Second Note Sent to Media Claimed Nancy Guthrie Died Following Her Abduction

In February, the second letter sent to the media regarding Nancy Guthrie‘s abduction indicated that the retired grandmother was killed shortly after she was taken from her Arizona home earlier this year, according to multiple reports on Monday.

Nancy Guthrie, the mother of longtime Today host Savannah Guthrie, was reported missing after she disappeared from her Tucson home on Feb. 1. Evidence indicated she was taken from her home where she lived alone. The frantic hunt for the 84-year-old quickly became a national news story; still, as weeks passed, very little new information came in days after she vanished. 

On Monday, both NBC News and ABC News reported that the second letter received by local media outlets indicated that Nancy Gutherie was dead. The networks cited sources familiar with the investigation. Both letters were sent within days of her vanishing. 

A week later, on Feb. 10, doorbell footage of a man approaching her home on the night of her disappearance was made public 10 days after Nancy Gutherie was last seen; this came after two notes deemed potentially credible by experts were sent to Tucson media outlets. 

The two correspondences were different in many ways. While the first letter demanded money for Nancy Guthrie’s return in cryptocurrency, the second note did not demand money but stated that Nancy Guthrie died shortly after her abduction. The letter prompted Savannah Guthrie to send a publicly shared video message to the kidnappers and possible killer of her beloved mother.

“We received your message, and we understand,” she said as her brother, Camron, and sister, Annie, flanked the morning show veteran. “We beg you now to return our mother to us so that we can celebrate with her. This is the only way we will have peace…This is very valuable to us, and we will pay.”

The missing persons case has gone relatively cold since the doorbell footage was released, as new evidence in the investigation never emerged. Savannah Guthrie has returned to hosting the daily morning show and has discussed her mother’s disappearance on occasion. But hope that the missing octogenarian, who needed specific medications to survive, dwindled with each passing day.