Part 53, page 244

Transcript

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

FD-350 (Rev. 7-16-63)

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Alive or dead, skyjack 'pioneer' came out loser

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By LEVERETT RICHARDS of The Oregonian staff

ON THANKSGIVING EVE five years ago, a man who said his name was Dan Cooper boarded Northwest Airline's flight 305 at Portland bound for Seattle. He displayed a "bomb," demanded and got $200,000 in $20 bills, then bailed out through the rear stair door of the Boeing 727 at 8:10 p.m. near La Center, Wash., with the money.

Cooper, erroneously described in the press and radio at the time as "D.B. Cooper," was hailed in some quarters as a folk hero who "beat the system" and got away with a small fortune. Some acclaimed him as a Robin Hood who had committed the perfect crime. Part of the folk lore is that Cooper will be "home safe" Nov. 24, 1976 when the five-year statute of limitations expires.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation doesn't see it that way at all.

The FBI agents believe Cooper was a bungling amateur; they think he is almost certainly dead.

And if he or any accomplices have survived, they are still wanted men. There is no statute of limitations for them — ever, says Ralph Himmelsbach, veteran FBI agent who has lived with the Cooper case for the past five years, literally day and night.

"We are continuing our investigation unabated," said Himmelsbach. "We don't intend to give up. I still give a substantial portion of my time to checking out leads. We still get several tips every week. We pledged at the outset to investigate any information we received from the public."

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"We have checked more than 1,000, maybe several thousand, reports altogether. We have checked a long list of missing persons. And after five years we still don't know if there ever was a Dan Cooper. We have no more information on his identity today than we had five years ago."

The FBI bases its rejection of the statute of limitations on three major assumptions: There is no statute of limitations in capital crimes and air piracy, or aerial hijacking was a crime punishable by death in November 1971 and still is.

There is no statute of limitations protecting fugitives from justice, according to a recent ruling of the Ninth Circuit Court in a similar case. Since Cooper has not turned himself in he is assumed to be a fugitive, if he is still alive. The same rule applies to his accomplices, if any, Himmelsbach explained.

Seizure of the aircraft with its 36 passengers/and crew of six could be considered kidnaping, a crime also exempt from the statute of limitations where injury or death is involved.

"Personally, after five years of intensive investigation I lean to the conclusion that Cooper was killed when he jumped from the plane or died soon after landing. That makes it a capital crime. If he had any accomplices, which is not indicated by any evidence so far, they would be equally guilty."

To back up his conclusions, Himmelsbach for the first time, told the detailed story of the hijacking:

"Cooper was given four parachutes," Himmelsbach said. "He cut the shroud lines on one of the best parachutes and used them to tie the 10,000 $20 bills to [guess: his] belt in a bag before he bailed out.

"He left behind the two best parachutes — a [guess: sky] diver parachute with a 32-foot canopy and a chest pack designed primarily for use as a second parachute.

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

3-1 THE SUNDAY OREGONIAN PORTLAND, OREGON

Date: 11-14-76 Edition: Author: Leverett Richards Editor: J. Richard Nokes Title: NORJAK

Character: or Classification: Submitting Office: PORTLAND [X] Being Investigated

/6 4- 4/- S/ [illegible handwritten text] JA[illegible]

DB Cooper-22582