Block J, Lot 2, Space 4 at Pilot Butte Cemetery in Bend contains the headstone of Lynn D. Cooper — who may have been the famous hijacker D.B. Cooper.

The legend of D.B. Cooper landed in Bend this week when a woman claiming to be the fugitive’s niece identified a man buried at a local cemetery as the hijacker famous in criminal folklore for stymieing investigators for nearly 40 years.

Marla Wynn Cooper, 48, of Oklahoma City, Okla., told ABC News this week that she believes her uncle, Lynn Doyle Cooper, is the man who pulled off one of the most romanticized extortion and escape acts in recent memory.

D.B. Cooper has long been considered an alias for the criminal who commandeered a Northwest Orient Airlines flight between Portland and Seattle on Nov. 24, 1971, demanded $200,000, then parachuted from the plane with the cash.

His disappearance after the leap left the FBI baffled about both his identity and his whereabouts, and bestowed the criminal with quasi-folk hero status.

Lynn Doyle Cooper is a deceased Navy veteran who served in Korea and is buried in a corner of Pilot Butte Cemetery. His gravestone marks his death on April 30, 1999.

Marla Cooper told ABC those two men are one and the same, recounting a tale from her youth of her two uncles planning a grand heist in her grandmother’s home in Sisters.

Cooper said the two men planned something “very mischievous” one night, then left to go hunting. She said the next day, the airplane was hijacked and that night, Lynn Doyle Cooper returned to the house covered in bruises and blood claiming he had been in a car crash.

Marla Cooper is working on a book about her uncle and has cooperated with the FBI by providing them with a leather guitar strap he owned.

The FBI is keeping tight-lipped on Cooper’s claims, but said they do follow-up on any leads they get.

“I did see the article that came out about that woman, and officially we are not acknowledging if she is a source of information or not,” said Fred Gutt, an FBI special agent in Seattle. “We have, of course, (investigated the Central Oregon area) as it’s in the area of where the hijacker is expected to have landed. But any more specific than that we don’t comment on the case. It’s a case that is followed up on only if and when we get information.”

Gutt said the case of D.B. Cooper is considered active but is not a high priority.

“It gets a lot of coverage in the news but that doesn’t necessarily equate to the amount of significance it’s given here,” Gutt said. “Technically it is an open case, but you have to put it in context. Any matter currently impacting the community today is taking priority.”