Recent Suspects, 2013-2015
With the hub-bub about R-Leps this week including several emails and media postings, I thought I best expand my book to include the most recent suspects. Here we go:
Chapter 30-Something
Recent Suspects—2013-2015
Although the DB Cooper case is over forty years old the suspects keep coming, and one of the enduring mysteries of this case is how many middle-aged white guys didn't show up for Thanksgiving at their family home in 1971.
One of those gentlemen who skipped out on his turkey dinner was Jack Albert Collins, and family lore says he spent the holiday weekend with his younger brother, Romaine “Bud” Collins. Jack Collins' story as DB Cooper came to light in 2013 when his son, Bradley Scott Collins, published his narrative account of his family,
My Father Was DB Cooper - $200,000 in ransom and a parachute jump to an uncertain fate.Bradley, who was fourteen in 1971, isn't sure where his father was on Thanksgiving Day, but remembers that he had departed from the family home in Everett, Washington, on Wednesday, having driven off early in the day and indicating that he was going to visit Bud, who lived near Battleground. Jack never called his wife or family during the holiday period, and returned on Sunday only to say that he “was tired.”
Bradley says that he assumed that his father and his Uncle Bud had gone skydiving, as both of them were experienced parachutists. In fact, they were both friends of Cooper suspect, Ted Mayfield. Both brothers were also life-long pilots, and further intrigue is added by “Uncle Bud,” who was a 727 pilot for Northwest Orient. However, author Bradley doesn't prove what his father or uncle actually did that weekend, and only offers his gut feelings about the two men.
When the skyjacking was taking place, Bradley says that he heard Flight 305 circle overhead as he sold Seattle Times newspapers at the Everett ferry docks, and claims he instinctively knew that his father was performing the hijacking above him. Bradley says his father was a risk-taker and would entice his younger brother to join in with his escapades, so the skyjacking was just their latest adventure. In fact, Bradley's father was a kind of wheeler-dealer and had the nickname of “Jumping Jack Cash.” As a result, Bradley feels his father performed the skyjacking, and Uncle Bud was the ground man, assisting Jack in making a getaway from his landing area near the Merwin Dam in Ariel.
Bradley's instincts were further solidified in December 1971 when his father announced that the FBI had interviewed him and Uncle Bud in connection to the DB Cooper case. Apparently a local “Town Mayor,” Harve Harrison, and his wife Jodi, strongly suspected Jack Collins of being the skyjacker and had alerted the police.
Although Bradley offers no conclusive proof that his father was DB Cooper, he shares numerous tidbits about his father's questionable business practices, and intimates that his father engaged in business fraud and money laundering. Bradley also delivers a dramatic account of finding his Uncle Bud in his family home, dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Uncle Bud also left a suicide note, blaming his brother Jack for “interfering in his life.”
In 2009, Bradley began researching his father's life, and his own personal suspicions that Jack Collins was DB Cooper. Bradley contacted Curtis Eng at the Seattle FBI, who inquired about DNA samples, but the results of Eng's investigation of “Jumping Jack Cash” are unknown.
During the 2013 DB Cooper Symposium in Tacoma, I interviewed Bradley about his book and his claim that his father was DB Cooper. The conversation was contentious, however, and when I pushed Bradley for some proof beyond his own personal “gut” feelings, he got angry and stormed out of the rotunda of Washington State Historical Museum where we were meeting. His wife, Robin, attempted unsuccessfully to soothe him, and endeavored to continue the interview with me. Unfortunately, she had little of substance to offer, other than to say that Jack had been a very nice guy and had “always been very welcoming to the family.”
Another gentleman to miss Thanksgiving in 1971 was Robert Richard Lepsy, of Grayling, Michigan. However, Lepsy missed more than a family gathering and had vanished in 1969, never to appear again.
The Lepsy story was brought to light in 2014 by Ross Richardson, an inquisitive scuba diver who loves exploring the sunken wrecks embedded in the Great Lakes surrounding his home. In fact, Ross' moniker at the DB Cooper Forum is NMIWrecks, which stands for Northern Michigan Wrecks. See: You are not allowed to view links.
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Nimi Wrecks, as he is belovedly known at the Forum, is our primary source of information on Lepsy, and he has included the Lespy-as-Cooper saga in his collection of secretive crimes from Michigan, titled:
Still Missing—Rethinking the DB Cooper Case and Other Mysterious Disappearances. Here is what we know of Richard Lepsy: In 1969, he was 31 and the manager of Glen's Market, a small, rural grocery in Grayling, Michigan. He disappeared abruptly on October 29, 1969, and several days later his car was found abandoned at the Cherry Capital Airport in Traverse City, Michigan. The keys were in the ignition and the car was unlocked. A half-pack of cigarettes was found on the dashboard.
The Michigan State Police and local police investigated, but discovered only a handful of clues. They reported that $2,000 was found missing from the grocery store safe, and that some locals claimed that Lepsy had a girl friend. The MSP also said that individuals resembling Lepsy and the girl friend had been seen boarding a plane at the airport where the car was recovered, and that the pair had made their way to Mexico.
Several years later, Lepsy's family appeared on the Sally Jesse Raphael TV show in 1986 and described their search for Richard. Lepsy's wife, Jackie, appeared to still be in shock, and the daughter, Lisa, did most of the talking. Currently, Lisa is advocating for the DB Cooper connection, and numerous news outlets picked up the story as their 2015 DB Cooper Anniversary story.
However, there is no substantive reason to connect Richard Lepsy to the DB Cooper skyjacking. Lepsy had no known skydiving experience, nor any special awareness of 727s or flying. He was not a pilot. Additionally, he was only 33 years-old in 1971, and had only a passing resemblance to the sketches of DB Cooper.
It is unknown if the FBI has ever investigated Richard Lepsy.
