AZ Nancy Guthrie, 84, (mother of TODAY Show host Savannah Guthrie) missing - last seen in the Catalina foothills area on Jan 31, 2026

[Nikynoo]

You are right. KOLD got it at 5PM on Monday. Media didn't report it until the 4th. "The first ransom note in the case of missing Nancy Guthrie was received by the Tucson television station KOLD News 13 at approximately 5:00 p.m. on Monday, February 2, 2026. "

So is it possible that because it was sent after the news of NG going missing but the headlines (24 hours later?) that the ransom request is a hoax? Surely if it was a genuine kidnap ransom the request/email would have been more or less immediate?

 

[Moonchime]

My inquiring mind wants to know, if the kidnappers can send a note to the local news station, why can't they also send a generic photo of NG to show proof of life? What would be so hard about that?? I mean, they can print it off and send it along with however they are sending the note or email.

JMO.

If there truly is a kidnapper, I can think of only two reasons they might refuse to provide proof of life. Either NG is no longer alive, or she is being held in a location the kidnapper no longer has immediate access to, such as a climate-controlled storage unit. In that scenario, the kidnapper may already be out of the area and planning to reveal NG’s location only after receiving the Bitcoin.

 

[Warwick7]

Evening news Tucson anchor.
Residents in Nancy Guthrie's neighborhood received this letter yesterday.

https://twitter.com/x/status/2019907474103693377

 

[Sadi]

DBM

 

[SUNchips]

I am not very informed in bitcoin either, can they identify a wallet and if there was an activity on it and from where? Maybe they are looking at the cameras outside of that gas station, looks like the atm is not inside the gas but 120 ft away? Based on this map below. The highlight on the chevron camera looks like they were looking outside

That map is of Chevron though, not circle K

 

[Starkville]

And... (speculating that NG's car might have been captured outside of NG's property) if NG drove her car home, opening her garage at 9:48 pm to drive her car in, why did she uber to dinner? Why was her car not available at 5 pm? And if NG drove her car, why did the police say family dropped her off?

The unanswered question -- was NG's car driven at any point that day/night? It's a fair question because LE seized it.

JMO

If there was front-end damage to the car, IMO it’s possible that Nancy had had a fender-bender and was spooked about driving. And of course, I don’t see anything weird about SIL driving her home at night. Many older people don’t drive at night. MOO

 

[Moonchime]

Oh gosh, they even taught us about watching out for white vans without windows in the 80’s… to this day i’m still weary!

I am too. If I see a windowless white van in a parking lot, you can bet I'm not parking anywhere near it.

 

[dogmom805]

I have a speculative answer not based on any fact whatsoever. My husband's parents once loaned their car to my neice (their granddaughter) for a couple weeks. Then they took an Uber to my SILs house to go pick up the car and drive it back home later that night.

I wouldn't think LE would have said family brought her home, though, if NG actually drove her car home. Unless someone is not being truthful. Perhaps she drove home herself and the family followed her, making she made it in the garage?

 

[Simply Southern]

I'm curious about any thoughts about the timing of this crime? Feb 1st feels very intentional.

I've done some looking into Feb 1st such as the obvious holidays, but can't seem to find anything of importance. The date being the 1st of Feb may have nothing to do with anything, but it's been bothering me.

Full moon … moonlight

Moon Phase for Today and Tonight

Keep track of the Moon Phases as it does it's monthly dance around the Earth

www.moongiant.com

 

[KellySleuth]

The thing is, if you have something to gain from her passing, then you have nothing to gain from the lack of a body. If she is officially registered as a missing person then you'd need a legal process to get her declared as having passed. I agree that it could be number 1 if the motive is revenge/rage as a result of a financial disagreement.

That is a very good point.

 

[slowpoke]

Wait. First people were saying the 2 minutes between garage door opening and closing was too long to just get Nancy in the house, and now it wasn’t long enough? I give up.

Has anyone seen any recent video of NG walking, so we would know her degree of low mobility? Maybe that can help us decide if 2-ish minutes is reasonable.

 

[ttjo]

DBm confirming the convenience store. L/e was at or if only the circle K was reported.

 

[SMK777]

Why Elizabeth Smart’s Father Believes Savannah Guthrie’s Family Spoke Directly to Kidnappers

https://people.com/elizabeth-smart-father-on-nancy-guthrie-11901258

 

[katydid23]

For now.. rbbm. snippets.

FBI profiler gives insight into man who 'abducted' Nancy Guthrie from own home

More than 72 hours after the disappearance of Nancy Guthrie, a former FBI special agent, has revealed what she believes is the profile of the 84-year-old's potential abductor

www.irishstar.com

''Speaking to the Daily Mail, Dr Bryanna Fox, a former FBI special agent in the agency's Behavioral Science Unit and criminology professor at the University of South Florida, stated that Guthrie most likely doesn't know her kidnapper.

"If it were a family member or somebody who knows the house, they wouldn't have forced entry," Dr Fox explained. "If she knew them, they would have been likely to have carried out a ruse to get her to go with them and get into the vehicle."

They could have staged the scene and faked a forced entry at some point, to throw people off. Not doing so would make it obvious it was a friend or family member, imo.

 

[Starkville]

You know, now that I think about it, this bothers me. What if it was days before she was reported missing? What if the one Eagle eyed church goer would jot have reported her missing. Its not uncommon to go several days of not talking to elderly parents and grandparents. Why not release the ransom note immediately. Or maybe they did and we aren't aware??? Is that possible?

Just a side note, but the “eagle eyed churchgoer” and their timely phone call have been left out of the official timeline.

JMO but I think it’s significant that such a significant event is not included.

 

[CSIDreamer]

I’m interested in what time the email was sent. Was it before or after the news of NG missing and her daughter was a well known newscaster, hit the headlines? The timing may well indicate whether the ransom demand is genuine or not.

I think the ransom note was after. This thread was started around 12:30 a.m. Monday. The first ransom note was Monday late afternoon. JMO

 

[HoveringWombats]

Please could you explain to me how the person who sent the ransom note could be hiding their source from FBI?

I keep hearing VPN but I myself have a VPN. Surely it can't be as simple as that?

I'm not the person you're asking, but I do think it's important to understand that there's a whole range of ways to hide your origin on the internet. Even under the umbrella of "VPN" there are a lot of pretty different things that the term encompasses. Long before there was ExpressVPN and all these consumer "privacy" VPNs, VPN was used to securely connect networks together. And today, yeah, if sign up through a reputable VPN service based in a Western country, and use that to commit crimes, it's probably not going to go well for you. Another step down the line is a VPN service based in, say, Russia or India. Maybe not impossible to trace, but it's going to be a bit harder. Now, do multiple hops through multiple sketchy providers. A bit harder still. Next, maybe set up your own VPN, hopping through cloud providers (maybe in compromised accounts). Or route your traffic through compromised PCs on residential networks, or a series of rogue proxy servers.

Imagine this scenario. I park somewhere in the parking lot of a mall. I use a high-gain antenna to connect to an open wifi network that some store or restaurant in the mall is running. I proxy through Russia, India, back to a different Russian proxy, and finally exit through a compromised windows computer in some innocent person's house in Michigan. The only thing I do through that proxy is open news station tips forms (NO access to an email account or anything else), and submit a plain text tip through the form. Yeah, this takes some work to do, but you don't have to be a genius. There's a lot of information out there on these things and it's not that buried. This would be quite difficult and time-consuming to track down. And honestly you probably don't need to make it this convoluted to hide effectively.

While it's 1000% true that many people get caught while doing things that they think are untraceable, it's also true that it isn't that hard to make it pretty difficult or potentially impossible for investigators. I know it's comforting to believe that the feds can trace anyone, it's not true. They can trace a lot more than most people think, and most criminals make enough mistakes to get caught, but it's not rocket science to hide.

MOO - I know I am not verified as an expert and I don't really know exactly what the boundaries of the rules are on this, so let's just say this is my opinion and leave it at that.

 

[tbgo]

The flood lights being destroyed is interesting. I’m guessing they’re asking if anyone close to Nancy knew about that. If it was damaged before she went missing - the person close to her may have also known about that (in the family) beforehand or they caught it via the media although the media, I don’t think, ever picked up on it and reported about it. Would someone actually damage them before they went in and kidnapped her. I doubt anyone went up on the roof at 2am and smashed them. Let’s say the SIL was involved, maybe someone did all this when she was away for a few hours that day. I guess flood lights would help a camera see them. It doesn’t sound like the doorbell detected that someone was at the residence before 2am. Then again, you never know.

They could end up arresting someone and never get to the bottom of who was sending the ransom letters. We may end up with suspicions that the person who did it was also behind them but we never get any hard evidence. I swear if the SIL and daughter are behind this, oh, boy… The media will have a field day looking into these two.

 

[cady]

Wait. First people were saying the 2 minutes between garage door opening and closing was too long to just get Nancy in the house, and now it wasn’t long enough? I give up.

Plenty of time, the door to house from inside the garage was probably only 10 steps max from the passenger door. In safely, car backs out and NG closes garage door. JMO

 

[No_Stone_Unturned]

I wouldn't think LE would have said family brought her home, though, if NG actually drove her car home. Unless someone is not being truthful. Perhaps she drove home herself and the family followed her, making she made it in the garage?

Why would NG enter her home via the garage and not the front door? This has been bothering me. The entire garage situation is bothering g me.