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After investigating a thousand suspects since a person who called himself (or herself) D.B. Cooper  skyjacked a Boeing 727 on November 24, 1971, the FBI thought it finally had a “credible” tip. Until last night, that is, when CBS News reported that the Cooper lead had fizzled and the FBI was expected to formally rule out the new evidence.

Tattered remains of ransom money in $20 bills Photo: FBI

Late last week a British newspaper leaked that the FBI sent evidence to its forensics lab in Quantico, Virginia, after an informant led them to recover an unspecified item from a person who has been dead for a decade.

Composite sketch Photo: FBI

But by Monday morning, author Geoffrey Grey told NBC’s Today staff that he doubted the credibility of any new evidence, because it would contain so many fingerprints as to defy an individual confirmation. Grey, coincidentally, was on Today to promote Skyjack, his book on D.B. Cooper for sale next week.

The skyjacker and most of a $200,000 ransom—other than $5,800 found in 1980 buried in a bank of the Columbia River in Washington—remain missing.

Still.