The parachute that infamous hijacker DB Cooper used to escape from a plane with $200,000 may finally have been found.
The enigma behind DB Cooper, the man who jumped from Northwest Orient Airlines Flight 305 with thousands of dollars after handing a flight attendant a note demanding the ransom, has long puzzled the FBI.
Nearly a decade later, the FBI has begun unofficially reviewing the case after Richard Floyd McCoy II’s children contacted YouTuber Dan Gryder in 2020 with possible evidence.
After Chanté and Richard III ‘Rick’ McCoy’s mother died, they came into contact with Gryder – who had harassed them on and off for years while he conducted his own research – and invited him to the family’s North Carolina estate in July 2022.
McCoy’s mother’s storage unit contained a modified military rescue platform that Gryder said Cooper used in the robbery, he said. Cowboy stands daily.
“That scum is literally one in a billion,” he told the outlet.
McCoy’s children also agree that their father may have been Cooper, but they did not go public with their speculation until their mother died, believing her to be complicit in her husband’s crime.
On Monday, Gryder released a video on his YouTube channel, where he announced that the FBI had investigated their latest discoveries.
The enigma behind DB Cooper, the man who jumped from Northwest Orient Airlines Flight 305 with thousands of dollars after handing the flight attendant a note demanding it happen, has long plagued the minds of sleuths and fooled the FBI held. Many believe it was Richard McCoy II
Nearly a decade later, the FBI has unofficially begun re-examining the case after his children and amateur investigator Dan Gryder led them to a parachute and harness they believed had been used by Cooper in McCoy’s mother’s storage unit.
The amateur investigator said FBI agents contacted him after watching his first two videos, one of which shows him discovering the parachute in the storage facility on the family’s property.
It was the first time the FBI took action in the DB Cooper case since filing it in 2016, pending new evidence.
The flight instructor claimed that FBI agents met with him and Rick to take the harness and parachute as evidence.
They were also interested in a log that Chanté discovered related to the Cooper hijacking over Oregon and a Utah hijacking for which McCoy was convicted that occurred months after the Cooper case.
Gryder’s girlfriend Laura Savino, a retired pilot, also attended the meeting and recalled to Cowboy State Daily that the officers were “professional and stoic.”
“Since they requested the meeting, it was clear they were taking it seriously,” she said.
Gryder and McCoy’s children said the parachute underwent the unique changes the parachutes had during the Utah hijacking, which have been well documented by Earl Cossey, who owned and supplied them before the 1971 crime.
The FBI has yet to return the evidence, leading Gryder to believe their speculation that the parachute was used in Cooper’s hijacking.
A month later, an FBI agent contacted Rick to ask to search the family property. Dozens of officers came to the south site and searched “every nook and cranny,” Rick said.
Many believe McCoy is Cooper because he committed an identical robbery months after Cooper’s before being arrested and convicted. Each time, the hijacker made off with hundreds of thousands of dollars
According to Cowboy State Daily, Gryder and Savino watched and documented from a distance the search that lasted about four hours.
Rick has also provided DNA samples to the FBI, but the agency has not yet notified the McCoy family of any developments in the case.
McCoy’s name has been tossed around among investigators for years and many believe the deceased man, who died after escaping from prison, is the famous hijacker.
Many believe this is due to the nearly identical robbery McCoy committed in Utah just five months after the Cooper robbery.
In April 1972, McCoy jumped from a United Airlines flight flying over Utah after demanding $500,000.
Within 72 hours, the FBI arrested him after fingerprints were left on the note, and a witness who worked at a roadside diner recalled selling McCoy a milkshake shortly after the robbery.
The FBI raided his home without a warrant, which most likely prevented them from arresting him for the Cooper robbery.
He was sentenced to 45 years in prison for the Utah robbery, but later escaped maximum security with three other inmates.
The FBI had tested a clip-on tie left by Cooper in 1971, but they did not say whether Rick’s 2023 DNA sample matched the DNA evidence on the tie.
Gryder believes the parachute found on McCoy’s property is Cooper’s harness because modifications were made to it
Two were caught within days, while McCoy evaded capture for three months. He was later shot by police in Virginia Beach, Virginia in 1974.
Although McCoy is widely believed to be the perpetrator of the Oregon robbery, not everyone agrees with the assessment.
Retired FBI Special Agent Larry Carr, who briefly took over the case in 2007, doesn’t believe the hijacker could possibly have survived the fall – even though Gryder has done it himself in the past.
Other naysayers say McCoy was too young to fit the profile of the man in his mid-40s who completed the heist.
Gryder writes that one off as McCoy simply wearing a disguise to hide his identity.
Moreover, Gryder is confident that the parachute and harness will hold their own.
“This will definitely prove it was McCoy,” he told Cowboy State Daily.
Despite having the evidence, the FBI has not announced any new changes in the case, but previously denied true crime investigator Eric Ulis’ FOIA request, according to a June report from The American sun.
Eric Ulis (pictured) says he has discovered an adjustable axle in a tie that matches the tie Cooper was wearing
Ulis suspects a man named Vince Peterson (pictured) is Cooper after material on the tie could be linked to Pennsylvania
He requested the DNA profiles after Rick provided the FBI with a sample.
The FBI had tested a clip-on tie that Cooper left behind in 1971, but the hidden spindle built into the knot has yet to be tested.
Ulis sued the FBI, saying Cooper’s DNA could still be on the spindle, but his efforts were unsuccessful.
A judge denied his first FOIA request for the spin, and he filed a second request asking for the DNA data, saying, “We know that the FBI clearly attempted to retest last year by contacting Richard Floyd McCoy’s son, so they obviously reactivated the case. case.
“So based on these recent tests in 2023 and the other tests they did in 2001, the partial DNA they documented is a series of lines or a series of numbers – and that’s clearly an agency record.
“If you look at the other documents released under FOIA in this case, they contain Social Security numbers, so there should be no excuse for this DNA data to be personal information.
‘I’ve done a lot of heavy lifting in this case over the years […] and the only way to definitively resolve this issue is through DNA testing,” he concluded.
According to The Sun, his request was rejected this summer.
The ticket showing a Dan Cooper boarded the Northwest Orient flight in 1971
Cooper made off with $200,000 after giving the note to the flight attendant
Ulis believes the mysterious hijacker is engineer Vince Petersen of Pittsburg, Pennsylvania.
Petersen worked as a subcontractor to Boeing at a titanium factory and fits the evidence left behind by the infamous hijacker, the DB enthusiast told The Sun. He would have been 52 years old at the time of the crime and has been dead for a long time.
Ulis – who was five when the plane jacking took place – first landed in Petersen’s name after analyzing microscopic evidence left on the clip-on black tie that DB left behind before parachuting from the plane.
Several of the particles found corresponded to specialty metals used in the aerospace sector, such as titanium, high-strength stainless steel and aluminum, Ulis explained.
The sleuth claims he has found “three particles of a very rare alloy of titanium and antimony that have a very specific equilibrium, a very specific mixture.”
Ulis then combined the alloy with a U.S. patent granted to Boeing’s subcontractor in Pittsburg.