Savannah Guthrie burst into tears as she apologized to her mother Nancy amid fears that her fame and fortune may have triggered the abduction.
‘Too much to bear to think that I brought this to her bedside, that it’s because of me. I just have to say, I’m so sorry, Mommy. I’m so sorry,’ Savannah told Hoda Kotb on NBC Today on Thursday
‘I’m sorry to my sister and my brother and my kids and my nephew and Tommy and my brother-in-law, just, like, I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry.’
Savannah went on to share how the speculation that her brother-in-law Tommaso Cioni was involved in Nancy’s abduction is ‘unbearable.’
‘It piles pain upon pain. There are no words. There are no words. I don’t understand, I’ll never understand, and no one took better care of my mom than my sister and brother-in-law. And to one protected my mom more than my brother. And we love her and she is our shining light. She’s our matriarch. She’s all we have.’
Savannah revealed the moment she realized her 84-year-old mother may have been kidnapped for ransom.
She was speaking to her brother Camron, who was in the military, and ‘saw right away what this was,’ the TV anchor said.
‘He said “I think she’s been kidnapped for ransom.” I just said “do you think because of me?” And he said, “I’m sorry, sweetie, but, yeah, maybe.” But I knew that,’ Savannah said.
‘We still don’t know, honestly, we don’t know anything. I don’t know that it’s because she’s my mom and somebody thought oh that girl, that lady has money, we could make a quick buck.’
Savannah, admitting she too believes Nancy was taken for ransom,
Savannah also revealed distressing details from the moment she learned her mother had been taken. She said: ‘My sister called me and I said “Is everything okay?” and she said “No, mom’s missing.”‘
Savannah and her sister Annie were in a ‘panic,’ she recalled. They initially suspected that Nancy had suffered a medical episode in the night, but quickly realized something more sinister had occurred.
‘Her phone was there and her purse was there and all her things, and it just didn’t make any sense,’ Savannah told Kotb. ‘I started calling the hospitals and the police were there and talking to her at the same time and it was just chaos, and disbelief.’
Nancy was taken from her home in Tucson, Arizona in the early hours of February 1 and has been missing ever since, with footage showing a masked figure on her doorstep around the time of her abduction.
Despite the Guthries offering a $1 million reward for information, there has been little movement in the investigation.
No suspect has been identified and announcements of potential clues – including discarded gloves – have not led to further progress.
Little information about the investigation has been publicly released by authorities in recent weeks.
But the Pima County Sheriff’s Department and FBI said Wednesday that investigators continue to examine leads in the case.
The Guthrie family last weekend appealed to neighbors in Arizona to search back through their memories for anything they might have seen that could help the investigation. ‘No detail is too small,’ they said.
Savannah Guthrie offered distressing new details of the moment she realized her 84-year-old mother Nancy had been abducted in an interview with Hoda Kotb on NBC Today
Nancy Guthrie, seen with Savannah, was taken from her home in Tucson, Arizona in the early hours of February 1 and has been missing ever since
Footage showed a masked figure on her doorstep around the time of her abduction
In her first interview since Nancy’s abduction, Savannah said that ‘someone needs to do the right thing’ and come forward with information to help the investigation.
‘We are in agony,’ she told Kotb in a portion of the interview aired Wednesday on her Today Show.
Savannah said she wakes up in the middle of each night thinking of what her mother went through.
‘To think of what she went through. I wake up every night in the middle of the night, every night,’ she said, tears streaming down her face.
‘In the darkness, I imagine her terror. And it is unthinkable, but those thoughts demand to be thought. And I will not hide my face. But she needs to come home now.’
She added that while it is unbearable to think of the terror her mother must have felt, ‘those thoughts demand to be thought. And I will not hide my face. But she needs to come home now.’
Both Savannah and Kotb were crying during the brief portion of the interview aired on Wednesday.
Kotb, Savannah’s former co-host, has returned to Today while her former colleague has been away.
Savannah Guthrie has been a co-host of NBC’s morning show since 2012, and is expected to return at some point, although no date has been set as she spends time with her family.
NBC said Wednesday that a full interview with its Today show host will air on the program this morning and Friday.
This is a developing story, check back for updates…
