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Recently unveiled FBI investigative documents shed new light on the infamous D.B. Cooper hijacking case, revealing that agents once considered a former pilot from western Maine as a potential suspect.
According to these files, the FBI interviewed Raymond Sidney Russell, who also went by the names R. Sid Russell and Sid Russell, in 1972. This inquiry was part of their attempts to unmask the individual who commandeered a Northwest Orient Airlines flight in November 1971, seized a $200,000 ransom, and made a daring parachute escape over the Pacific Northwest.
The hijacker has never been apprehended, and the case remains one of the most notorious unsolved mysteries in the FBI’s history.
The Portland Press Herald reports that Russell, originally from Norway, Maine, and born in 1923, had served in the military and later pursued a career in aviation, working with the Flying Tigers and other cargo airlines. He had lived on the West Coast before returning to Maine in 1971.
The FBI had released sketches following the hijacking incident on November 24, 1971, when a man known as D.B. Cooper took control of a flight from Portland to Seattle and vanished after parachuting from the aircraft with $200,000 in hand.
The FBI files do not specify how Russell first drew investigators’ attention, but the documents show agents reviewed his background and interviewed him at his home in September 1972. During that interview, Russell reportedly denied any involvement in the hijacking and said he had returned to Maine months before the crime to be with his mother.
According to the newspaper, some of the people agents spoke with believed Russell could have committed the crime, while others did not think he was capable of it.
The newly released portion of the file includes a handwritten notation dated November 1972 that reads “ELIMINATE RUSSELL,” suggesting the bureau decided not to pursue him further.
Ryan Burns, a Mississippi criminal defense attorney who runs a YouTube channel called “D.B. Cooper Sleuth” and attends an annual Cooper-focused gathering known as “CooperCon,” told the Portland Press Herald that he has reviewed all the FBI’s released files.
“It’s kind of the coolest crime ever. This guy is wearing sunglasses, smoking cigarettes, drinking bourbon in the back of a plane,” Burns said. “And he got away with it.”
Burns said roughly two dozen people appear to have been investigated as seriously as Russell. The expert said that he doesn’t believe Russell was the hijacker, citing differences between Russell’s physical characteristics and witness descriptions of Cooper. He also noted that despite decades of investigation, he doubts the case will ever be solved, in part because potential DNA evidence may have been destroyed.
“I don’t think anybody in the world wants it solved more than I do, given all the effort I put into it,” Burns told the newspaper.
Money recovered in 1980 that matched the ransom money serial numbers. (FBI)
Records reviewed by the newspaper show Russell was a standout high school skier in Norway and later received a $5,000 state grant in the late 1980s for an invention. Russell died in 1989 and is buried in Paris, Maine. The FBI redacted the names of witnesses and acquaintances interviewed in connection with Russell.
Fox News Digital has reached out to the FBI for comment on the case.
The canvas bag that contained one of the parachutes given to D.B. Cooper in 1971. According to the FBI, Cooper asked for four chutes in all; he jumped with two (including one that was used for instruction and had been sewn shut). He used the cord from one of the remaining parachutes to tie the stolen money bag shut. (FBI)
More than five decades after the hijacking, the Cooper case continues to draw fascination, inspiring books and movies. Despite thousands of pages of released documents and countless theories, the identity of the man who successfully hijacked the commercial aircraft remains a mystery.
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