DB Cooper

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Mugshot from 1972 by DB Cooper

Dan Cooper and DB Cooper are pseudonyms for a hijacker , who on 24 November 1971 on the Pacific Northwest over the mountain range of the southern Cascades of a Boeing 727 jumped, having previously a ransom of 200,000 US dollars equivalent (a modern equivalent of about $ 1.2 million).

There was no conclusive evidence of the kidnapper's identity or whereabouts, and there are a number of contradicting theories about what happened after he jumped off. The only clues in this case are three wads of weathered banknotes that a child dug up on the sandy banks of the Columbia River in 1980 and that were identified as part of the ransom, as well as part of a sign believed to have come from the aircraft's back stairs from the Cooper had jumped off. The FBI is code-naming the Cooper case "Norjak".

In December 2007 and March 2009, the FBI revived the case, hoping to clarify Cooper's identity based on new information. But even this and more recent research did not yield any definitive answers.

The case has not yet been resolved. The FBI announced in July 2016 that it had closed the investigation into the DB Cooper case after 45 years.

The abduction

A briefcase with a bomb

On November 24, 1971, the eve of Thanksgiving , at 4:35 p.m. local time in the United States, a man traveling under the name Dan Cooper hijacked a Northwest Orient Airlines Boeing 727-051 with flight number 305, threatening him with a bomb . He carried a briefcase full of wires and red poles.

Cooper had previously boarded the plane with 36 other passengers and six crew members in Portland , Oregon, heading for Seattle . He was wearing a black raincoat, slippers, a dark business suit, a neatly ironed white shirt, a narrow black tie with a mother-of-pearl tie pin, and black sunglasses .

The plane was barely in the air when he called a stewardess, Florence Schaffner, seated near his seat to order a drink. When she paid, he also gave her an envelope. Thinking he would give her his phone number, she put it in her pocket, unopened. Cooper leaned closer and said, "Miss, you'd better take a look at the note! I have a bomb. ”In the envelope was a note with the following:

“I have a bomb in my briefcase. I will use it if necessary. I want you to sit beside me. "

“I have a bomb in my briefcase. I will make use of it if necessary. I want you to sit next to me. "

The flight attendant asked to see the bomb. The kidnapper opened his trunk a crack, long enough for Schaffner to see red cylinders and wires. Then he asked for $ 200,000, four parachutes and fuel to refuel the plane.

After the flight attendant notified the cockpit of Cooper and his slip, pilot William Scott contacted air traffic control at Seattle / Tacoma International Airport . This gave the instruction to cooperate with Cooper. Scott instructed Conductor to return to Dan Cooper and sit next to him. When she came back he was wearing black sunglasses. He ordered her to tell the pilot not to land until the money he asked and the parachutes were ready in Seattle-Tacoma. Schaffner went back to the cockpit and relayed Cooper's instructions.

Release the hostages in exchange for his demands

The Boeing 727 has an equipment feature that is rare for a civil aircraft - a tailgate with a gangway

When the plane landed at its Seattle-Tacoma destination at 5:45 p.m., the hijacker released the passengers in exchange for $ 200,000 and four parachutes intended for four people on board, the pilot, co-pilot, a stewardess and Cooper himself. It is believed that Cooper wanted to ensure that the parachutes were not tampered with. At 7:40 p.m. he forced the cockpit crew to take off again and at a relatively low speed and at an altitude of about 10,000 feet (compared to the normal flight altitude of 25,000 to 37,000 feet) with the landing gear and flaps extended to 15 Degrees to fly towards Mexico. At some point during the flight he jumped off the back stairs of the plane with the money and parachutes. The FBI suspects that the time of the jump was at 8:11 p.m. over southwest Washington state , because at that time the stairs hit the plane. Because of the poor visibility, his jump could not be observed by the pursuing F-106 fighters.

Disappeared without a trace

Escape

A , B , C Airports Portland - Seattle - Reno
1 First calculated presumed jump point
2 Location of the torn off instructions for use of the rear stairs
3 Location of the bundles of money
4 Second calculated presumed jump point.
The gangway at the stern of the Boeing was not designed to be lowered during flight. It fell due to gravity and remained in this position until the aircraft landed.

The FBI first questioned a man named D. B. Cooper and then released him. This man was never considered an urgent suspect. However, due to a misunderstanding with the media, his initials were firmly linked to the kidnapper, and he is now known as D. B. Cooper . The landing zone was initially located on Clark County and Cowlitz Counties in southwest Washington state near the Lewis River . Later deliberations localized the area further southeast in the catchment area of ​​the Washougal River . However, despite several extensive searches, no trace of Cooper was found, even by private individuals.

After three similar but less successful hijackings , the Federal Aviation Administration required that all Boeing 727s be fitted with a mechanical aerodynamic wedge, known in America as a "Cooper vane", which prevents the back stairs from being lowered during a flight. Metal detectors were installed at the airports and some flight safety rules were in place.

The ransom

Part of the ransom money found in 1980

On February 13, 1980, while on a picnic trip with his family, an eight-year-old boy found three wads of $ 20 bills, totaling $ 5800, on the banks of the Columbia River, five miles northwest of Vancouver, Washington, United States. The bundles could be assigned to the ransom because the serial numbers had been noted. The rest of the money was never found.

From the FBI's point of view, there are some indications that the kidnapper did not survive the parachute jump. In the words of FBI Special Agent Larry Carr on the case :

“We originally thought Cooper was a skilled jumper, maybe even a paratrooper. After a few years we came to the conclusion that this was just not true. No experienced skydiver would jump on a pitch-black night in the rain with a headwind of 320 km / h, wearing a trench coat and street shoes with a parachute [over an unknown area]. It's just too risky. He had also overlooked the fact that his reserve parachute was only intended for training purposes and was sewn up, a fact that an experienced skydiver would not have missed. "

This could also explain the fact that no ransom banknotes were ever found, except for those that washed up on the Columbia River. Still, the FBI kept this case, which is the only unsolved aircraft hijacking case in the United States, open until July 2016. The serial numbers of the $ 20 bills can still be obtained.

A reference to the suspect group could also be the chosen pseudonym Dan Cooper . There is a Belgian cartoon character with the same name . This Dan Cooper is a Canadian military pilot and the comics include parachute jumps among other things. The kidnapper could have been a fan of this comic book hero. Since the comic series was not available in English at the time, it has been speculated that the kidnapper might be of French Canadian origin.

DB Cooper FBI wanted poster

Suspects

Richard McCoy, Jr.

Four months after D. B. Cooper's hijacking, Richard McCoy hijacked an airplane on April 7, 1972. McCoy boarded United Flight 855 on a stopover in Denver. As in Cooper's case, the plane was a Boeing 727 with a rear staircase; McCoy used it to escape after giving instructions similar to Cooper's to the flight crew. McCoy had a dummy hand grenade and an unloaded pistol with him. Since he left his fingerprints on a magazine he had read during the flight and also forgot his handwritten notes, the FBI was able to identify him.

Police questioned McCoy following a tip from a driver. The driver hitchhiked McCoy, who was wearing a parachute suit and carrying a garment bag.

McCoy was married with two children. He taught at a Mormon Sunday school and studied law at Brigham Young University . He spoke to a number of people about how easy it would be to hijack a plane. As an avid skydiver and helicopter pilot in a special unit , he had been recognized as a Vietnam veteran. His dream was to become an FBI or CIA agent.

Because the fingerprints and handwriting matched, McCoy was arrested two days after the kidnapping. Ironically, McCoy had been involved in the search for the kidnapper as a National Guard helicopter pilot. In his home, the FBI found the skydiving suit and the garment bag filled with $ 499,970 in money. McCoy pleaded innocent but was convicted of hijacking an airplane and sentenced to 45 years in prison. One appeal went to the Supreme Court .

While in custody, he used his entrance to the prison dental laboratory to model a handgun from dental paste. Together with fellow prisoners, he escaped in August 1974 by stealing a garbage truck and breaking through the main gate. It took the FBI three months to track McCoy down in Virginia. Presumably McCoy opened fire on the FBI agents. According to the report, he was shot dead with a rifle by officer Nicholas O'Hara in the following exchange of fire. Other witnesses deny this statement.

In 1991 the book “D. B. Cooper: The Real McCoy, ”written by Bernie Rhodes and former FBI agent Russell Calame. This includes evidence that Cooper and McCoy are the same person. The authors point to the same kidnapping methods, the tie and the Brigham Young medallion with McCoy's initials on the back, which Cooper left on the plane. It is also stated that McCoy never admitted or denied that he was Cooper. And when McCoy was asked directly if he was Cooper, he replied, “I don't want to talk about that.” The policeman who is said to have shot McCoy is quoted as saying, “When I shot Richard McCoy, I did too at the same time DB Cooper shot. ”McCoy's widow, Karen Burns McCoy, agreed with the book authors that the book with the theory that McCoy was Cooper should not be made into a film.

Duane Weber

In July 2000, US News and World Report published an article about a Pace , Florida widow named Jo Weber and her claim that her late husband Duane Weber had confronted her before he died in 1995: "I'm Dan Cooper." She became suspicious and began to check his past. Duane Weber had served in the Army during World War II and later worked in a prison near Portland Airport. She remembered her husband once having a nightmare and talking in his sleep about jumping out of an airplane and "leaving the fingerprints on the rear steps." In his documents she once found an old plane ticket with the abbreviation SEA-TAC (Seattle-Tacoma Airport). She also stated that her husband said shortly before his death that his old knee injury was "from jumping out of an airplane".

Jo Weber also talked about a vacation the couple spent in Seattle, "a sentimental trip," as Duane called it. On this vacation they also went to the Columbia River. There her husband strangely went down to the banks of the river - exactly four months before the part of Cooper's loot was found in the same area. She also said that she looked at a book about the Cooper case in the local library and recognized her husband's handwriting in the notes. She began correspondence with FBI Agent Ralph Himmelsbach, the chairman of the Cooperative Investigation Board. Himmelsbach stated that Duane Weber was one of the main suspects. Although the correspondence of wanted photos with Weber's photographs had to be regarded as inconclusive, facial recognition software made him the best match.

The suspicion that Duane Weber was Dan Cooper was also supported by Robert Knoss of Minneapolis, Minnesota, a former acquaintance of Weber. According to him, Weber was known as Dan Cooper, who lived in Bloomington, Minnesota , where he had also trained as a skilled parachutist three years before the kidnapping.

However, based on a DNA analysis in which Weber's DNA samples were compared with traces of DNA from the tie left on the plane, Duane Weber could be ruled out as the perpetrator.

John List

In 1971, multiple murderer John List was suspected of the D. B. Cooper kidnapping, which occurred immediately after his family was murdered. List's age, features, and build matched the mysterious hijacker. List's debts were exactly the same as Cooper's loot at the time. However, out of prison, he stubbornly denied being Cooper, and the FBI eventually stopped viewing him as a suspect.

DB Cooper's presumed aging

Kenneth Christiansen

In 2003, Lyle Christiansen came from Minnesota while watching a documentary about the airplane hijacking, the thought that his brother Kenneth Christiansen, who died in 1994, might have been the culprit. He joined the army in 1944 and was trained as a paratrooper there. A few years after the end of the war he left the army and worked as a flight attendant and later as a purser at Northwest Airlines in Seattle. According to his brother, he had developed feelings of aggression towards his employer because of the poor pay. Some details of the personal description agreed with the D. B. Coopers, e.g. B. left-handedness, estimated age, preference for bourbon and cigarette smoking. Christiansen also bought an expensive stamp collection shortly after the kidnapping. In his estate, the relatives found a bank account with US $ 200,000 and a file folder with newspaper clippings about incidents at NWA that dated around the time of the kidnapping but broke off afterwards. However, there were also personal details that did not match the kidnapper, such as: B. Eye color, complexion, height, weight, hair, so that the FBI did not consider Christiansen as the primary suspect.

Lynn Doyle Cooper

In July 2011, almost forty years after the crime, the then late Lynn Doyle Cooper came under suspicion. His niece reported that he - a veteran of the Korean War - and another uncle had had a conversation the day before the crime, during which she noticed expensive radio equipment. The day after the crime, Lynn Doyle Cooper turned up "bloody, injured and untidy" and initially spoke of a car accident, but then of a plane hijacking and resolved money problems. After that, she never saw her uncle again. The FBI fingerprinted a guitar strap that the suspect owned and performed DNA analysis , but to no avail.

In series and films

The fact that the case was never resolved provided material for film and television in many cases :

  • In the US series Twin Peaks (1990) the investigating FBI agent and main person is called Dale Bartholomew Cooper, named after D. B. Cooper.
  • The D. B. Cooper case plays an important role in the US series Prison Break . Charles Westmoreland, a fellow inmate of the main character Michael Scofield, is Cooper. However, he denies this to everyone except Michael Scofield. He reveals to Scofield the hiding place of the money (in the series 5 million).
  • In the film Trouble Without Paddles , three friends in their 30s go in search of D. B. Cooper's money and stumble upon his supposed remains.
  • In the episode "Showdown of a Legend (The Ballad of D. B. Cooper)" of the 4th season of the US series Renegade - Merciless Hunt , Bobby receives information about the current whereabouts of D. B. Cooper and goes on a search for him.
  • In the 10th episode "Old Soldiers" of the 6th season of the US series Numbers - The Logic of Crime , ex-FBI agent Rodger Bloom, who was investigating the DB Cooper case at the time, is called in to investigate after banknotes of the ransom appeared in a prevented robbery.
  • In the episode “The DB Cooper Job” of the US series Leverage , the case is reopened and re-enacted in retrospect.
  • Episode 13 of the Mysteries of History series (Mystery of Flight NW 305) deals with the case
  • xkcd 1400 draws parallels between the whereabouts of DB Cooper and Tommy Wiseau

music

  • The American songwriter Todd Snider takes up the subject in his song "DB Cooper".
  • The American singer and guitarist Roger McGuinn alludes to the airplane hijacking in the song 'Bag full of Money' on his first solo album 'Roger McGuinn' from 1973.

literature

Web links

Commons : DB Cooper  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Trace in the only unsolved US aircraft hijacking. In: Berliner Morgenpost from August 2, 2011.
  2. ↑ Ralph P. Himmelsbach, Thomas K. Worcester: Norjak: The Investigation of DB Cooper . Norjak Project, West Linn, Oregon 1986, p. 135, ISBN 0-9617415-0-3 .
  3. ↑ a b D.B. Cooper Redux - Help Us Solve the Enduring Mystery. FBI , December 31, 2007, accessed May 21, 2014 .
  4. ^ In Search of DB Cooper - New Developments in the Unsolved Case. FBI , March 17, 2009, accessed May 21, 2014 .
  5. ↑ Evan Pappas: Bigfoot killed and other infamous American hoaxes. Seattle Post-Intelligencer , April 7, 2014, accessed May 19, 2014 .
  6. ↑ Dan Cooper case. FBI gives up search for hijacker after 45 years. In: Spiegel Online . Spiegel Online, July 23, 2012, accessed June 10, 2018 .
  7. ↑ Oliver Burkeman: Heads in the clouds. The Guardian, December 1, 2007, accessed July 12, 2012 .
  8. ^ A b David Krajicek: The Crime. In: DB Cooper: The Legendary Daredevil. Archived from the original on December 3, 2013 ; Retrieved July 12, 2012 .
  9. ^ Himmelsbach et al .: Norjak: The Investigation of DB Cooper. 1986, p. 18.
  10. ^ DB Cooper's loot to be auctioned off . Associated Press, February 13, 2006, accessed January 27, 2016 .
  11. ↑ DB Cooper Part 7 of 7. (PDF, 3.92 MB) In: FBI Records: The Vault. US government, US Department of Justice, pp. 10-12 , accessed February 18, 2016 .
  12. ^ DB Cooper Redux: Help Us Solve the Enduring Mystery. Federal Bureau of Investigation, December 31, 2007, accessed March 26, 2011 : “We originally thought Cooper was an experienced jumper, perhaps even a paratrooper. We concluded after a few years this was simply not true. No experienced parachutist would have jumped in the pitch-black night, in the rain, with a 200-mile-an-hour wind in his face, wearing loafers and a trench coat. It was simply too risky. He also missed that his reserve chute was only for training and had been sewn shut — something a skilled skydiver would have checked. "
  13. ↑ Airplane hijacking : The man who jumped out of a Boeing with $ 200,000 . In: The time . July 13, 2016, ISSN  0044-2070 ( zeit.de [accessed on July 13, 2016]).
  14. ^ DB Cooper's Loot Serial Number Searcher. check-six.com, March 17, 2011, accessed on March 26, 2011 (English).
  15. ↑ FBI-backed team finds Canadian link to famous' 70s plane hijacking. National Post, November 24, 2011, accessed May 20, 2012 .
  16. ↑ Richard Floyd McCoy, Jr. - Aircraft Hijacking. Federal Bureau of Investigation, accessed July 12, 2012 .
  17. ^ A b Marianne Funk and Staff Writer: McCoy's widow admits helping in '72 hijacking. Deseret News, February 21, 1992, accessed July 12, 2012 .
  18. ↑ a b c d Geoffrey Gray: Unmasking DB Cooper. New York News & Features, October 21, 2007, accessed March 26, 2011 .
  19. ^ FBI rejects the latest DB Cooper suspect: Bonney Lake man accused of crime. The Associated Press, October 26, 2007, accessed March 26, 2011 .
  20. ^ Dietrich Nixdorf: The hunt for the phantom. In: Sz-online.de . August 6, 2011, accessed May 19, 2014 .
  21. ↑ Airplane jumper case: woman accuses deceased uncle. In: Spiegel Online . August 3, 2011, accessed May 19, 2014 .
  22. ↑ Howard Berkes: DB Cooper Update: FBI Says No DNA Match With New Suspect. National Public Radio , August 9, 2011, accessed May 19, 2014 .
  23. ↑ 11. Riddle about flight NW 305 Fernsehserien.de. Retrieved July 28, 2018
  24. ↑ DB Cooper xkcd.com. Retrieved July 28, 2018
personal data
SURNAME Cooper, DB
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Cooper, Dan
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American hijacker
DATE OF BIRTH 20th century