On Tuesday morning, during her first appearance on NBC’s Today show since news of the second ransom note dropped, Savannah Guthrie addressed the news as tears fell from her face.
The longtime television presenter again begged people with information to come forward: “Somebody knows something,” she said. “We are in agony.”
“This is a new story today that is on your radar, but this is the life we live every day,” Guthrie added.
When asked about the case by reporters on Tuesday, US President Donald Trump said that he hopes they find her and that the Guthrie family “has gone through hell”.
The FBI and Pima County have spent months investigating the elder Guthrie’s mysterious abduction from her home near Tucson, Arizona.
“The Pima County Sheriff’s Department continues to work closely with the FBI as investigators follow up on leads, review information, and pursue the facts surrounding this case,” a spokesperson for the sheriff’s department said.
The FBI declined to comment on the contents of the ransom notes or whether investigators had found any evidence that Guthrie had died.
The BBC’s US partner CBS and other outlets reported on Monday that law enforcement had requested that media hold off publishing details of the notes while they investigated Guthrie’s disappearance.
“CBS News was aware of that second note, and was aware of the contents of the second note, but there was a real concern about messing up an investigation that was at a very sensitive time,” journalist Anna Schecter said on CBS’s streaming platform on Tuesday.
Schecter noted concerns that putting out the information could slow the momentum of the public’s help – searching through their security videos or looking for anything suspicious in their neighbourhoods.
“That was really the reason why those of us journalists who were following this very closely did not report this at the time,” she said.
Nancy Guthrie vanished after being dropped off at her home by relatives on 31 January. Concern grew when she did not go to a friend’s house to watch a virtual Sunday church service the next morning.
An initial ransom note was sent the day after she went missing and demanded millions in bitcoin for her release.
It gave specific details about her home, as well as details about her bedroom and the home’s surroundings, investigators told CBS.
The note was reportedly addressed to Savannah Guthrie. It was sent to multiple media outlets, including a local TV station which reportedly adhered to a police request not to disclose its contents.
It has only now emerged that a second note – sent on 6 February – used language similar to that of the first one, but did not include any demands, instead apologising for her death and stating it was inadvertent.
After the two notes, Savannah Guthrie and her siblings released a video addressed to the kidnappers.
“We received your message, and we understand,” the NBC host said. “We beg you now to return our mother to us.” She said the family “would pay”.
Authorities and Guthrie’s family repeatedly issued public warnings that the elderly victim was in poor health and was without critical medication.
As the search continued, authorities released images of a masked person who was seen in security camera footage outside her home.
The Guthrie family had been offering a $1m (£760,000) reward, in addition to $100,000 pledged by the FBI, for information leading to Nancy Guthrie’s return.
On 24 February, Savannah Guthrie said they would keep hoping, even though they “know that she may be lost, she may already be gone”.
In a March interview with NBC, Guthrie said several ransom notes were sent, and she believed some of them were bogus. She also told the network her family believed the two initial notes were authentic.
Guthrie stepped away from NBC’s Today show for more than two months while the investigation was underway. She returned to the programme in early April as the search continued.
