Disturbing new details about a ransom letter related to the search for Nancy Guthrie revealed that a looming multi-million-dollar payment deadline could be a crucial turning point, as family members plead with their mother’s captors to make contact.
The alleged ransom note sent to the media promised Nancy was alive and included a Bitcoin address to send cryptocurrency for the mother-of-three’s release, TMZ revealed Thursday as the first payment deadline passed.
A secondary deadline for the family to hand over millions in Bitcoin and return Nancy home is ‘far more consequential,’ the news website’s Harvey Levin told Fox News on Thursday night, without offering any specifics.
But concerns are growing within the Guthrie family as they struggle to reach the people who may have kidnapped the 84-year-old.
The note sent to TMZ and local TV stations only claimed Nancy, the mother of television host Savannah Guthrie, was ‘safe but scared’ but left no way for the family to get in contact with the kidnappers.
‘The letter says: “You will have no way of contacting me, this is the only contact,”‘ Levin told CNN following the family’s second plea for the captors to make contact.
He noted that the author went to ‘great lengths in making sure it’s anonymous.’
‘So that’s why they’re pleading for proof of life, because they have no idea how to get in touch with this person.’
He then claimed that officials are still having trouble tracking down who may have sent the letter, and Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos has said officers still have not yet identified any suspects in the case.
‘As far as we can tell, it’s impossible to trace the origin of this email,’ Levin said Thursday night.
But, he said, ‘there are real reasons, based on what’s written there, that I believe that this person is in the radius of the Tucson area,’ citing ‘something specific in there’ without going into detail.
‘I think at least what the authorities have is they have a radius, and that’s something,’ the TMZ producer said.
Nancy was mysteriously taken from her $1 million home in Tucson, Arizona, early Sunday, and the alleged ransom note offered specific details about an Apple Watch placed inside her house and a broken flood light, Levin said.
‘This is not a letter that was thrown together in a couple of minutes,’ the TMZ producer told Hannity. ‘It’s a very specific, well-organized, layered letter that really lays things out.’
‘This is not AI. It’s not a crazy person who’s writing this,’ Levin continued, citing the ‘very, very structured’ and ‘very detailed’ format of the note.
FBI officials have said they have not verified that the ransom is legitimate, but insisted it is being taken ‘very seriously’ as an investigative lead.
Meanwhile, the bureau announced Thursday it arrested an imposter who was charged with allegedly sending a fake ransom note.
Authorities have said that Nancy was abducted from her home after going out for dinner with her eldest daughter, Annie, and son-in-law Tommaso Cioni.
She had traveled to Annie’s home, about 30 minutes away, at around 5.30pm in an Uber on Saturday night, and a family member then dropped her back off at her house at around 9.50pm, where she entered through her garage door, Nanos said at a news conference Thursday.
Hours then went by before her doorbell camera disconnected at 1:47am Sunday, but at 2:12am, a person was detected by the camera’s sensors. At 2:28am, Nancy’s pacemaker app – a device tracking her heartbeat – cut off from her phone’s Bluetooth, Nanos said.
Nancy was then reported missing after she failed to show up for church services later on Sunday morning.
When investigators then combed through Nancy’s home, they found blood droplets steps from the front door and the doorbell camera missing from the front porch.
Blood samples have since been ‘rushed through’ for DNA processing, but ‘the results were minimal.’
‘It, it, it came back to Nancy. That’s what we know,’ he continued, adding that more items have been submitted for DNA testing, but have not come back yet.
In the meantime, FBI Special Agent Heith Janke said authorities have not ruled anyone out as suspects, and said that agents are ‘analyzing information from all digital sources, which includes banks, social media companies, phone companies, and any other organization where a digital footprint could have been captured.’
‘We’re actively looking at everyone we come across in this case, everybody,’ Sheriff Nanos agreed.
‘We would be irresponsible if we didn’t talk to everybody – the Uber driver, the gardener, the pool person, whoever. Especially – it’s so cliche – but everybody’s still a suspect in our eyes. That’s just how we look at things and think as cops,’ he continued.
‘And the family’s been very cooperative,’ the sheriff added. ‘They’ve done everything we’ve asked of them. And we want that relationship to continue.’
The Guthrie siblings have made several pleas to their mother’s captors, begging them for proof that she is still alive.
On Wednesday night, Savannah sat beside her two siblings in a teary-eyed video in which she said they were ‘ready to talk.’
But she said they wanted proof that the potential kidnappers were not using fraudulent images of Nancy before they sent any money.
‘We live in a world where voices and images are easily manipulated. We need to know, without a doubt, that she is alive and that you have her. We want to hear from you and we are ready to listen. Please, reach out to us,’ the Today Show anchor said through tears.
Her brother, Camron, then reiterated that message on Thursday after the first ransom deadline passed.
‘Whoever is out there holding our mother – we want to hear from you,’ he began, noting: ‘We haven’t heard anything directly.’
‘We need you to reach out and we need a way to communicate with you so we can move forward,’ Camron continued.
‘But first, we have to know that you have our mom,’ he said.
‘We want to talk to you and we are waiting for contact.’
Savannah captioned the short video, ‘Bring her home.’
