INQUISITR.COM / News & Politics

D.B. Cooper Update: Did Amateur Sleuths Find ‘Potential’ Evidence To Solve 46-Year Mystery?

By Georgia Makitalo
Published on: 11:44 PST, Aug 10, 2017

Have volunteer investigators uncovered evidence to solve the D.B. Cooper cold case? According to Fox News, Thomas Colbert and his wife and sleuthing partner, Dawna, confirmed that their amateur expert group uncovered what “appears to be a decades-old parachute strap.”

The team, lead by television producer Colbert, was given a lead by an unidentified source, and they found the “potential” evidence “right where a credible source claimed the chute and remaining money are buried.” Thomas Colbert and the amateur sleuths have a website chronicling their findings.

Who could D.B. Cooper be? The group believes it is Robert Rackstraw. He is a Vietnam veteran who, according to the Daily Mail, faked his own death in 1978 to avoid a “fraud trial.”

The now 73-year-old, who lives on a San Diego-based yacht named “Poverty Sucks,” was an FBI suspect soon after the hijacking, and was interrogated in 1978. Rackstraw insisted he was not Dan Cooper, and a year later, he was no longer a suspect.

The unsolved hijacking case of D.B. Cooper occurred 46 years ago, on the day before Thanksgiving, on Northwest Airlines Flight 305, just a 30-minute flight between Portland, Oregon, and Seattle, Washington. Dan Cooper approached the flight attendant with a note claiming that he had a bomb and was hijacking the 727 plane that was two-thirds full with holiday travelers.

Once he received the $200,000 (worth over $1.2 million now) that he requested, as well as four parachutes, he then allowed the passengers to safely deplane.

Now with only the crew, Cooper instructed the pilots to fly low, as they traveled between Seattle and Mexico City. This specific flight plan required a fuel stop halfway, and the flight conditions were rapidly deteriorating, with the wings and windows taking on ice. Once the flight took off, Cooper, assisted by the flight attendant, walked down the stairs of the plane, and presumably parachuted into the thick forest, never to be seen again.

Many surmised that he died from exposure, as he wore a “thin suit” and went into the cold, unprotected. Most assumed he was dead as nearly none of the money was ever spent, and he was never found.

Over the years, several suspects were interviewed, but there were no real leads. In 1980, a young boy vacationing with his family found close to $6,000 along the shores of the Columbia River, just a few miles from Vancouver, Washington. However, the D.B. Cooper cold case remained one of the great unsolved mysteries.

Last year, the FBI claimed that they “exhaustively reviewed all credible leads” and closed the 45-year cold case. Six months later, the Inquisitr reported that the Citizen Sleuths found some evidence from the J.C. Penney clip-on tie that Dan Cooper wore.

Using an electron microscope, they determined from the particles that there was cerium, strontium sulfide, and pure titanium. Not everyone would be around such particles, helping the group identify that the hijacker either worked for Boeing or was a contractor for an aeronautics company, as titanium was used in the Super Sonic transport plane.

Are you following this unsolved case? Do you think the FBI should reopen the case of D.B. Cooper and finally solve it?

[Featured Image by Johannes Simon/Getty Images]

Share this article: D.B. Cooper Update: Did Amateur Sleuths Find ‘Potential’ Evidence To Solve 46-Year Mystery?
FBI
More from Inquisitr