By Daily Mail (U.S.) | Created at 2024-11-27 22:06:36 | Updated at 2024-11-28 00:46:04
2 hours ago
Infamous airplane hijacker DB Cooper has been unmasked by DNA technology as a North Carolina father called Richard Floyd McCoy Jr, an expert has claimed.
McCoy's children - Chanté and Richard III 'Rick' - contacted YouTube investigator Dan Gryder after their mother died to confess they believed their parents were behind the DB Cooper hijacking mystery.
Now, in a bombshell update, Gryder told DailyMail.com FBI agents had asked Rick to provide a DNA sample, and that there were startling results.
Gryder claimed there are parts of Rick's DNA that lined up 'perfectly' with that of DB Cooper, possibly indicating a partial match of a relative.
The FBI is now planning to exhume his body from where it is currently buried at the family's property, Gryder added.
The iconic hijacker, whose real identity has long remained unknown, commandeered a Boeing 727 at Seattle-Tacoma airport on November 24, 1971, and held its crew and passengers hostage with a bomb threat.
He demanded $200,000 in cash - the equivalent of $1.2 million today. Once he got the money - and four parachutes - he had the crew take off before sky-diving out over the dense Pacific Northwest woods. From there he vanished without a trace.
One of the few clues in the case is DNA found on a clip-on tie left on the plane in 1971.
On November 24, 1971, an unknown man dubbed DB Cooper hijacked a Boeing 727 at Seattle-Tacoma airport and demanded $200,000 cash
Once his demands were met and transferred onto the plane, Cooper had the crew take off before he jumped out
There have been many suspects over the years, including Richard Floyd McCoy Jr. (pictured) who was convicted of an eerily similar hijacking just months after the Cooper case
After considering the similarities between the DNA, Gryder told DailyMail.com investigators are now asking to exhume McCoy's body for testing.
'All [the McCoy children] were able to tell us is that there's DNA markers that are present, and they have X amount of those that line up perfectly like Swiss cheese models where all the holes in the Swiss cheese eventually line up, but they need more of those markers, and where they have fallen down is the difference between the son's DNA and the necktie versus actual Richard Floyd Mccoy,' he said.
'Undisputable DNA, which would give them more of those markers, is what is what they're looking for. That that's where they were at on the thing. And that's how come they've requested to exhume the body, which is a huge deal.'
'If the kids will give permission, and they feel like they're that close, that if they could get those final markers to align with what was left on the airplane compared to Richard Floyd Mccoy himself.'
When contacted by DailyMail.com about the DNA testing, the FBI deferred to their July 2016 announcement that they will no longer actively investigate the case.
But Gryder, who previously revealed how he discovered a parachute rig he believes Cooper used to escape on the McCoy family farm in North Carolina, said he has seen FBI agents at the property.
McCoy's name has been thrown around among sleuths for years and many believe the late man - who died after escaping prison - is the famed hijacker.
They say this is due to the near identical heist McCoy pulled off in Utah just months five month after the Cooper heist.
One of the only possible bits of DNA evidence from the crime scene is a clip-on tie (pictured) that was left on the plane in 1971
YouTube investigator Dan Gryder investigators are looking to make a DNA match to McCoy
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 matching fingerprints left on the note, and speaking to a witness who worked a roadside restaurant and recalled selling McCoy a milkshake shortly after the heist.
The FBI raided his home without a warrant, which more than likely didn't allow them to pin him for the Cooper heist.
He was convicted to 45 years in prison for the Utah heist, but later broke out of the maximum security with three other prisoners.
Two were caught within days, while McCoy evaded arrested for three months. He was later shot by the FBI in 1974 inside his Virginia Beach home.
