FBI: 'D.B. Cooper' test inconclusive

WASHINGTON, Aug. 9 (UPI) -- DNA testing of a necktie belonging to airline hijacker "D.B. Cooper" has failed to link it to a new suspect in the four-decade-old case, the FBI says.

However, the bureau said, the testing does not definitely rule out a man named L.D. Cooper, now deceased, as a suspect, USA Today reported Tuesday.

L.D. Cooper's niece, Marla Cooper, told the FBI earlier this year she believed L.D. and another uncle were involved in the skyjacking of a Northwest Orient flight over Oregon in 1971, when the hijacker, known as "D.B. Cooper," threatened to blow up the plane and demanded and received $200,000 ransom and a parachute.

With the cash in hand, the hijacker bailed out of the airplane somewhere over Oregon.

Marla Cooper, who was 8 at the time of the hijacking, says L.D. Cooper showed up at her house bloodied and bruised the morning after the hijacking.

She overheard her uncles talking about a hijacking and getting "rich," she says.

The FBI says testing of some items belonging to L.D. Cooper has proved inconclusive, but they are talking to the family to identify other items that could be tested, possibly for fingerprints.