Coopericane

I don't think we (or at least I) know enough about Gunther to say for certain if a hoax is the kind of thing he'd try to pull off. On one hand, he was an award-winning, seemingly serious journalist. But after taking a look at his other publications, they seemed a little... fanciful? The covers almost remind me of what clickbait may have looked like in the 1980's if it existed. Mind you I didn't actually read any of them, and I have no idea if the attention-grabbing quotes on the cover are even something the author would be responsible for. All in all, it's a relatively minor dig at his credibility. I haven't found anything to make me think he invented his whole Cooper story. Him being misinformed and/or taken for a ride by a hoaxer seems more likely to me considering some of the basic fact-checking about the hijacking he fails to do in his book.

Hahneman does have that "geeky, older guy" look going on. Surely the stews must have been shown pictures of him at one point? But the results are probably redacted beyond recognition...

Right... I forgot about that. Nevermind lol. Also the timeline doesn't seem to work considering The Paper Trip was only first published in 1971... Is there a digital copy of "Do-It-Yourself Divorce" floating around anywhere?

There's something I've wondered about in the back of my mind for a while... could Max Gunther's Dan Leclair have been inspired by an infamous book called The Paper Trip? I stumbled upon a digital copy yesterday, and I was surprised at how well some of the instructions line up with what Gunther lays out in his book. It does seem like the sort of book a man like Leclair, someone obsessed with "disappearing" himself, would seek out and read... https://archive.org/details/the-paper-trip/mode/1up

Funny, from a certain point of view, one might say that this conversation contains one Cooper suspect being questioned about another Cooper suspect...

Where does the last one on the right in the top row come from? And the one before Hahneman's pictures and McCoy's sketch?

I think he's saying that the documents about the guy John Anderson was looking into is someone else. Another suspect from Egg Harbor, older and working at a different airline. Which would make sense to me considering the discrepancy between Catalano being a good match for the sketch and this other guy apparently not being so. Catalano is the unresolved Egg Harbor suspect. His name is unredacted in the newest FBI files.

It is very odd indeed to me to sit on what seemed like a relatively compelling suspect for so long. I believe there was some contention with a few cops who knew him whether or not he actually resembled the sketch, which led to him being erroneously eliminated at some point. I wonder if because of this, his files could have gotten shuffled around and misplaced, only to be drawn back to the FBI's attention decades later during a lookover of the case? That's pure speculation on my part, though I can't think of another reason to play coy with such a seemingly good lead. Hopefully, some future documents will shed some more light here... especially on their reinvestigation into him in 2004.

They seem to have kept him close to their chest despite being aware of him for a long while. I wonder why. It's possible he never even knew he himself was a suspect.

Very nice... just noticed that Catalano's complexion is confirmed as "dark" in those docs you posted... he also had unspecified military experience (paratrooper training, just maybe?). Seems a little scrawny for Cooper at 155 pounds though, and 37 might still be too young... Anyone able to figure out anything else new about him? I haven't found much, other than a few lawsuits mentioning him... looks like he even filed one himself. He did NOT like TWA, that much I can say for sure, lol.

I've always heard that it was actually three different partial profiles they found on the tie, each belonging to a different male. So when a suspect's DNA is tested, they are actually being compared to that batch of partial samples. It's not an unreasonable assumption to make that one of those profiles is Cooper, but then again it's not something they can be sure of, either. Whether or not any suspect was ruled out entirely on the basis of their DNA is unknown to me, but I feel like it's one of many factors they would have considered though acknowledging it's not something they can rely upon completely.

Indeed... not much of an olive/swarthy complexion, though, which worries me! I wonder also if as an Italian he had any sort of noticeable accent?

He left TWA in 1974... but it seems like he had a grudge against the company both before and after that. He was arrested in 1999 for tampering with evidence, and he passed away in 2006.

Looks like our new friend has gotten in trouble before... https://arrestfacts.com/Fred-Catalano-2p7u54

Fred Catalano, sixth from the end.