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

[Bodhi]

Presumably whoever called the family was known to them as an acquaintance of Nancy, but if Nancy hadn't driven to the church for years, the person would know that. If they usually chatted with Nancy after the livestream, and she wasn't on the chat that isn't a reason to panic, unless the person tried to call her to see if she was ok and no answer. Maybe THAT is why the family just went to check on her and THEN discovered something was amiss and called the police??? Hopefully, everyone knew who this person was....

I agree. It is easy for the sheriff to verify the congregant is a real person and that they called the family member. That's why I put more stock in the sheriff's account than the Daily Mail's single unnamed source.

 

[ab01]

McCabe's analysis is a stretch, IMO. I have a tough time believing that they would go and plead for a legitimate ransom demand. Indeed, that the ransom demands they received so far were not legitimate, but there may be one out there!

I do agree with him that whoever sent the current ransom iteration isn't in the Guinness Book for intellectual prowess.

One thing that holds me up about the ransom demand is that there evidently wasn't one left at the scene, which would've been far more efficient (and less dangerous!) for any kidnapper. But we do live in a world of fame craved folks. Doesn't matter the kind of fame lots of times.

JMO.

It very could be that they can’t verify the current ransom demands but can’t disregard them totally and are at a crossroads. The usual suspects haven’t panned out and they want to leave no stone unturned as they move outward. I don’t believe the ransom angle will lead anywhere, but I do understand why they would want to stay open to it. moo

 

[SlimPickens]

It very could be that they can’t verify the current ransom demands but can’t disregard them totally and are at a crossroads. The usual suspects haven’t panned out and they want to leave no stone unturned as they move outward. I don’t believe the ransom angle will lead anywhere, but I do understand why they would want to stay open to it. moo

Not disagreeing, but I'm skeptical that law enforcement would put the family through a production like that without some kind of viability as to its legitimacy. Would be a cruel thing to do to them, IMO.

"Hey you know, we don't really have anything at all, but just in case do y'all want to make a video for us on the outside shot someone wants something for her?"

JMO.

 

[Bodhi]

This is a hard case to get a handle on. There's so many ways this could go. I'm in BC Canada and we are dealing with a lot of extortions and shootings ,in a way I can see kidnappings and ransoms happening now a days. I just feel sorry for Nancy and her family ,I hope they will find her alive but hope they find her. There's so much out there but no idea what's true any more .jmvho

I am inclined to wonder if this is political, like someone seeking retribution for her daughter's coverage of something awful like the Epstein files or for Nancy's own opinions. The atmosphere is ugly IMO. Teachers and librarians, for goodness sake, are routinely threatened with violence. Stochastic terrorism encourages isolated individuals to act violently. My fear is that something Nancy did or posted online or maybe her connection to her journalist daughter made her a target of an unhinged person. MOO.

 

[justwannahelp]

ICAC?! Well that’s from left field.

Nevermind. I now see ICAC does the whole phone techy thing, so i don’t want to let my mind think the worst.

 

[Charlot123]

Perhaps Savannah has alot of crypto. She would be who they expect to profit from.

It is more about: they think it won’t be traceable. Also, they know that Savannah is a good daughter.

 

[Charlot123]

The Daily Mail article casts doubt on the official timeline that a congregant contacted Nancy Guthrie's family about her absence after church on Sunday morning. It's clickbait, in my opinion.

The Daily Mail states Nancy Guthrie had not attended church services in person since Covid, and her absence on Sunday would not have been noteworthy.

It states the church livestreamed services. That's passive viewing. Viewers cannot see who else is viewing the livestream. They cannot communicate with other viewers or the host. Therefore, according to the Daily Mail, another congregant could not have noted whether Nancy was viewing on Sunday.

The implication is that either the congregant or the family member who claimed a congregant contacted them is lying.

Please note the Daily Mail's claim that Nancy didn't attend church in person is based on a single unidentified source. It doesn't cite a source that the church livestreams services rather than using a platform like Zoom where her absence could have been noted. (Zoom allows active participation: everyone can see who else is participating and communicate with each other in a sidebar.) Or even if the church livestreamed, as @Inthedetails said, Nancy and others could have had a separate group chat open during the service to sustain community.

I don't put a lot of stock in the Daily Mail reporting. Until the sheriff states otherwise, I accept that a congregant noticed Nancy's absence and contacted a family member. MOO.

Shocking truth about mystery tip off that sparked Nancy Guthrie search

Fresh doubt has been cast on the tip off that first led to alarms being raised over Nancy Guthrie's shock abduction this weekend, the Daily Mail can reveal.

www.dailymail.co.uk

If I remember correctly, Suzanne Morphew, too, missed her Zoom church during COVID and the parishioners got anxious.

I don’t see anything unusual in it.

First, I doubt that it was a mega-church. If I were to guess, it is some local, likely, Protestant church that much depends on a steady flow of parishioners. Live-streaming means, people could log in and yes, communicate.

Now, whether it was Zoom or another app, but people leave donations, right? Many apps allow to donate online, or at least they can broadcast a link.

So all that the church had to see would be an aberration of the pattern; every Sunday an old local lady would be present online. And then one Sunday it doesn’t happen.

Knowing that she is old, they let her family know.

JMO.

 

[Sillybilly]

One thing that holds me up about the ransom demand is that there evidently wasn't one left at the scene, which would've been far more efficient (and less dangerous!) for any kidnapper.

JMO.

<rsbm>

I had considered if the 2nd time LE was back at Nancy's and appeared to be focusing on the garage, if the perp(s) had left something in the garage that would be proof to LE they were dealing with the actual kidnapper.

 

[Charlot123]

I did actually look up if a pace maker continues working after death before I posted. Every single source said yes. Here is one.

Does a pacemaker keep working after death?
Yes, pacemakers may continue sending electrical signals even after death, as they are not designed to recognize when a person has passed. This does not affect end-of-life processes
.https://www.myrhythmdevice.org/living-with-a-cardiac-device/end-of-life/

The battery works, that is. Meaning, the pacemaker is functioning. But if the tissues have died, the electrical signals don’t result in heart contraction. This would be my understanding.

IMHO: it is like a TV remote. As long as batteries are there, it is sending signals to the TV.

But if the TV is broken, nothing happens.

Can a pacemaker be “traced”? No. It doesn’t have a GPS. It is neither a computer, nor a cellphone. Rather, it is like that marine creature, an electric ray, IMHO.

 

[gitana1]

Regarding the pacemaker.

It was reported all over that Nancy was taken around 2am.

However I think it's important to explain that a pacemaker doesn't, and can't directly sync to an apple watch. No smart watch has this capability from what I can find.

I know my aunt has a pacemaker which does transmit data, but this isn't to a smart watch or phone..it's to a specialist device and it's called a "cardio messenger". It does this once only every 24 hours during the night to record and capture the previous 24 hours activity. If for whatever reason the person isn't in range of the home device at the scheduled time for data transfer, the pacemaker continues doing its job and will sync the data once back in range.

So I think the pacemaker and apple watch statement is a little jumbled. What I am guessing is, the sheriff meant that her pacemaker transmitted data at 2am which is the once daily usual time for it to do so. This takes matter of seconds. I don't know what device Nancy has and if there is the capability for the technical department of the device can see when the device actually goes OUT of range of the cardio messenger or similar home device. If so this is helpful but not necessarily possible unless the daily preset transfer of data has been missed.

However what this tells me is, Nancy was alive and in her bed at 2am when the data was transmitted. It may be they were on the ball to contact the pacemaker company and they are able to see the exact time the pacemaker was removed from range which isn't something that would be readily available. OR it could be even the sheriff is not fully aware of the technical side of this and actually based on the pacemaker alone, Nancy could have been taken anytime AFTER 2am since the pacemaker wouldn't be due to transmit data for another 24 hours.

If it's the first scenario where the tech company has provided the exact time Nancy wasn't in range of her home device they will also have data up until the point of the transmission related to her heart which could give some more details (suddenly spike in HR, etc)

Sorry for the lengthy post but I just wanted to mention incase others were also scratching their head at a pacemaker syncing to an apple watch.

Great post. Thanks for that info!!

 

[Charlot123]

I am inclined to wonder if this is political, like someone seeking retribution for her daughter's coverage of something awful like the Epstein files or for Nancy's own opinions. The atmosphere is ugly IMO. Teachers and librarians, for goodness sake, are routinely threatened with violence. Stochastic terrorism encourages isolated individuals to act violently. My fear is that something Nancy did or posted online or maybe her connection to her journalist daughter made her a target of an unhinged person. MOO.

Give a take, it is a big crime. If (when, I hope) the kidnapper is caught, it be taken very seriously. From what I understand, her daughter is a celebrity working for a “light” TV program. (Nothing light about Savannah, she is smart and ambitious, but the show that doesn’t have a “niche audience” should be rather light, IMO).

Of course, some meth-infused dude may simply dislike what his old lady neighbor has posted. We can’t account for anyone’s sanity. But I would really doubt that anyone incited about Epstein files would go to a rural area 60 miles from a Mexican border to abduct an 84-year-old wheelchair-bound lady with a pacemaker, as a form of protest.

Nancy doesn’t have a huge following, she is not an influencer.

I would still think that the motive is financial.

What another poster mentioned (some obsessed weirdo) is possible as well.

Political, tbh, seems less likely.

 

[gitana1]

I can see a scenario where it is a random home invasion. Or a worker of some type who decided to rob/attack her for whatever reason. But in both cases, I don’t see the perp carefully removing/destroying cameras and ensuring there is no footage anywhere. It seems too time consuming/complex.

I feel it is a bit more likely, under those circumstances, to be someone who knows her home and movements well.

Either that, or a very psychopathic, calculated monster who felt they could calmly take the time to make sure bo evidence was left behind.

 

[katydid23]

https://twitter.com/x/status/2019196288969969786

Maybe this^^^ is why LE ran back to the house and put the crime scene tape back up?

Hurry, the FBI is coming tomorrow----where's that yellow tape at??????

 

[Charlot123]

Regarding the pacemaker.

It was reported all over that Nancy was taken around 2am.

However I think it's important to explain that a pacemaker doesn't, and can't directly sync to an apple watch. No smart watch has this capability from what I can find.

I know my aunt has a pacemaker which does transmit data, but this isn't to a smart watch or phone..it's to a specialist device and it's called a "cardio messenger". It does this once only every 24 hours during the night to record and capture the previous 24 hours activity. If for whatever reason the person isn't in range of the home device at the scheduled time for data transfer, the pacemaker continues doing its job and will sync the data once back in range.

So I think the pacemaker and apple watch statement is a little jumbled. What I am guessing is, the sheriff meant that her pacemaker transmitted data at 2am which is the once daily usual time for it to do so. This takes matter of seconds. I don't know what device Nancy has and if there is the capability for the technical department of the device can see when the device actually goes OUT of range of the cardio messenger or similar home device. If so this is helpful but not necessarily possible unless the daily preset transfer of data has been missed.

However what this tells me is, Nancy was alive and in her bed at 2am when the data was transmitted. It may be they were on the ball to contact the pacemaker company and they are able to see the exact time the pacemaker was removed from range which isn't something that would be readily available. OR it could be even the sheriff is not fully aware of the technical side of this and actually based on the pacemaker alone, Nancy could have been taken anytime AFTER 2am since the pacemaker wouldn't be due to transmit data for another 24 hours.

If it's the first scenario where the tech company has provided the exact time Nancy wasn't in range of her home device they will also have data up until the point of the transmission related to her heart which could give some more details (suddenly spike in HR, etc)

Sorry for the lengthy post but I just wanted to mention incase others were also scratching their head at a pacemaker syncing to an apple watch.

Thank you very much.

From what I understand, we don’t even know what kind of a pacemaker Nancy has. If this is for afib, then all that it does is to increase ejection fraction, which is very important for ailing bodies but not life-or-death.

If it is a Anti-Tachycardia Pacing device (ATP) for ventricular tachycardia, it is way more serious.

I don’t know which of the two would require pairing with an Apple device and monitoring. Probably, the one for vtach?

Because, I have mentioned that my dad’s pacemaker didn’t have such an option, but perhaps, it is because his was for afib? Where daily monitoring is not that important? It increases EF by 15% or such, so it does its job, and any EKG can see that it is functioning.

I wonder if Nancy’s one is of the other type?

This being said, one can check EKG tracing on a home monitor now, so maybe Nancy had a certain app on her phone?

Basically, what the sheriff said that till 2AM, Nancy was within the proximity of her device, so, at home?

 

[katydid23]

It actually happens all the time. I can think of two recent cases where family members continued to live in bloody crime scenes, and CSI teams had to return multiple times during that period (it made no difference in the end).

Here it looks like the search is located outside the house, which isn't as bad.

Kelsey Berreth? Her mother and brother were staying in her home while she was still missing, and they found blood in the bathroom and had to call LE to come investigate it.

Luckily they still got Justice with a Guilty verdict.

 

[tricia]

Hey Everyone.
You can post Ashleigh Banfield for now unless she mentions a possible "prime suspect." The sheriff has come and said there is no prime suspect.
It's not fair to name someone as a "possible" prime suspect when the sheriff denies it. Normally, Banfield would be fine, but how would you like it if a YouTuber claimed you were the prime suspect in the biggest true crime case in the US at the moment, even though law enforcement made a special statement saying there was no prime suspect?
It is very troubling.

 

[truecrimel]

Things that point to a ransom angle (MOO)

- NG seems to have left the property alive. (Blood trail suggesting non fatal injury, sheriff stating he thinks she’s alive)
- Ransom note mentions things potentially only the offender would know.
- Close relationship to someone famous (SG)
- LE seems to be taking it seriously, suggesting something in the note points to its validity and/or corresponds to the scene.
- Family was shown the note immediately and decided to put out the response video.

Things that point away from ransom (MOO)

- Waiting 24 hrs+ to make demands.
- An odd choice of victim (senior so more liability, SG may be famous, but non controversial)
- The Thursday/Monday situation.
- The extensive knowledge the offender seemed to have of the home and security systems (knew NG would be alone, smashing cameras)

IMOO, the ransom angle is a bit out there, but seemingly more likely as things play out. I’m leaning towards someone who knows NG abducting her for personal or financial purposes, but adding the ransom in it is odd. If they are keeping NG captive and going to release her once they get their payout, she would obviously identify them if there’s a personal tie. I hate to say this, but it feels like NG isn’t supposed to return regardless (I hope I’m wrong)

 

[Charlot123]

I can see a scenario where it is a random home invasion. Or a worker of some type who decided to rob/attack her for whatever reason. But in both cases, I don’t see the perp carefully removing/destroying cameras and ensuring there is no footage anywhere. It seems too time consuming/complex.

I feel it is a bit more likely, under those circumstances, to be someone who knows her home and movements well.

Either that, or a very psychopathic, calculated monster who felt they could calmly take the time to make sure bo evidence was left behind.

Could be both in one. There are cases where psychopathic constructors or housekeepers broke into houses and abducted owners, but they usually would have robbery as the reason. I wonder if this case started like it, but then went astray? We don’t know if any credit or bank cards disappeared, do we?