What To Know
- Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos reacted to a recent ransom note claiming to have video evidence related to the disappearance of Nancy Guthrie.
- The sender of the note demanded one Bitcoin in exchange for a phone allegedly containing incriminating video and information.
- Sheriff Nanos emphasized that while media attention can aid investigations, false ransom claims and disruptive actions by some individuals hinder the search.
Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos isn’t putting much stock in the Nancy Guthrie ransom note from a sender who claimed to have video of the missing 84-year-old mother of Today co-anchor Savannah Guthrie.
“I think the FBI has done a number of arrests for false or fake ransom notes,” Nanos said on the Buckmaster Show on Arizona’s 1030 KVOI AM on Friday, June 26. “It’s a shame that that happens, but I think we’re looking at another one of those today with what’s been reported, but we’ll let the FBI do their work.”
Earlier on Friday, TMZ reported it had received an email from a person who said Nancy had been abducted and had died. The sender also claimed to know the identities of Nancy’s supposed abductors and claimed to have video of “the main guy” and Nancy on the day she supposedly died.
“I have a phone stashed in a secure location guaranteeing both the information it stores and the safety of the phone,” the sender wrote. “What it contains is my definition of delivering them on a silver platter, a short video of the main guy with nancy [sic] the day that was probably her last, pictures of both involved, names and addresses and age.”
TMZ reported that the sender asked for one Bitcoin in exchange for the phone — and that the site countered by asking for a screengrab of Nancy to authenticate the claim.
On the Buckmaster Show on Friday, Nanos said that it’s a “shame that these types of events occur.”
He added, “People have great interest, and that’s good because it helps us, but then it really gets abused [with] people who call in fake ransom notes.”
Nanos also said the media attention around Nancy’s case is good because it helps investigators get the word out, but he also criticized people who “get out and disturb, in this case, an entire neighborhood” in the case of content creators arrested at Nancy’s Tucson-area home.