HBO's new documentary film The Mystery of D.B. Cooper profiles the cases of four suspects believed to be the legendary hijacker. While the details of the case of D.B. Cooper are widely known, the man behind the crime remains a figure of mystery nearly 50 years after his famous mid-flight escape. This has resulted in a cottage industry of dueling conspiracy theories regarding the true identity of D.B. Cooper.
On Wednesday, November 24, 1971 (the day before American Thanksgiving), a middle-aged man later described as 5'10" with dark hair and a swarthy complexion entered the Northwest Orient Airlines terminal at Portland International Airport and boarded a Boeing 747 bound for Seattle. Giving his name as Dan Cooper when he paid cash for his one-way ticket, the man was said to be quiet and polite, ordering a bourbon and soda and smoking filter-tipped Raleigh cigarettes in the back of the cabin. He passed a note to one of the flight attendants shortly after the plane took off, which informed her that he had a bomb in his briefcase and that he would set it off if arrangements were not made for $200,000 in negotiable currency and four parachutes to be waiting in Seattle when the plane landed. The plane circled for two hours as the arrangements were made, landing at Seattle-Tacoma Airport at 5:39 PM.
Two hours later at 7:40 PM, the refueled 747 took flight again, this time heading to Reno, Nevada, where it would refuel in anticipation of a flight to Mexico City, which was DB Cooper's stated destination. Cooper did not wait, however, and lowered the stairs at the back of the cabin at around 8:00 PM after ordering the plane to slow down as much as possible while maintaining flight velocity at a height of 10,000 feet (3 km). It is believe that Cooper jumped from the plane at 8:13 PM when the jet experienced a sudden upward movement in the tail section, parachuting into the forests along the state line between Washington and Oregon.
Despite the largest manhunt in American law enforcement history at that time, no trace of D.B. Cooper of his ill-gotten gains was found until 1980, when an eight-year-old boy found approximately $3000 in bills that were traced to Cooper's cache on the Tena Bar beachfront, 45 miles downstream from where Cooper was believed to have touched down. Apart from those bills (which were in poor condition and barely identifiable) none of the money has ever come back into circulation and there are many who believe that D.B. Cooper died in his escape and the money was scattered to the four winds. There are others, however, who believe that he survived and it is four of these theories that The Mystery of D.B. Cooper explores.
Suspect #1: Duane Weber
Insurance salesmen are often presumed to live dull, ordinary lives. Such was the case for Duane Weber and his wife Jo, who married in 1978. Jo never suspected that her husband had a double life, but came to learn there were many things about his past he didn't tell her after she began investigating him following his curious deathbed confession in 1995. Reportedly his final words were "I am Dan Cooper," which meant nothing to Jo until she mentioned it to a friend, who told her of the case of D.B. Cooper.
Jo Weber learned that the man she knew as Duane Weber had a lengthy criminal record and had a number of fake identification cards among his personal papers. The wallet in his car had a fake Florida driver's license in the name of John Carson Collins; the name he reportedly used when he served time in prison. Duane also had an old knee injury which he claimed was acquired while jumping out of a plane, and a reoccurring nightmare where Jo said he talked in his sleep about leaving his fingerprints behind on a plane.
The most damning evidence, however, is based around Jo's recollection of a trip they took to the Pacific Northwest in 1979. Duane was obviously familiar with the area, taking Jo to several places, including a point near Lake Merwin (which is close to the wooded area Cooper is believed to have landed) which she recalls him identifying as the spot "where Cooper walked out of the woods." Jo also recalled a strange incident where Duane returned from a walk covered in dirt as if he had been digging, and later threw a bag full of trash into the river as they visited another nature site. It is Jo's belief that Duane had dug up the money he had buried for safekeeping and that the rotten bills found by the eight-year-old boy several months later were the "trash" Duane had thrown away.
Suspect #2: Barbara Dayton
Born Robert Elmer Dayton in 1926, Barbara "Barb" Dayton transitioned into a woman in 1969 and was reportedly the first trans woman to undergo surgery in Washington State. An avid pilot and skydiver who was active in an aviation group in Pierce County, Washington, Barb kept her past secret from most of her fellow pilots. She did, however, confide in Ron and Pat Foreman, who noted that Barb would become defensive of D.B. Cooper whenever he was discussed among the local pilots and anyone dismissed Cooper as a common criminal. Things came to a head one evening when, as a joke, Ron took a picture of Barb with her hair combed to one side while wearing a pair of sunglasses, leading to an apparent confession that she had been Dan Cooper.
The resemblance has also been noted by Barb Dayton's family. Her daughter, Rena, as well as Barb's niece and sister-in-law, believe that Barb was D.B. Cooper. According to family legend, Barb was also immediately recognized by her brother Bill Dayton, when he saw the composite photo of D.B. Cooper in the newspaper in the days after the hijacking. There is also no doubt in the mind of Barb's friends that she had the daring and knowledge needed to stage and survive an in-flight parachute jump.
Suspect #3: Lynn Doyle "LD" Cooper
In 2011, Marla Cooper went public with her belief that D.B. Cooper was her uncle Lynn Doyle "LD" Cooper. Marla recalled that LD disappeared after Christmas 1972 and that her father would be vague whenever she asked what happened to him. It was Christmas 1995 when Marla's father admitted that LD had been in hiding since he tried hijacking an airplane. This stirred memories from Marla's childhood and she remembered seeing her uncle LD arrive at her grandmother's home in Oregon on Thanksgiving Day 1971, barely conscious and in a blood soaked t-shirt, muttering about how he had hijacked a plane and how all the family's financial problems were solved.
The FBI found Marla Cooper's claims credible and she passed a polygraph test regarding her testimony. However, many theorists have pointed out that just because Marla believes her own story does not mean it is accurate. They also find it had to believe that D.B. Cooper, who was so meticulous in not leaving evidence behind, would use an alias so close to his real name. Additionally, apart from Marla Cooper's accounting, there is no other evidence linking LD Cooper to the case and LD Cooper isn't known to have had any of the specialized training or knowledge D.B. Cooper demonstrated during the hijacking.
Suspect #4: Richard Floyd McCoy
A devout Mormon Sunday school teacher and engineer who served in the National Guard, Richard Floyd McCoy was the sort of outstanding citizen few would peg as a potential criminal. Yet McCoy was a criminal, who skyjacked a Boeing 747 flying from Denver to Los Angeles, diverted the plane to San Francisco, picked up a $500,000 ransom along with four parachutes, sent the plane back up after refueling with instructions to fly east and bailed out of the plane in mid-flight near Provo, Utah. This occurred on April 7, 1972, roughly 5 months after D.B. Cooper's heist in the skies between Portland and Seattle.
The circumstances of McCoy's robbery mirrored Cooper's in most respects, right down to the number and style of parachutes requested and the model of plane hijacked. It has also been commented that McCoy resembled the composite drawing of D.B. Cooper and had the military and survival training necessary to plot such a stunt and survive it. He also had the tenacity to break out of prison twice after being convicted of the Denver skyjacking and died in a gunfight with FBI agents in July 1972.
McCoy was questioned regarding D.B. Cooper's crimes after being captured, but refused to confirm or deny anything. While the FBI officially declared McCoy's skyjacking a copycat crime, the similarities in MO and other physical evidence have convinced many of the investigators who looked at McCoy's case that he was the man called Dan Cooper. While The Mystery of D.B. Cooper ends without taking a stand, the evidence it presents regarding the idea that Richard Floyd McCoy was D.B. Cooper proves the most convincing.