Philippine officials identify hijacker; money missing

May 26, 2000
From staff and wire reports

MANILA, Philippines (CNN) -- Philippine officials Friday recovered the body of the man suspected of hijacking a Philippine Airlines plane and robbing its passengers before unsuccessfully trying to parachute to freedom Thursday.

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Quezon provincial police confirmed the man's body had been found embedded in the ground about 70 kilometers (40 miles) outside the capital, Manila. Police identified the man by his driver's license as Reginald Chua.

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Local authorities -- who said they had found the body on Thursday night, but had = been reluctant to retrieve it sooner because Communist rebels operate in the are= a -- were only able to locate the remains because a hand was sticking out of the ground.

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They al= so said they believed Chua had died because his homemade parachute had malfunctione= d.

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"A= trained skydiver wouldn't use any improvised parachute similar to the one he used," said Aviation Security Group Director Marcelo Ele Jr.

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"I= would say (he was) an adventurist or a man who was fantasizing that he's a skydiv= er. Using that kind of parachute would be plain and simple suicide," he sa= id.

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Parachute found near body

The par= achute was found about one kilometer from Chua's body. Police found 1,440 pesos ($= 25 U.S.) a= nd two unused .22-caliber bullets on Chua's body. They did not, however, find eith= er the pistol or grenade believed to be used during the hijacking, or the money taken during the robbery.

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Officia= ls said Chua was a resident of the southern Philipp= ines province of Surigao del Norte, which is in the <= st1:place w:st=3D"on">Mindanao region. Chua was also carrying a residence certificate bearing the name Augusto Lakandula,= the name he used to board the flight.

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Ele said the hijacker was able to get = on the plane because there was no fence around the airport, making it easy for any= one to bypass security. Also, he said, the airport did not have a walk-through metal detector and the x-ray machine was not working.

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On the = flight, the hijacker moved from bathroom to bathroom toward the front of the jet complaining of a stomachache. He announced the hijacking minutes before the scheduled landing in Manila, passengers said.

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Armed w= ith a grenade and a pistol, the man -- who had donned a ski mask and swimming gog= gles -- ordered the pilot of PAL Flight PR812 to return to Davao City in the southern Philippines. The pilot said h= e did not have enough fuel. Davao City is about 600 miles from the capital, Manila.

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At one = point, the weeping and distraught hijacker fired a shot inside the cockpit, perhaps accidentally, said Emmanuel Generoso, one of the plane's three-person flight crew.

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"H= e was very tense," Generoso said. "I don't = think there's any political implications there. He had famil= y problems, he needed the money, so that's what happened."

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The pla= ne was depressurized to permit the hijacker to jump while it circled at 6,000 feet outside Manila, PAL spokesman Rolando Estabillo said.

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Thursda= y's hijacking was the first in the Philippines since 1982, when a farmer carrying a grenade took over a Philippines Airlin= es domestic flight. The man was arrested on the ground.

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Remembering D.B. Cooper

The biz= arre hijacking was similar to the 1971 takeover of a Northwest Orient Airlines Boeing 727 by a man who bought a ticket in Portland, Oregon= , under the name of Dan Cooper. The man was later misidentified by an FBI age= nt as "D.B." Cooper, and the hijacking has become legendary.

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Cooper = forced the plane to land in Seattle, Washington, where he was gi= ven a $200,000 ransom and four parachutes. He then demanded that the plane be flo= wn to Mexico: But somewhe= re between Seattle and a refueling stop in Reno, N= evada, he lowered the jet's rear stairs and leapt into history. =

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Nine ye= ars later, a boy playing on the banks of the Columbia River found $5,880 in eroded bills. But no other possible trace of Cooper -- who parachuted into a nighttime freezing rainstorm 10,000 feet over southwester= n Washington's rugged Cascade Mountains with the jet at 200 miles per hour -- was ever found= .

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The cas= e is the only unsolved domestic hijacking in the United States.

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Journalist Atika Shubert and the Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Philippine officials identify hijacker; money missing

May 26, 2000 From staff and wire reports

Parachute found near body

Remembering D.B. Cooper

Journalist Atika Shubert and the Associated Press contributed to this report.

May 26, 2000
From staff and wire reports