DB Cooper & the FBI
Bruce A. Smith has been an investigative journalist since 2006, first at The Dispatch in Eatonville, WA, and then at his online news magazine, The Mountain News-WA. (www.themountainnewswa.net).
Bruce is also the author of several books on the infamous DB Cooper hijacking incident from 1971, most notably: DB Cooper and the FBI – A Case Study of America’s Only Unsolved Skyjacking, 3rd Edition (2022).
His investigation into this crime began in 2008, when he interviewed local DB Cooper authors, Ron and Pat Forman, for The Dispatch. When Bruce started the Mountain News in 2011, he deepened his investigation of the case, and since then has participated in several documentaries on Cooper. Most notable are the four-hour History Channel broadcast in 2016 and the 2020 HBO documentary: “The Mysteries of DB Cooper,” which is his favorite. Bruce has appeared several times with Josh Gates in various “Expedition Unknown” episodes, exploring various aspects of the skyjacking, particularly the uncanny money find at Tina Bar where approximately $6,000 of Cooper's ransom was discovered in 1980 buried at a Columbia River beach. He speaks extensively on the Cooper case and has appeared on numerous podcasts and radio programs, such as Ground Zero Radio and Darren Schaefer’s “The Cooper Vortex.” Bruce has also been a regular speaker at DB Cooper Conferences, held most recently at Seattle’s Museum of Flight in 2022, 2023, and 2024.
DB Cooper Case Overview
recorded November 8, 2016 at the Graham, WA Library
DB Cooper and the Parachutes
October 2017
The Money Find
November 2017
This video explores the discovery of part of DB Cooper's ransom money in 1980.
Money was found in two separate places at a beach called Tina Bar, a spot along the Columbia River just downstream from Vancouver, Washington.
The first portion was found on Sunday, February 10, 1980, by an 8-year-old boy named Brian Ingram. Brian found three bundles of weathered twenty-dollar bills when he was digging in the sand, and shortly thereafter, the bills were confirmed by the FBI as ransom money that had been delivered to the skyjacker in November 1971.
The second portion was discovered when the FBI descended upon Tina Bar and unearthed thousands of shards of money buried in the sand for a stretch of 40 feet under the area where Brian had found his bundles. After digging through the areas with shovels, the FBI brought in backhoes and found fragments of bills down to a depth of 3-4 feet.
How the money got there and when is still unknown, but there are plenty of theories to explain this unusual phenomenon. Welcome to the DB Cooper story – one that is filled with inexplicable mysteries.
Citizen Sleuths
December 12, 2017
The Citizen Sleuths is an FBI auxiliary group formed in 2008 by FBI Special Agent Larry Carr, and led by paleontologist Tom Kaye. The Citizen Sleuths have performed, arguably, the most important research and forensic investigations of the case, notably on the money recovered and other related issues in the skyjacking, such as the particles found on the tie worn by DB Cooper and recovered from the plane when it landed in Reno, Nevada Nov 24, 1971. The Citizen Sleuth and Tom Kaye are still active in the case, and Bruce’s interview with Tom: