D. B. Cooper is Alive and Living in San Diego

[Jerjo]

I found this in a sidebar while reading a story about The Who. This sounds fairly credible. So much for the story of ol' DB getting eaten by Bigfoot.

https://www.rollingstone.com/culture...entity-693912/

[Scott Bails]

Very interesting. I've always been fascinated with the story. But it's thin on actual details. It would have been nice to have a picture of the guy to compare to the famous sketches, for example.

[rcarlberg]

There have been a NUMBER of likely suspects and even confessions over the years -- but the bare fact is, in February 1980 a camper found some of the ransom money, deteriorated but still bundled in rubber bands (and confirmed by the FBI as Cooper's ransom money) along the Columbia river. This means Cooper and his money got separated, which means he either died in the jump or died in the landing.

[Scott Bails]

Thanks for the pics.


Not sure how being separated from the money means that he died.

[ronmac]

Thanks for the pics.


Not sure how being separated from the money means that he died.

It doesn't. Some of the money was found. We could easily assume he survived and spent the remainder. Or we can assume nothing.

[rcarlberg]

Not sure how being separated from the money means that he died.

If you went to all that trouble to get $200,000 in a duffel bag, wouldn't YOU go retrieve it when it fell?

Some of the money was found. We could easily assume he survived and spent the remainder.

The found money was still banded with rubber bands. If Cooper had opened the duffel and gone through the money on his way down in the parachute, don't you think he would've kept the BANDED stuff?

[ronmac]

Who suggested he opened his bag during his descent? Maybe had a rough landing and lost some of the money during his 20,000-foot jump? Maybe he ran into a hunter who demanded money at gun point. Maybe he fought off a bear with it. Maybe he used that particular bundle as toilet paper. Maybe he planted it and tried to grow a money tree.

Bottom line is that you don't know any more than anyone else here about what actually happened. You just choose to make assumptions about it.

[rcarlberg]

Yeah, it's much more likely D.B. Cooper is alive & well and living in San Diego.

FBI technicians confirmed that the money was indeed a portion of the ransom—two packets of 100 twenty-dollar bills each, and a third packet of 90, all arranged in the same order as when given to Cooper.[79][80] In 1986, after protracted negotiations, the recovered bills were divided equally between Ingram and Northwest Orient's insurer; the FBI retained fourteen examples as evidence.[69][81] Ingram sold fifteen of his bills at auction in 2008 for about $37,000.[82] To date, none of the 9,710 remaining bills have turned up anywhere in the world. Their serial numbers remain available online for public search.

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In 2016, Rackstraw re-emerged as a suspect in a History Channel program[184] and a book.[185] On September 8, 2016, Thomas J. Colbert, an author of the book The Last Master Outlaw, filed a lawsuit to compel the FBI to release its Cooper case file under the Freedom of Information Act. The suit alleges that the FBI suspended active investigation of the Cooper case "in order to undermine the theory that Rackstraw is D.B. Cooper so as to prevent embarrassment for the bureau's failure to develop evidence sufficient to prosecute him for the crime."[186] In January 2018, a small cold case documentary team reported that they had obtained a letter originally written in December 1971 and sent to The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, The Seattle Times and The Washington Post, with numerous numbers and letters written on it. The team, led by Tom and Dawna Colbert, says that the codes were deciphered and matched to three units Rackstraw was a part of while in the Army, and the FBI refused to acknowledge the findings because "it would have to admit that amateur sleuths had cracked a case the bureau couldn't".[187]

One of the Flight 305 flight attendants reportedly "did not find any similarities" between photos of Rackstraw from the 1970s and her recollection of Cooper's appearance.[181][188] Rackstraw's attorney called the renewed allegations "the stupidest thing I've ever heard",[189] and Rackstraw himself told People.com, "It's a lot of [expletive], and they know it is."[181] The FBI declined further comment.[186] Rackstraw stated in a 2017 phone interview that he lost his job over the 2016 investigations.[190]

A June 2018 article circulated claiming private investigators "decoded" a previously publicly unknown letter on file with the FBI, which purportedly includes a disguised confession.

Don't be so gullible, people.

[ronmac]

I'm trying to figure out who's being gullible here. You're the one connecting dots here. We're merely challenging your assumptions.

Don't bother replying, because this is just another thread being hijacked by incessant bickering and I don't want to participate.

[Painter]

This means Cooper and his money got separated, which means he either died in the jump or died in the landing.

False choice. These are not the only two things that could have caused him and a portion of his money to be separated. The scenarios are literally endless, a few of which Ronmac imagined.

The found money was still banded with rubber bands. If Cooper had opened the duffel and gone through the money on his way down in the parachute, don't you think he would've kept the BANDED stuff?

You clearly have never jumped from an aircraft. NO ONE, and I do mean NO ONE, would have opened that duffel bag while descending in order to "go through the money", even on a clear day over a desert. The conditions that Cooper jumped (nighttime, driving rain, mountainous terrain with the ever-present danger of trees) makes such a proposition even more ridiculous. With next-to-no light, no ground flares or anything else to assist the jumper in making a safe landing, and descending under a round 'chute, he was dropping fast and would be very lucky if he didn't break a leg on landing.

[3LockBox]

The conditions that Cooper jumped (nighttime, driving rain, mountainous terrain with the ever-present danger of trees) makes such a proposition even more ridiculous. With next-to-no light, no ground flares or anything else to assist the jumper in making a safe landing, and descending under a round 'chute, he was dropping fast and would be very lucky if he didn't break a leg on landing.

Yep, and its for those very reasons you outlined that I believe that the dude's dead or died soon after, unless he was some sort of special ops commando with hours of similar jumps under his belt. But you're right, nobody really knows. It's an entertaining thought to think he made off with a chunk of cash and eluded detection and capture, I guess, but then again I'm entertained by ghost stories too.

Dude's dead.

[rcarlberg]

You clearly have never jumped from an aircraft. NO ONE, and I do mean NO ONE, would have opened that duffel bag while descending in order to "go through the money", even on a clear day over a desert. The conditions that Cooper jumped (nighttime, driving rain, mountainous terrain with the ever-present danger of trees) makes such a proposition even more ridiculous.

Thank you. That was PRECISELY why I chose to word it like I did, to show how ridiculous it was to propose that Cooper removed bundles of cash from the duffel and kept the rest (queue the rolly-eyes icon).

There are exactly two choices.

1. Cooper got separated from his money when he exited the airplane
2. Cooper got separated from his money when he landed

No other scenario makes sense.

If #2 is true, then he must have died on impact (chute didn't open, bad landing, hung up in a tree for three weeks...) Any other outcome he would have retrieved the money.

That leaves #1 as the ONLY other possible scenario. Picture it. He's standing in the 727 cargo bay at 115 mph 10,000 feet up in the pitch dark. He engages the controls to open the rear bay door. The cabin experiences a rapid air pressure change, indicating a sudden rush of air out of the aircraft. Cooper would have been forcefully sucked out of the aircraft. If he was prepared enough, he MIGHT have held onto his duffel bag and he MIGHT have maintained his parachute (experienced paratroopers say the 115 mph airspeed is just barely survivable). But the chances are he wasn't prepared for the violence of it (minus 70 degree windchill, HUGE rush of air as the door opens...)

I.e. it seems nearly incontrovertible, to me, that he died shortly after exiting the airplane. Hypothermia, parachute ripped off or didn't open, knocked unconscious or worse.

The Bureau were more skeptical, concluding that Cooper lacked crucial skydiving skills and experience. "We originally thought Cooper was an experienced jumper, perhaps even a paratrooper," said Special Agent Larry Carr, leader of the investigative team from 2006 until its dissolution in 2016. "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."[83] He also failed to bring or request a helmet,[109] chose to jump with the older and technically inferior of the two primary parachutes supplied to him,[53] and jumped into a −70 °F (−57 °C) wind chill without proper protection against the extreme cold.

You're right of course, nobody knows for sure. But it takes a lot more imagination to propose how he survived than to propose how he died.

[ronmac]

Thank you. That was PRECISELY why I chose to word it like I did, to show how ridiculous it was to propose that Cooper removed bundles of cash from the duffel and kept the rest (queue the rolly-eyes icon).

Of course, nobody suggested that, did they?

[ronmac]

If #2 is true, then he must have died on impact (chute didn't open, bad landing, hung up in a tree for three weeks...) Any other outcome he would have retrieved the money.

Really? What if, during a rough landing, the money got scattered somehow and he missed one of the bundles while retrieving them?

This is all speculation. There are no musts.

[rcarlberg]

Thank you. That was PRECISELY why I chose to word it like I did, to show how ridiculous it was to propose that Cooper removed bundles of cash from the duffel and kept the rest (queue the rolly-eyes icon).

Of course, nobody suggested that, did they?

I dunno. That's how I read your comments:

Maybe had a rough landing and lost some of the money during his 20,000-foot jump? Maybe he ran into a hunter who demanded money at gun point. Maybe he fought off a bear with it. Maybe he used that particular bundle as toilet paper. Maybe he planted it and tried to grow a money tree.

[Scott Bails]

If #2 is true, then he must have died on impact (chute didn't open, bad landing, hung up in a tree for three weeks...) Any other outcome he would have retrieved the money.
.

This is where you lose me. There are all kinds of reasons why he wouldn't have retrieved the money.

[rcarlberg]

Name a few.

Bear three facts in mind:

• loafers
• trenchcoat
• manually-operated ripcord parachute

[Scott Bails]

1. He was injured during the descent and prioritized his health and survival over the money
2. The money could have fallen miles away from where he landed. His body was never found - why would you expect him to be able to find money in such a wooded area?
3. Only a portion of the money was ever found. Maybe he figured that he had enough and it wasn't worth looking for whatever was lost.
4. The money could have fallen into the river (it was found on a riverbank) and traveled miles away downstream.

And on and on.

The point being, "if he didn't die, he would have retrieved the money" is a very limited conclusion to draw.

[rcarlberg]

it takes a lot more imagination to propose how he survived than to propose how he died.

..

[Scott Bails]

Only if you're closed-minded and stubborn.

[ronmac]

I dunno. That's how I read your comments:

Everyone here, except you, were able to discern that I was merely illustrating that there could be a multitude of scenarios other than yours. I was not suggesting any of them were true, like you seem to be so hell-bent on doing with your narrow theory.

[rcarlberg]

I love how you claim to speak for "everyone but me" when only Scott and you are promoting this idea. I have the FBI on my side, dude.

[Scott Bails]

That Rolling Stone article is about a team of former FBI investigators.

[Gruno]

I love how you claim to speak for "everyone but me" when only Scott and you are promoting this idea. I have the FBI on my side, dude.

I don't know about 'everyone', but I have stayed out of this, while siding with those whom you oppose. I just don't have the energy to go back and forth with you.

[ronmac]

I love how you claim to speak for "everyone but me" when only Scott and you are promoting this idea. I have the FBI on my side, dude.

I'm not promoting any idea except the that yours ISN'T THE ONLY POSSIBLE SCENARIOS no matter how sure or yourself you are.

I don't know about 'everyone', but I have stayed out of this, while siding with those whom you oppose. I just don't have the energy to go back and forth with you.

Me neither. I'm done wasting my time with another relentless shit-fest about NOTHING. Fuck this BS.

Let's have a real conversation some day.