Part 78, page 390

Transcript

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

FD-350 (Rev. 12-5-78)

(Mount Clipping in Space Below)

[Indicate page, name of newspaper, city and state.] 7 St. Paul Dispatch St. Paul, Minn. Date: 3/14/80 Edition: Evening

Title: cooper

Character: or Classification: 164-73 Submitting Office: Minneapolis

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FBI finds more Cooper hijack money scraps

VANCOUVER, Wash. (AP) — As hordes of reporters and a herd of cows looked on, scientists and FBI agents sifted through sand along the Columbia River, searching for more of the loot that had been missing since sky pirate D.B. Cooper parachuted from a plane nine years ago.

Agents trenching the riverbank Wednesday found a few more scraps of the $200,000 ransom but no sign of the first man to hijack an airliner for money.

And the FBI agent who led the investigation since the 1971 hijack says the discovery tends to confirm his speculation that Cooper, who has become something of a folk hero, died the night he parachuted into a storm somewhere over southwestern Washington.

SOGGY AND battered fragments of several thousand dollars in $20 bills were discovered Sunday by an 8-year-old boy during a family picnic. Serial numbers confirmed they were part of the ransom.

FBI agent Paul Hudson said he ruled out the possibility that the money was buried along the river near Vancouver.

"However they got there, they must have been deposited within a couple of years after the hijacking," said agent Ralph Himmelsbach, due to retire in two weeks after heading the Cooper investigation since the hijack. "Rubber bands deteriorate rapidly and could not have held the bundles together very long."

The Corps of Engineers identified a layer of sand as having been deposited when the 40-foot ship channel was dredged in August 1974. Agents speculated Cooper's body would have clogged the dredge if it had been in the channel then, but a sachel could have gone through.

AGENTS ALSO speculated the bills could have washed into the Columbia from a tributary in the area near LaCenter, Wash., into which Cooper apparently parachuted.

Officials roped off the riverbank to keep would-be treasure seekers from the area as they dug for more of the ransom. The only spectators allowed in Wednesday were reporters, three fishermen and dairy cows.

"I'll admit to a certain sense of satisfaction," said Himmelsbach. "The case isn't solved, but this is certainly a major milestone.

"So we know at least that he never spent this money, and we know that none of the money he was given has ever turned up in circulation," he said. "So, if he got away with it, why hasn't he spent any of this money?"

He said Cooper's skelton probably never will be found if it is in the forested, mountain area in which he is supposed to have landed.

"Unlike the money, Cooper is biodegradable," he said.

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[date stamp] 4-13 -[illegible] SEARCHED SERIALIZED FEB FBI — MINNEAPOLIS

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FBI/DO. DB Cooper-34268

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