Part 48, page 20

Transcript

The scan is the source; the transcript is machine-generated from it.

FD-350 (Rev. 5-8-81)

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(Indicate page, name of newspaper, city and state.)

Date: 1/23/86 Edition: The Deseret News, Page B-1, Salt Lake City, Utah Title:

Character: CAA or Classification: 164-259 Submitting Office: SU

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D.B. Cooper — the real McCoy?

By Brett DelPorto Deseret News staff writer

A would-be author is convinced that a Provo man convicted of hi- jacking a commercial airliner in 1972 was the legendary D.B. Coo- per, and has filed documents in U.S. District Court for Utah to obtain records to prove his contention.

Bernie D. Rhodes has filed a Freedom of Information complaint asking the federal court to force the FBI to turn over documents he believes will prove that former Provo resident Richard Floyd Mc- Coy Jr. is D.B. Cooper.

A federal court jury convicted McCoy of the April 1972 hijacking of a United Airlines Boeing 727 jet- liner. The jury found that McCoy was the man who commandeered the airplane near Grand Junction, Colo., claiming he had a hand gre- nade and a gun. He forced the crew to land in San Francisco, where he obtained $500,000 in ransom, and bailed out over the Provo area. He was arrested at his home two days later.

Judge Willis Ritter sentenced McCoy to 45 years in prison, but McCoy escaped in August 1974 from a federal prison inLewis- burg, Pa. He was killed in a shoot- out with FBI agents Nov. 9, 1974, in Virginia.

Rhodes was the chief federal probation officer in Utah at the time of the hijacking and prepared a presentence report on McCoy. From the extensive conversations with McCoy, Rhodes concluded that McCoy was Cooper.

"From my conversation with McCoy, his wife, your agents at the time of the offense and, recently, to the prosecutor at the time and de- fense counsel, I was convinced then as I am now that Richard Floyd McCoy Jr. and Cooper are one and the same," Rhodes said in a letter

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to the FBI attached to the com- plaint.

McCoy's exploits bear a striking resemblance to the events of Nov. 25, 1971, the day a middle-aged man calling himself D.B. Cooper parachuted from a jet into the Washington state wilderness after collecting $200,000 in ransom mon- ey. The case has never been solved, although FBI agents found wadded $20 bills in a dredge pile near Van- couver, Wash., in February 1980.

But Dave Kohl, assistant special agent in charge of the Salt Lake FBI, said the FBI was aware of that theory and thoroughly investi- gated McCoy. He said McCoy's death made definitive resolution of the case difficult, but he noted that agents, nonetheless, felt confident that McCoy was not Cooper.

"It was one of a number of theo- ries going around," Kohl said. "but we pursued it at the time and we are convinced he is not D.B. Cooper."

Glen Hanni, McCoy's attorney for the federal court trial, also said he knew of nothing indicating that McCoy was Cooper. "I have no in- formation that would lead me to believe that he was Cooper," Hanni said.

See COOPER on B-2.

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Continued from B-1

McCoy is the second Utahn whose name has surfaced this month in con- nection with the D.B. Cooper case. Two weeks ago, David Westmoreland, a Utah State Prison inmate, an- nounced he was the long-sought hi- jacker. But Kohl said the FBI has in- vestigated Westmoreland's story and concluded it is a fabrication.

Rhodes said he is writing a book about McCoy and has requested docu- ments concerning McCoy from the FBI office in Salt Lake City. In Febru- ary 1984, the FBI wrote back explain- ing there were 44 pages of informa- tion on McCoy. However, 32 pages were withheld under various exemp- tions to the Freedom of Information Act, which allows federal agencies to hold back documents if their release would interfere with law enforcement proceedings.

Rhodes' complaint challenges those exemptions, claiming that McCoy's death and the length of time that has passed since the hijacking makes the FBI documents irrelevant to any cur- rent investigation.

"That section of the McCoy file that deals with the hijacking should not be considered sacrosanct," Rhodes wrote in his letter. "That happened almost 13 years ago. Releasing that information is not going to impact your investiga- tion."

The complaint asks for a prelimi- nary and permanent injunction forc- ing the FBI to turn over the documents.

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SEARCHED _____ INDEXED ____ SERIALIZED ____ [illegible]

16 4A-81-8841

JAN 31 1986

EATTLE b6 b7C

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DB Cooper-19811 FBI/DOJ