he was dead to cover their embarrassment, and now they just happened to stumble onto something . . . clowns . . .

You are likely right, setanta.

well, I guess we know now where gus has gone.

The FBI is investigating whether a dead man in the Pacific Northwest is D.B. Cooper, who hijacked a passenger jet in 1971 over Washington state and parachuted with $200,000 in ransom.

Cooper has never been found.

FBI agent Fred Gutt said Monday the bureau is following up a "credible" lead in the unsolved case and is focused on a suspect who died more than 10 years ago.

Gutt said the bureau received a tip from a retired law enforcement source about the dead man possibly being Cooper. FBI agents requested personal effects of the possible suspect, who died of natural causes.

The FBI is trying to find fingerprints or DNA on the dead man's effects to compare with items the hijacker left behind. The FBI said three years ago that it found DNA evidence on the clip-on tie Cooper left on the plane before he jumped.

Gutt said the FBI has already tested one item of the dead man's belongings for fingerprints. It was not conclusive. They are now working with surviving family members to gather other items for further testing.

The suspect is someone who has not been previously investigated, and Gutt said initial vetting supported the belief of the tipster. But he cautioned that the new lead may not pan out and that investigators were still pursuing other possibilities.

"Maybe this is just someone else who just happened to look like him and whose life story just kind of paralleled," Gutt said.

Gutt said the new lead is also promising because of the way it came to the FBI. The tipster initially discussed the case with a retired law enforcement officer who then contacted the FBI. Only after the FBI contacted the witness directly did the person discuss the Cooper case with investigators.

"They're not seeking attention," Gutt said. "To the contrary, they're looking to avoid it."

Federal investigators have checked more than 1,000 leads since the suspect bailed out on Nov. 24, 1971, over the Pacific Northwest.

The man who jumped gave his name as Dan Cooper and claimed shortly after takeoff in Portland, Ore., that he had a bomb, leading the flight crew to land the plane in Seattle, where passengers were exchanged for parachutes and ransom money.

The flight then took off for Mexico with the suspect and flight crew on board. The hijacker parachuted from the plane after dark as it flew south, apparently over a rugged, wooded region of the Pacific Northwest. In 1980, a boy found several thousand dollars in $20 bills from the ransom decomposing along the Columbia River.

The FBI's latest tip in the case was first reported by The Telegraph newspaper in London.

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Baker reported from Olympia, Wash.


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Read more: http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/top/all/7679191.html#ixzz1TpFgHkCg

If he is ultimately identified and captured, he should be released on grounds of being the baddest ************ ever.

Badder than Shaft?

I wouldn't put it past them but that doesn't seem to be the case to me, the notion that he was dead mainly arose from the finding of the decaying cash (which happened much later) as well as their inability to find any of the payment's serial numbers in circulation after much time. As for the new suspect, he's dead too (as the latest article Edgar posted notes).

This is one of my favorite mysteries, I hope we get to find out more about it!

The "credible suspect" the FBI is investigating in the D.B. Cooper skyjacking case is a man named Lynn Doyle Cooper, who reportedly died in 1999.

ABC News first revealed the name Wednesday in an interview with Cooper's niece, Marla Cooper, of Oklahoma City, who said she is cooperating with the FBI.

Steve Dean, the assistant special agent in charge of the criminal division of the Seattle FBI office, confirmed Wednesday that Marla Cooper had contacted the bureau and turned over items to assist in the investigation.

Cooper, citing childhood memories, told ABC News she is convinced her uncle was the man who hijacked a Seattle-bound jet on Thanksgiving Eve 1971 and parachuted over Southwest Washington with $200,000 in cash.

"I'm certain he was my uncle, Lynn Doyle Cooper, who we called L.D. Cooper," she told ABC News.

Although some investigators concluded the skyjacker died in the jump, a body was never found in what remains America's only unsolved hijacking.

'Twasn't him.