377

Not crazy. Not delusional. Simply obsessed. And yes Jo, you certainly do have a right to be emotional in dealing with your late husband as a major crime suspect. Emotion, however, doesn't excuse a lack of hard evidence. Your memories are not hard evidence. Still I've always liked having you here. And it was you who insisted to me that 727s were used for airdrops during the Nam war. Your stubborn insistence and my skepticism lead me to the U of T Air America historian who provided confirmation. You were right. I don't think DW=DBC but it's OK if you do. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Tell us more Orange, no teasing allowed here... unless you are Jo. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Yes. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

I see your point Georger, but you depend every day on the certainty of laws. You justifiably feel safe from a speeding violation if you are going slower than a posted speed limit. Law is squishy. It's fluid. Its meaning is changed all the time. I'm an engineer too. I know the other side where laws are physical and not capable of alteration by mercurial judges. Some laws are a lot less squishy than others. SOLs arent squishy. They are quantitative. They have an easily calculated expiration date. The US Department of Justice knew that unless they got the guy in the plane indicted before the SOL expired he would be off scott free if found later. That's why they indicted him. It would have been impossible to get accomplices indicted because there was zero evidence of their existence and connection to the skyjack. I think any and all Cooper accomplices, if they exist, are home free. If Bernie was an accomplice he could write a tell all book without risk of prosecution for Norjack. If the Ted Braden pictures are authentic he isn't a good match for the witness descriptions. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Georger, The staute of limitations has run out on any accomplices. They cannot be successfully prosecuted for Norjack. That law was enacted by legislatures. Courts can interpret it but judges dont write statutes. My point was that the Feds could look for more viable and more current offenses to charge them with, things totally unrelated to Norjack such as unreported income, bank loan application fraud etc. Bernie is home free on Norjack regardless of guilt or innocence. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Blevins writes: Cute, but how does a coyote get 50 miles offshore? A Border Collie surely could pull it off, but a coyote? You know we give Bruce a really hard time about spinning a non interview into a story, but look at Gray's recent NY Times piece. It is amusing but has no substance. Nobody jumped Gray for that puff piece. I was really surprised Quade dropped in a few pages ago. He let us know that he only comes around when bored, but still, he posted. Quade is an aspiring screenwriter, but wisely shuns DBC as a topic, character or theme. Nobody has made any serious money on Cooper. Doubt if anyone ever will. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Really? No suspected accomplices were indicted, only the guy on the plane. The SOL has expired. What's so "shockingly reckless" about opining that a DBC accomplice can not be prosecuted today? Giving advice to non clients is risky, but the advice given was correct as far as legal analysis goes. Still, when the Feds want to put you away they can be VERY resourceful. I know of a case where they knew a guy was doing major credit card fraud but couldn't make a case. They ended up getting him convicted of bank fraud for lieing on his mortgage loan application. He was current on his loan and never had a missed or late payment, but the app was full of lies about employment, salary etc. Tacomaman: do you still think LDC is a viable DBC candidate? If so, why. Don't just say "trust me." Give us a solid reason. Will Marla get to be on Letterman after all? Letterman will like the 2 way radio part of Marla's tale. David Letterman is a closet SWL, short wave listener. He has a receiver and uses it. It doesn't fit with his hip image so it's a down low hobby, but he listens. Read the Howard Stern interview of David Letterman. Stern really dogs him about listening to short wave radio. http://daveletterman.tripod.com/sterndave3.htm 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Farflung wrote: Snow also found that DC 9 pop top tail cone info. I am surprised and somewhat humiliated that I missed it, so we'll just call it even on the BAC 111 Farflung. Have you seen this more basic approach to jettisoning a DC 9 tail cone? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x9deMKE-iek 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Interesting quest Farflung and I can't find the AD either. Must be an SB from Boeing? Who made them? What about the one I saw on our Douglas DC 9-21 jumpship? That vane looked engineered and manufactured, not cobbed up by a maintenance department. It was rendered ineffective by simply removing the ventral door, but it was still on the plane, ready to foil the next DBC wannabe if this old DC 9 ever went back into airline service. The whole idea of the Cooper Vane shows that the FBI thought parachuting skyjackers wouldn't try it on jets that couldn't be jumped. Does that prove they believed the converse, that Cooper KNEW a 727 COULD be jumped? Nope. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Thanks Vicki. I hope it has more to do with tacomaman not understanding how to work the details of the forum posting system than deliberately trying to mix his words into mine. I'll give him the benefit of the doubt. Tacomaman also continues to ignore requests for sources. He claims to have an inside track to what the FBI is doing, but so have many others. All I know for sure about the inside workings of the FBI is that every day each SA worries about getting recognized by the boss and getting that overdue and highly deserved promotion, worries about getting posted to some god forsaken backwater office, wonders how the kids can go to college on the meager family savings culled from the modest FBI salary and wonders why he or she always gets stuck with piles of dull cases with no media interest while other agents are practically TV stars. "Daddy why arent you on TV? Carr's Dad is on all the time." Son, your Dad is working on the super secret stuff that cant be shown on TV. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

I have no idea what footwear Cooper actually wore, but I've made high speed exits out of a C 130, a CASA 212 and a DC 9-21 passenger jet. The kind of shoe shown in your attached photo wouldnt come off, but loafers almost certainly would. Of all those jumps the firewalled Herc was the fastest. What a tumble I took for the first few seconds until I could get stable... it was wild. The jump was a test jump for SSK, the US support arm for the Cypres AAD. They outfitted me with a black box pressure sensor recorder. They wanted to see what kind of pressure transients you'd get on a high speed tumbling exit. I sure obliged them on the tumbling part and the Herc drivers sure delivered the speed. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Tacomaman wrote: An agressive US Attorney could get a ham sandwich indicted, but getting a conviction is another matter. An accomplice has an excellent chance of beating the case on a motion to dismiss based on an expired SOL. DBC is not as lucky, he is defintely proescutable today. There is Z E R O hard evidence that DBC had an accomplice waiting for him on the ground or working with him in any capacity. If there was such evidence the Asst. US Attorney who filed on Cooper as a John Doe would have also included the accomplice(s). You can't get an indictment based on pure speculation. There has to be evidence that a crime was committed by the accused suspect, even if the identity is not yet known. How could you make a case against even a John Doe accomplice? It would be 100% speculation. US Attorneys aren't gods (unless they jump) and State prosecutors and county DAs are not "schmucks" as you call them. Both offices have a wide range of talent. Quite a few federal prosecutors used to be DAs. The fed job is more attractive due to pay, stability and benefits, so you rarely see job hops in the other direction. Also, the federal system is just cleaner, no stale vomit in the hallways and holding cells, no graffitii carved in to the seat backs. The courtrooms are more expensively and gracefully appointed, no dirty floors, squalid restrooms or broken ventian blinds. But don't judge the book by its cover. Legal talent resides in both the mansions and the dirty alleys of the court systems. I've seen geniuses and fools in both venues. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Orange wrote Orange is right. DBC can be prosecuted today because he was indicted (as a John Doe) before the SOL cutoff date. If he had accomplices they are no longer at risk. SOL has run out. Jo's copyright notices bug me too, but no worries. They are defective. This forum should conform to the anarchistic legal standards associated with DZs. No liability, everything is waived, lawyers can jump, but can't practice their trade outside of dispensing free advice to fellow jumpers on how to beat spousal support modification motions. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Yawn. Look up the term "vexatious litigant" Jo. You have to actually file a lot of meritless suits to be labeled as a vexatious litigant. You just threaten them. Go ahead and file every suit you've threatened. You will be searching dumpsters for aluminum cans to sell to pay your legal bills. You won't have enough money to buy food much less make the Medicare co-pays. Just stop the suit threats. You aren't going to sue anybody and nobody is going to sue you. Either or both would be a stupid waste of money. Forget litigation. Threaten to write a book or screenplay. At least there is a possible upside on that activity. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

I like Farflung's posts. I'll even indulge his phobias and spell words in a manner that does not perturb his easily rattled self views of gender and masculinity. He isn't mentally challenged, at least not to USAF standards, so that leaves "mind altering chemicals." He takes a Whuffo attitude about those chemicals, like he owns them. If he was a jumper at my DZ we'd all have a share. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Farflung, Has hunkiness and nun lust compromised the thoroughness of your aviation research. Didn't you omit the BAC 111? 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

I think a copycat skyjacker jumped from a DC 9 a few years after Norjack. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Robert99 wrote DC 9s were flying in 1971. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Freethefly's tagline is a line from a Neil Young song "Old Neil" (as Alabama folks refer to him) might as well have been writing about the Norjack jump. Into the black indeed. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Bruce wrote: Could it be a very photogenic blonde? Maybe exBlue can back me up on this. A very attactive female crime victim or witness gets a lot more attention from law enforcement than does an ordinary looking person with the same story. I've seen it first hand more than once. Sure, the FBI might not have seen Marla when they got the first report about LD, but soon she was visible and the story got legs. She really killed the golden publicity goose with the Dan Cooper comics component to her story. Had I been her agent I would have nixed that. She'd have taken her sweet time providing an LD DNA sample and she'd have already been on Letterman. Timing is everything. Howard White is a great skydiving historian and a good guy. I welcome his input here, but I also welcome Whuffos. Skydivers yawn at 99.9% of what gets posted here. Without Whuffi this forum would be growing cobwebs. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Farflung writes: That stuff doesn't get much attention here. Sounds too much like factual evidence. Bruce did raise a provocative point that got no responsive comments. He pondered whether Gray was cleverly escalating Cooper news such as Marla's story to prime the market for his book. I doubt very much whether he has that much influence but it is a nice coincidence for Gray that DBC is front page news right around book release time. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Now we know what kept him warm! I just KNEW you would catch that Vicki. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

So true Airtwardo. My instructor in 1968 said: "Anyone can jump out of a a plane and land on the ground. What you are going to learn here is how to land alive, even if something goes wrong, so pay attention." It wasn't hard to pay attention, there were no iPhones, iPods or Walkmans. Pterodactyls were our main collision hazards. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Come on Georger, it's OK to attack Blevins' conclusions but why deride him for doing real work, housecleaning? I've made a lot more money pushing paper and arguing the legal version of how many angels can stand on the head of a pin, but I've also worked gutting fish and cleaning toilets. Doing real work, the kind that is defined by Newtonian physics isn't dishonorable or an indicator of intelligence. You know that and you've probably done a fair amount of that work yourself if you raise cows. I know you get really torqued by Blevins. I don't. He's never claimed he can prove KC was DBC. He just has a theory and presents it as such. He is a magnet for vitriol but not mine. I am not his apologist or PR person. I just think he gets flamed so much that a fire extinguisher needs to be discharged once in a while. Ted Braden might be a candidate who should be revisited. The guy had a motive for sure. 377 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.

Maybe... Many think Cooper was a jumper and possibly a sport jumper. The FBI sent agents all over the skydiving community right after the skyjack. They looked at over 14,000 USPA membership records. They sent undercover agents to DZs. Most people have driven a motor vehicle. That criteria doesn't narrow the search much. If Cooper was a jumper then we are looking at a much smaller universe and one to which this website is deeply connected. 378 2018 marks half a century as a skydiver. Trained by the late Perry Stevens D-51 in 1968.