Nancy Guthrie, the 84-year-old mother of US breakfast television presenter Savannah Guthrie, is at the centre of a disturbing new lead in Arizona after dispatch audio surfaced describing 'a woman hanging out of a car window screaming' on the night Nancy was abducted. RadarOnline reported the call placed the sighting around three miles from Nancy Guthrie's home, with the vehicle described as a dark grey or blue Chevrolet Malibu with no licence plates.
For starters, Nancy Guthrie has been missing since 1 February. She was last seen the night before, after dinner with her daughter and son-in-law. Nest camera footage at her home depicted a masked man wearing gloves with a gun in a holster, and no suspects have been identified up to this writing.
Nancy Guthrie And The 911 Audio
RadarOnline said the 911 call came in on the same evening Nancy Guthrie was abducted and ended with a dispatcher issuing an alert about a woman hanging out of a car window, screaming. In the dispatch audio, the caller was described as 'advising they saw a female out of a vehicle window screaming.' The dispatcher then relayed that 'the vehicle was a dark gray or blue Chevy Malibu,' adding there were no licence plates.
@insideedition The $1 million dollar reward NBC News journalist Savannah Guthrie is offering for information about her missing mother is generating an avalanche of new information as authorities continue their search for Nancy Guthrie, who was reported missing from her Arizona home on February 1. One new theory about the missing woman suggests that Guthrie's kidnappers may have used a tunnel in Tucson to escape. Some of those tunnels go all the way to the Mexican border. Inside Edition's Jim Moret has more. Ransom Kidnapping SavannahGuthrie Crime TrueCrime
♬ original sound - Inside Edition - Inside Edition
That lack of plates is the sort of detail that makes your stomach drop because it sounds deliberate, like someone planned to disappear. The audio also includes a description of the woman, with the dispatcher saying the caller reported she was 'wearing all black' and that 'the door was also open.' The location, RadarOnline reported, was a mere three miles from Nancy Guthrie's home.
In the United States, 911 is the emergency number, and 'dispatch audio' often means the rapid, practical radio traffic between operators and officers who are trying to pin down what is happening and where. It can be invaluable, and it can also be deceptively thin, a snapshot based on a frightened witness, a hurried description, and a vehicle that may already be gone. The danger, especially when a case has a famous name attached to it, is that the audio becomes a story in itself rather than a tool for finding the missing person.
Nancy Guthrie And The Problem With Leads
Nancy Grace, the former prosecutor turned TV host, discussed the dispatch audio and asked whether it was connected to Savannah Guthrie's mother's disappearance. Her answer was not comforting but it was honest. 'We don't know,' Grace said, before adding, 'But it's close to her home around the time she was taken. We can't really discount anything.'
RadarOnline also reported that investigators are searching large underground flash drainage tunnels in the area where Nancy Guthrie resides, for evidence or even the possibility she is being held there. It is an unnerving thought, and it sits alongside the more mundane reality that tunnels and storm channels are common in parts of the American Southwest, built to manage sudden floods and often sprawling in ways most residents never see.
The morning after Nancy Guthrie was last seen, she was due to attend a friend's house to watch a livestream of a church service, but she did not show. The friend tried to reach her, failed, then called Nancy's daughter Annie, according to the report. When Nancy's children arrived at her home, she was already missing, while personal items including her wallet, mobile phone, and keys were left behind.
Savannah and her siblings have been posting statements on Instagram, including a clip dated 24 February in which she said it had been 24 days since Nancy was 'taken in the dark of night from her bed' and that 'every hour and long night' since has been 'agony.' She said the family is 'worrying' about Nancy and 'fearing for and aching for her'. 'And most of all, just missing her,' she added, telling viewers she feels the prayers of 'every faith and no faith at all.'
In the same message, Savannah Guthrie addressed for the first time the possibility her mother is no longer alive, saying Nancy 'may be lost' and 'may already be gone.' Even then, she insisted the family 'need to know where she is' and 'need her to come home.'
Nothing in the dispatch audio confirms the screaming woman was Nancy Guthrie, so any connection should be treated with a grain of salt.
