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TMZ founder Harvey Levin believes that Savannah Guthrie’s kidnapped mother could be being held in the “radius” of Tucson as he described the purported ransom email as “very specific” and “well organized.”
Levin said on “Hannity” that Monday’s deadline is “far more consequential” after Thursday’s came and went, with kidnappers demanding the family shell out millions in bitcoin for NBC “Today” anchor’s 84-year-old mother safe return.
“The letter begins by saying she is safe, but scared, and they go on to say she knows exactly what the demand is,” he told Fox News host Sean Hannity on Thursday.
“So they are, you know, through us (TMZ), telling the family and obviously the sheriff’s department gave the family the letter we received, exactly what they’re demanding, and they’re saying that Nancy is aware of it.”
The celebrity news mogul said the ransom email’s contents make him suspect the sender is close by the area, potentially still in the vicinity of Tucson, where Nancy vanished last Saturday.
“There is a phrase in this email that absolutely makes me believe this person who wrote this, and if they’re telling the truth, that Nancy is within a radius of the Tucson area — not in Tucson right now, but in a radius,” he said.
“It could be New Mexico. I don’t know how far, but I think at least what the authorities have is they’ve got a radius, and that’s something.”
He said the letter called for crypto to be transferred to a legitimate yet unidentified Bitcoin address and that the demands appeared carefully structured and strategically crafted.
“I know the Bitcoin address is real,” Levin shared. “What I will say is this. This is not a letter that was thrown together in a couple of minutes.”
“It is a very specific, well organized, layered letter that really lays things out. This is not AI,” he added.
The note’s authors knew precise details about items inside the 84-year-old’s million-dollar Tucson home — including where an Apple Watch was kept and the placement of a floodlight — which had never been made public, Levin claimed.
Reporters with TMZ confirmed that they “made an agreement” with the FBI and Pima County Sheriff’s Office to “not disclose” certain details from the notes “for the sake of the investigation.”
TMZ said authorities are taking the note “seriously” due to unspecified “characteristics” suggesting “these people are serious and they actually do have Nancy.”
Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos provided a clearer but chilling timeline of events before and after Nancy’s disappearance during a press conference on Thursday afternoon.
She went to her daughter Annie Guthrie and son-in-law Tommaso Cioni’s home for dinner at 5:30 p.m. on Saturday and was dropped off at her home at 9:48 p.m. — the last time she was seen alive.
Her doorbell camera went offline at 1:47 a.m., motion was detected at 2:12 a.m. without recorded footage, and her pacemaker disconnected at 2:28 a.m., investigators said.
After she failed to attend church, her family grew increasingly worried. They went to check on her just before noon and called 911 at 12:03 p.m. to report her missing.
Police confirmed that splotches of Nancy’s blood were found inside her home.
Sources told The Post that the investigation has turned toward those close to Nancy and that authorities have not ruled out her son-in-law — the last person to see her Saturday evening — as a potential suspect.
“Everybody’s still a suspect in our eyes. That’s just how we look at things and think as cops,” Nanos said in the news conference.
After the note’s first deadline passed, Cameron Guthrie — the eldest of Nancy’s three children — delivered a prepared statement on the family’s behalf, pleading with the kidnappers to reach out to them and prove their mom is safe.
“We haven’t heard anything directly. We need you to reach out and we need a way to communicate with you so we can move forward,” he said.
“But first, we have to know that you have our mom. We want to talk to you, and we are waiting for contact.”
with Post wires
English (US)