A former FBI supervisory special agent said the suspected kidnapper of Nancy Guthrie, the 84-year-old mother of TODAY Show anchor Savannah Guthrie, made amateurish moves that “boggle the mind” which prove that he’s unlikely “a trained assassin.”
James Gagliano acknowledged that the suspect was carrying a holstered gun awkwardly when he was caught on surveillance video outside Guthrie’s home.
“It does not look like a trained assassin or somebody who’s been doing this a long time,” he told FOX & Friends early Thursday (February 12) morning.
“I look at the gun, I’ve never ever seen somebody carry a weapon that way. I carried a weapon in the service of my country for 33 years. I have never seen somebody carry it that way,” Gagliano added. “This looks like it was thrown together either last minute or the person got a holster from one person and the weapon from somebody else.”
The former FBI supervisory special agent said he was also surprised that the suspect went to Guthrie’s heavy front door, where he was caught by a Nest camera, to get inside rather than an alternate entrance.
“There are multiple points of entry that you could get into very easily,” he said of Guthrie’s home. “In the back of the house, there is a door that’s got like nine panel window panes in it, and you could have easily broken one panel, reached in your hand, unlocked the door and gone in with nobody noticing.
“So why did this suspect [go] to the front?” he asked. “It really boggles the mind.”
TMZ said it received a third ransom note in connection with the abduction of Guthrie, which included a demand for one bitcoin on Wednesday (February 11). The note said that the “name of the individual involved” would be revealed if the $67,000 payment was made.
TMZ had previously obtained two notes since Nancy was reported missing on February 1.
“If they want the name of the individual involved, then I want 1 Bitcoin to the following wallet. Time is more than relevant,” the note states, according to TMZ. The Bitcoin account associated with Guthrie’s previous ransom notes was reported to be showing activity on Tuesday (February 10), one day after a reported deadline for a payment to be made had passed, the New York Post reports.
About $152 worth of the cryptocurrency appeared in the account’s publicly viewable logs, which are accessible after a single transaction is made, equal to a .0022 bitcoin deposit. It’s unclear where the money came from as anyone who obtained a copy of the ransom note would be capable of wiring funds to it.
The transaction was reportedly made at around 4:00 p.m. PT, TMZ founder Harvey Levin told FOX News‘ Sean Hannity.
“There are reasons that I have been careful with my words and it obviously has to do with sourcing and I am just not at liberty to talk about amounts right now,” said Levin, who read the first ransom note sent by Guthrie’s alleged kidnappers. “This is a complicated case and we gave our word on something and we’re gonna stick by that,” he said.
The individuals suspected of kidnapping Guthrie had reportedly stopped contact with her family after a $6 million ransom deadline passed on Monday (February 9), the FBI announced via the New York Post. The ransom deadline expired at 5:00 p.m. local time on Monday and there’s no sign its been paid nor proof that Guthrie is still alive as of Tuesday morning.
Savannah Guthrie made a “desperation” plea as the deadline for her family to pay the ransom neared on Monday.
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