FBI Drops Major Clue About Mystery Perp, Gloves Found, Backpack ID'd | Nancy Guthrie Missing Day 11

Hey everyone, I'm Ashley Banfield and this is Drop Dead Serious and I'm back in the studio and I have a terrible cold. So I am sorry in advance. I am actually like blowing my nose and dabbing my eyes. Even my eyes are watering from this cold. So I'm gonna get through it, but I do have a ton to get to in the Nancy Guthrie investigation. I'm recording this episode on February the 11th, which is also day

11 in the search for Nancy Guthrie and if you thought that this search for the mom of Savannah Guthrie, the Today Show host, couldn't get any more intense, the last 24 hours just kind of threw us all on our heels and then rocked us back again. So let me get you up to speed on a couple things I'm going to talk about in this episode that are, I think, key. Gloves are found today. Don't know whether they're part of the actual crime. A single glove was found and then a pair of gloves was found. I'll

tell you about how those are different and who found them and why. And also, men were back at Annie Guthrie's home today. Two men, I can't say that they were FBI or sheriff's deputies or bodyguards because they refused to talk to the reporters and answer their questions. They didn't have sidearms. They were in unmarked vehicles.

There was one telltale sign, I'm going to talk about that in a second, as to who they were. And I've got somebody on the podcast today who has a pretty good idea of who they were. But they were back at Annie Guthrie's house. Something weird happened.

They went inside. They were there for about 10, 15 minutes. And they came out with a whole foods bag and a plastic bag. While you might think that is like, what the actual, my guest today actually has some pretty good intelligence on why that might be and why they were wearing

blue latex gloves. They also collected the mail from Andy Guthrie's mailbox. So something else that happened in the last 24 hours, I'm going to dig into it a little deeper and actually play you the comment, the quote as it happened. Kash Patel, the FBI director who is in Tucson, it was a previously arranged trip, but he was there and he was meeting with a lot of the FBI agents who were on the Nancy Guthrie

case. He said something to Sean Hannity on his program that may be due a what now? But also it doesn't square with some of the video that the FBI dropped yesterday. So I'm going gonna go into that, I'm gonna play what Kash Patel said, two comments in fact, and then I'm gonna explain why it just made me

tilt my head, look askance a little as what's going on here. But that video, I call it terror in the night. We all expected some video was coming yesterday and we thought it might be a grainy image of someone but my god when that video dropped everybody's breath sucked in and you know it was chilling and it looked like terror in the night. Seeing an image like that, a man like that at an 84 year old woman's door and

knowing that she's missing and there's blood. All of it was just so chilling. And obviously, it had a huge effect on everyone across the nation because the FBI has received 4,000 plus tips since they dropped that video. My guest today has some very interesting insight as to what many of those tips will be, because he's been around the block a few times as a homicide prosecutor. Matt Murphy, you know him from ABC News, you know him from most really high-end true crime

reporting because Matt wrote a book called The Book of Murder. He literally knows this business of true crime and he has a lot of insight into that issue. He has a lot of insight into the tips that come in because he's had to sort through them. So he's going to weigh in on that in a moment. But also Harvey Levin got another communique today. It happened about 11 o'clock in the morning. It came into the TMZ offices and it's a new dirt bag. That's how I'm going to refer to this person, a new dirt bag. Because whether this person's connected to the crime or not, they're dirt bags. This one wasn't so much, I've got Nancy and I want you to pay.

This one, there's a special place in hell for this person. Newsflash, it's crime. I'll tell you exactly why and what and the other extraordinarily stupid thing this person did.

Stupid!

And thank God when they're stupid. I love the world's stupidest criminals because they get themselves caught. And I'm going to give you the information as to why this person is probably going to get caught pretty soon because of this one. That's all coming in a moment. But as this day unfolded, and again, it's Wednesday, Feb 11, the investigators are back at Nancy's home in the Catalina foothills and they're searching in her front yard on day 11. And they're also searching all around the Catalina foothills today.

So yeah, the investigation is really active. I've got all of that for you, the details, and still hovering over all of this is what might be the most explosive piece of evidence yet that was just released yesterday, that Nest Cam. And we found something in the Nest Cam today. Sorry, it took me a little bit.

I was processing a lot yesterday. We saw something today that is odd. And it means there's something else to the videos. More than likely, they have a lot more video. And there's some kind of movement to the pattern of this perpetrator. It's the second time he came to the door. Or maybe it's the first time.

But there's two different times that this guy came to the door. It's jarring. It's a double take. I'm going to show it to you and break it down for you in a moment. This footage, of course, has been like the most scrutinized evidence so far in this entire investigation, for good reason, you know. The clue in this new juxtaposed image

is really kind of rattling. And Matt Murphy, as the veteran homicide prosecutor that he is, he's going to weigh in on it as well. That's all coming in a moment. And also, somebody else with a lot of wisdom in solving crimes and catching bad guys

noticed something in the videos as well and posted it on Twitter today. It is a marking on the kidnapper, a tattoo, potentially a tattoo. And because this comes from a really good source, Jim Clemente, I'm going to show it to you and then I'm going to show you his actual comments as well. I'm going to go through all of this on this episode, so get comfy, right?

I always say pour a drink. This is what's left of my root beer. I've been just so dehydrated today from this cold, but I'm going to have this great conversation with Matt Murphy as well. If you don't know Matt, where have you been? He's a senior deputy DA in Orange County, formerly in California.

And he wrote the book on this. He's literally written the book called The Book of Murder. So we'll talk to Matt about all this, get his analysis and get him to weigh in on some of these oddities that happened and that we discovered today. First though, as I always say to you now, you know I left TV for you. You know I left TV for you. You know I left TV for you. I left TV so that I could be an independent journalist and just work for you on this podcast

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code Banfield for 25% off your first order. lovebirdfoods.com slash Banfield. Click the link in the description. Buy it. It's good stuff. And they sponsor this podcast too. You can also find them at Walmart, Whole Foods, Sprouts and other major retailers nationwide. Lovebird Cereal, join the real food revolution and take back our country's health from big food. You can do it box by box. Okay, back to the episode. Got a lot to get to. So let's start here. If you missed it, this was massive. A guy named Carlos Palazuelos. What a night he had.

They busted down his door, they put him in cuffs, they held him for a couple hours. His cuffs actually caused his wrists to be injured and swell. And all the while he said, they didn't even ask me any questions. And then they released him. And he gave an interview. And it was very telling.

Why did they grab him? Because they came in guns a-blazing, right? And we saw the SWAT teams taking off from the Pima County Sheriff's Department. We saw the bomb squad taking off from Pima County Sheriff's Department. And they descended on his house, his mother-in-law's house, busted down the front door. And she said, I asked, do you have a

warrant? They said they don't need one. So here's a quick look at his interview after he was released.

As you can see, I didn't have nothing to do with it.

Carlos, what do you want people, your name's everywhere. I'm innocent.

I'm innocent. That's all I can say.

I didn't have nothing to do with this. Were you shocked when that happened? Yeah, I was. Tell me. Come on. Would you expect me to...

How do you expect me to react when something like this happens? I don't know what's going on. They grabbed me like I was a criminal. They kidnapped me. They held me against my will. They didn't even read me my rights until two hours later.

Okay.

Okay. From the handcuffs? And did you have any idea that this was about? No.

Do you know who Nancy Guthrie is?

No. That's the problem. No, I don't know anything.

You were like, where is this coming from?

How did they come up on you?

I don't know.

Like, were you just driving around?

Yeah, working.

Yeah, they said you were delivering door knocks?

Yeah, this.

How'd they pull up on you like nah I pulled up on them. They were following me. Yeah, they were following me Marana This is Santa Cruz County and Marana was down here. It's like come on two and two

And so then when they when they came up on you, what did they say like what did they say?

Nothing Nothing they just told me stop moving like what's your name Carlos? That it they put me in the cop car you gotta wait like two hours i waited like two hours until the detectives came here and everything

oh my god well when they finally told you this was had to do with some kidnapping like what

what were you thinking what the am i doing here i didn't do anything to be honest like i'm innocent

and you don't even know who the lady is do you know who savannah gun is? No. I don't follow the news. Right. I don't watch the news. You don't watch the Today Show?

No.

So this was a complete shock.

It was.

What kind of questions were they asking you?

Nothing. They didn't ask me any questions. Nothing, nothing, nothing.

They just sent me in the car.

They investigated my car and this man and that's it. Did you get the other car back or they still have it? No, it's right there.

Oh, they gave it back to you? Yeah.

And they said you can go home?

Yeah.

And how did they treat the people you were with?

Your girl, your child?

I don't want to speak about that.

Yeah, not interested.

How's your family?

They scared everybody.

Well, they're already shot. I was going to say, they scared all in shock right now. Wow. Did they damage the house? Yeah. What did they do to the house?

They broke the doors.

What else? The garage door in the back.

Yeah.

So what are you going to do now?

I'm going to try to clear my name. I didn't do anything.

Well, this is one of them.

I hope they get the suspect, because I'm not it. They better do their job and find the suspect that did it so they can clear my name. I'm done

Look at what I'm putting my family through. You're on national news now. Not just them, even my parents in Tucson Yeah, and your mother-in-law was worried about you. She was saying it doesn't look anything like that. Yeah, see that's what I'm telling you guys. Why do you think they came here? Why did you think they came to you? If I would have known that answer, I would have given it to you, but I don't.

So you have no idea what led them to you? Nothing. They didn't give, they didn't say car make, a license, nothing.

Here's the question. How did they get to him? What brought them to Carlos's house, right? Did they get a tip after that video? There's some reporting that they had other investigative process that led them to Carlos Palazuelos house but you know they released him and that poor family had a hell of a night and poor Carlos he sure took it in stride but I look pretty pissed to me. In any case I don't think that's going anywhere they let him go and back to square one or what square are we on?

Because they're not talking to us very much. I do want to tell you about the images that the FBI released. We were all kind of overwhelmed by this terrifying image of the guy in the balaclava, but tucked in the videos and the still images was one image that if you look more closely, tells a bigger story. It's the kidnapper outside of the arch of Nancy's entranceway, not wearing the backpack,

not wearing the gun.

Where's the backpack?

Where's the gun? What sequence did this video come in? Is this the first time that this guy approaches the house? Or is it the second, after he's already been up there with the backpack and the gun and he's gone in a different way and done something and he's coming back to the front door? It's just a little fascinating when you see, where'd you put the gun?

Where'd you put the backpack? Why are you back at the front door? What I cannot see in that picture is if the blood droplets are on that front entryway. It's just too hard to tell if Nancy Guthrie's blood has already been spilled on that front entryway at the time of the second image.

The first image, you see him, right? The one that, you know, sequentially we were sent with the backpack and the light in the mouth. And that one, you can tell there's no blood in the front entryway. The second one, second image, him outside that entryway without the backpack, without the gun, can't tell if the blood is there.

It just, it means there's more video. It means more than likely there's more video. And I sense that in the days to come, we will get more. Right? I think they have to dole it out in bits and pieces. Because every time they dole it out, guess what happens? Tips, tips come in. Is that what led the police to Carlos Palazuelos? I don't know. Did they get a tip? Apparently, the

reporting is is that it's other things as well, not necessarily just a reaction to the video. Carlos himself said, I don't know, I was told that my eyes look like this guy, but there's something else I want you to look at in the image. Because if you look closer, I had talked at length in my podcast last night about the mouth light. I've spoken to digital forensics experts who do not believe that that is a reflection from a grill

or from silver teeth, that that is absolutely a mouth light. And the more you look at the video, the more that bears out. Because as he's approaching, before he gets to a slight step up onto Nancy's front entrance, he lights it up like he's expecting that step to be a few feet away.

It's very telling. It almost makes you feel like he knows that step is coming. It is pitch black out there, folks. This is night vision camera. Just imagine he is not seeing anything. It is pitch black.

So what you're seeing is not what he's seeing. And that mouth camera, as his face is towards the ground, looks to light up the ground and light up that step. But interestingly, it lights it up before he gets there, almost as though he knows it's there. So is he familiar with Nancy Guthrie's entranceway? Is he familiar that the gravel walkway, gravelish walkway,

eventually leads to a step up onto that porch. It's a slight step up, but it's a step up. And he seems to know it's coming. That was very, very telling. Jim Clemente, retired FBI supervisory special agent, he's also a producer of CBS' Criminal Minds,

tweeted out a picture. And I'm always mindful. I'm watching social media. I'm always mindful, I'm watching social media, I'm watching Twitter, I don't jump on everything I see. Some people are a bit out there. But when Jim did this with his FBI background, I was more fascinated. He zeroed in on a brief moment when this perpetrator reaches and there's a very slight space between his glove and his shirt sleeve and you can

see a little bit of skin. And Jim Clemente said in his tweet, you know, is this a tattoo? Other people noticed it as well. And there's Jim with all of his expertise saying, is this a tattoo? I think it's helpful because whenever they have someone that they're going to bring in, they're going to look for that more than likely.

Right. And I know a lot of you are speculating online about who's got tattoos. I'm not going to go there right now. So another very interesting observation came from Steve Fisher, who's a private investigator in California. I've interviewed him on the show on News Nation when I did Banfield,

and he's been very, very forward on the David story, right? The David and Celeste story. He's been breaking a lot of news on that. He noticed when he slowed down the video of the perpetrator's gloves, he got to a point where it appeared there might be a small hole in the perpetrator's glove right on the tip of the finger.

I found that really interesting because if one of these gloves that was found by law enforcement today has that little hole in the glove, it's very telling because you know what else is in a glove, right? Skin cells, fingerprints, sometimes, not always, but DNA. You know what else can be on the outside of a glove? Blood and DNA, potentially of Nancy,

or something in Nancy's home, touch DNA. All of that could be on those gloves if those are the gloves in question. I will also say this, and Matt Murphy will weigh in on this in a moment. Go outside next time and really look around. You'll probably see some gloves on the side of the road.

They're all over the place. Gardeners and workers and all sorts of people discard gloves all the time. But listen, this is all within the vicinity of Nancy Guthrie's home. So a black glove that looks a lot like the one in the video, really, really important evidence. And my thought is that they were processing it the minute they got it in.

So watch this space for the developments from that. Okay, let me get into Kash Patel's comments because I hung on every word that Kash Patel said to Sean Hannity, because Kash is in Tucson and he's talking to the agents down there, right? And he said something so specific about the videos that they got from Nest. First of all, he characterized this as though, you know, the Nest cams, and can I just remind you that a week

ago Tuesday, I reported that my source told me they were Nest cams, right? They're Nest cams. He reported that the FBI worked with Google and brought the power of the FBI into the partnership with Google to actually get video that perhaps Nest and Google couldn't get themselves. Because ultimately, these images were there. I mean, these images.

You know, the FBI was told, sorry, or at least the sheriff said, we were told, sorry, there's nothing we can do. There's nothing we can get well damn it did they ever and so I listened to what Kash Patel told Hannity about that and I want you to listen as well but I want you to train your ears to the plural that he uses when he talks about person of interest he says persons of interest so

let's play that clip from Hannity take Take a look. And not only were able to get this type of information, but we were able to exploit information pursuant to our private sector partner engagements that showed us that there might be persons of interest in and around the area related to this event. And so first and foremost, our priority is to find Nancy Uthrey. And of course, right behind that is to find anyone and any others involved in this kidnapping case to make sure they're brought to justice. And that's what we're doing. We're protecting the integrity of the investigation, but we're also being very public because

it's a very public-facing case. And as President Trump said, all resources have been dedicated to this investigation. They're going to continue on the ground getting everything and absolutely anything they need from the

FBI. So the next question that Hannity asked him was really important. He said, do you believe there are people of interest now? Listen to the question and listen to Kash Patel's answer.

Director Patel, can I ask you just straight up, do you believe there are people of interest now? Have we gotten to that point?

Are there potential suspects now out there? Sean, without, you know, polluting the investigation, I will say we have made substantial progress in these last 36, 48 hours thanks to the technical capabilities of the FBI and our partnerships, and I do believe we are looking at people who, as we say, are persons of interest, but as you know, with any investigation, you are a person of interest until you're either eliminated or you're actually found to be the culprit or the culprits involved.

And that's the stage we're at right now.

Why I find that so fascinating is because Kash Patel went on Hannity just a few hours after the FBI actually released those images of a single person, one person at that front entrance of Nancy Guthrie's home. And yet he's talking about multiple. So is there something they know about either what else happened around her home on the back door cameras, maybe the cameras inside the home that they're not discussing. Maybe there's more. Maybe there's more than one person.

It's very hard to carry a 150-pound deadweight person out of a home against her will. And if she's dead, God forbid, it's very hard to carry deadweight of 150 pounds if you're by yourself. Very hard. Not that it can't be done. It can. And Matt actually has a case, he's going to talk about this in just a moment, that it can be done.

But do they know of some conspiracy? Are they looking for co-conspirators? That is all in play right now, without question, certainly with regard to Cash's comments and the video that shows one person, not multiple. Also, a KGUN reporter, that's a local station in Tucson

that's been at the heart of this because they also received one of the ransom communications. That reporter said that, quote, a source close to law enforcement has discovered the backpack. And it looks like it's available at Walmart.

It's called the Ozark Trail Hiker Backpack. The KGUN reporter isn't the only person that found that information, according to the source close to law enforcement. Other sleuthers found it, right? Loads of people sleuthing on the internet and reporters alike discovered that that kind of backpack is available at Walmart and that it is the Ozark Trail

Hiker Backpack. Thank God. How many Walmarts? They'll go to all of them. And they will ask about every one of those purchases. And they will work with Walmart.

They will ask about shipping. Who got a Ozark Trail Hiker Backpack shipped to an address in the Tucson area. I can't tell you how many crimes have been solved this way. Like too many. Too many that I've witnessed.

I've watched these guys on camera at the checkout at Walmart buying the things that they use and the crimes they're going to use. It's just, it just happens so often that they just think they're anonymous when they're making the purchases, even if they're using cash, because the cameras are always on the checkout. And if you have it sent to you, well, you've got to have it sent to an address, right? And you've got to know someone at that address, and that someone is going to drop a dime on

you if the FBI shows up and arrests them, right? So that's a fascinating piece of the puzzle. I still want to know what was in that backpack. And Matt Murphy has something to say that took my breath away, but I guess we got to consider it. And it's upsetting.

It's coming in a moment. Something else that happened today that was odd. Remember the pizzas that showed up at Nancy Guthrie's house the other day and it was like what the hell? Where's the sheriff to stop the pizza delivery guy from taking three pizzas up to her door? It was all innocuous. It was a viewer of JLR who's a live streamer sending him some food and the only

address that they had was Nancy's house. And the sheriff actually put a statement out saying, please don't order anything to the house. Well, today a flower delivery showed up at Nancy's house. Look, I'm sure that the intentions are very, very kind. Someone who wants to send flowers.

It happens a lot, actually, at crime scenes that I've been at, a lot. Flowers showed up at Brian Laundrie's parents' house, you know, but the note wasn't so nice on the flower delivery. I remember that. But the flower delivery that showed up at Nancy's house today was actually compounded

by something else. Neighbors also started bringing flowers to Nancy's house, but not to the home, not to the step, out to the front. And I'll bet you that as the days go on, we'll start to see more of a makeshift memorial, something to just honor Nancy and to tell Nancy, we're here for you. The flowers were yellow, hope, you know, to signify that there's hope that she'll come home. I remember when I was a kid, Tony Orlando and Don had a song called, Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Old Oak Tree. It's been three long years. Do you still love me? And so that signified coming home, right?

Yellow. So the FBI also came to Nancy's house today. And on day 11, this just surprises me, they were searching the front yard. Searching the front yard on day 11? On day 2, all the searches were called off. But they were back at the front yard searching around. And then they also searched around the vicinity of the home as well, all around Nancy's home. So searches are sporadic, they keep happening on and off, on and off. It's just, you know, they're not telling us why or what specifically brings them for

that particular day. They're just doing it. Okay, now to the glove and the gloves. So the New York Post was shooting video as agents discovered a glove on the side of the road. I don't know if they're sheriff's deputies or if they're FBI. I just know that there was so much searching that was going on along the highways, the

sides of the highways, the sides of the highways. There's video all day long of searchers going out along, looking along the sides of roads. Don't know whether it was a tip, don't know what took them to the roadsides, but something was yielded from that work. And the New York Post had video rolling as those agents came across a black glove.

And the images are clear as, you know, a black glove. And the images are clear as a bell there. It's a black glove. Looks fairly clean. We are at day 11, so think about that. What would the desert do to the black glove 11 days out? Would a kidnapper or killer throw their gloves out

on the side of the road? Maybe, if they're trying to get rid of them without anyone ever seeing and never thinking for a moment, maybe. Would they throw them out on the front lawn? Doubt it.

But it was interesting because this discovery was about 1.5 miles away from Nancy Guthrie's home. That single black glove that the New York Post videotaped the agents or deputies photographing, processing, collecting, discovering, right? Here's Brian Enten from News Nation, my friend and colleague

formerly from News Nation, and a guy I just have so much respect for. Here he is talking about that discovery.

We have confirmed that FBI teams found a black glove along a roadway about a mile and a half from Nancy Guthrie's home, which is where I'm standing right now, that it was bagged and that it has been taken into evidence. No confirmation that it is connected back to the Nancy Guthrie case, but certainly something very, very interesting. And you can imagine the kind of testing that they're going to be doing on that glove very, very quickly.

A lot of other activity here outside the home. Just within the last hour, we saw FBI teams moving through. They were searching the brush across the street from Nancy Guthrie's house. And then they were back at Nancy Guthrie's house again, searching in the yard and searching in the side yard.

So it wasn't long after the single black glove was discovered on the side of this roadway that Fox Digital reported they also knew that a pair of gloves had been found, quote unquote, in the area. So this is different.

And I don't know what in the area means. Trace Gallagher is out in front of Nancy Guthrie's home, and he said in the area. But I don't know if that means right there or 1.5 miles away or near the other glove. But it was a pair, very different from the single glove.

And again, gloves are the best, because you sweat in them, and you shed skin cells in them, and you pull them off, and they pull your skin with them. So they're just usually a boon of DNA. So yeah, they're gonna test that.

They're gonna look, and they'll put it in a CODIS and see if there's any criminals and then they'll go check them. Maybe we'll see another raid. And I say that because one of the big points of interest that I discuss with Matt Murphy is the raid. The raid that caught a young man completely shocked and his mother-in-law and his wife and his children, put him in cuffs and kept him for hours while they searched his home

and then released him. The raid is a fascinating point of discussion in this entire Nancy Guthrie saga and ordeal because the law enforcement authorities are going on the assumption that Nancy Guthrie is alive and needs to be rescued.

They've got nothing else to go on otherwise, right? So if they get a tip that there's a possibility or if they think for a moment that there's a possibility that Nancy Guthrie is being held against her will somewhere in a home or an establishment, they can behave very differently than they would otherwise if they just want to take a look around or want to ask questions about somebody. And Matt and I are going to talk about that. We're going to talk about that because

when you're trying to save someone's life, you don't have to get a warrant. Okay, so this might have been what happened last night. I'll get into the details in a second because that poor mother-in-law said, I asked if they had a warrant and they said they don't need one. Raised a lot of eyebrows. And the language that the sheriff used, that raised a lot of eyebrows too. The sheriff said it's a court authorized search, not a search with a warrant. So words matter.

I say that because there could be more. As they get tips, clues, information, or they think Nancy might be held somewhere, you might see more of those. You might. So at about 2.55 p.m. today, Brian Enten reported that yet again there was activity at Annie Guthrie's home.

Annie Guthrie is Savannah Guthrie's sister. She's married to Tommaso. We've had a lot of conversation about him, and have not seen him for over well over a week. And we haven't seen quite frankly, any of the Guthrie's other than the videos that they've released that the siblings, the three siblings. But at 2.55pm, Brian Anton reports that these men showed up at Annie Guthrie's home, they were driving an unmarked truck. The truck had yellow lights in the grill.

So it looked somewhat law enforcement like, but nobody would answer the question, who are you with? Are you with the sheriff? Are you with the FBI? Are you law enforcement?

Those two guys wouldn't answer. They did go inside Annie's home for about 10 to 15 minutes, right? And they emerged wearing, one of them was wearing blue latex gloves. Another agent was carrying a paper bag from Whole Foods. It said Whole Foods on the outside.

And also a plastic garbage bag. And then he put that into the unmarked truck and the other agent went over to Annie's mailbox and emptied the mail out and then put that in the truck as well. So it's sort of an interesting moment because nobody can get confirmation as to who they were. Who were you with?

Might they have been private security guards? Good question. And a question I put to Matt Murphy and I did not expect the answer but it was wise and that's coming up in just a moment. I mentioned and again I'm so sorry I've got this cold I just feel like I got over one it was brutal I lost my voice and then a week later I get this one again as soon as I've gotten

rid of that one this one comes back and I have to sneeze and I have to blow my nose and my eyes are watering so pardon me. So let's get to the TMZ communique today, because this was just batshit crazy. Harvey Levin received one of the first alleged ransom emails, right, from the scum sucking, parasitic, lowest form of humanity that is either connected to this crime and is scum sucking, lowest form of humanity, or isn't and is still lowest form of humanity. And that communique was turned over to the FBI.

It asked for $6 million. It asked for $4 million on a Thursday deadline and if that Thursday deadline is missed, $6 million on a Monday deadline. Those deadlines passed and to our knowledge, ransom wasn't paid. We don't know. There was some reporting that $6 million went into a Bitcoin wallet last night, but I haven't seen a lot of other reporting on that.

And certainly it hasn't been tied to the Guthrie case. Harvey was actually asked about that on Fox News and said, I'm not comfortable talking about that. But he was also asked about the communiqué today and the communiqué that came in to TMZ was nuts. It was absolutely nuts.

It says, I know where Nancy Guthrie is. I've got the information and I'm prepared to give you that information for one bitcoin. One bitcoin equals about $66,000, give or take the day. What low life does that? What low life does that? The FBI is offering 50 grand for tips, but what low life is going to sell the information?

Likely a liar, I think. Harvey says on Fox News when he's interviewed by John Roberts that the communique says, quote, time is more than relevant. And the sender included an email address and a name. So thank God for the dum-dums. I've been telling you all along that I rely very heavily on people who are way smarter

in the business of crime than I am. And Matt Murphy is one of those people. There's a reason you see Matt Murphy on Good Morning America and on 20-20 and on Nightline. He's one of ABC's go-to guys, right? He's a former senior deputy DA in Orange County, California. They see a fair amount of their crime there, right?

He successfully prosecuted dozens and dozens of murder cases there, not to mention all the other crimes too. And he wrote the book on crime, right? Literally, it's called The Book of Murder, a prosecutor's journey through love and death. And so I'm going to ask, I'm going to ask Matt a lot about that raid last night, whether we're going to see more of these maybe warrantless raids, right? And what his thoughts are about it and then his thoughts on all the stuff I just told you about. But first, a very quick thank you to my sponsor,

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Okay, here's my conversation with Matt Murphy and a lot of answers that I wasn't expecting. Matt, there's been so much that went on today, but I want to ask you about something really big last night. There was this flurry of activity. The bomb squad went out, the SWAT teams went out, and suddenly a door to a home in Rio Rico was battered in, and a guy was put in cuffs and called detained.

And the sheriff put out an interesting statement. He said there's a court authorized search. He didn't say there's a court authorized search. He didn't say there was a warrant. And the woman in the home said she asked for a warrant and was told we don't need one.

I sense there were reasons for that. And I wanted to get an expert to weigh in on it. And that's you.

Well, I've been in law enforcement. Well, I've been practicing law for 33 years. I was a DA for 26. I've never heard anything called a court-approved search. I've never heard that term before, so I don't know where he's getting that. That can be, it's either a search warrant, which doesn't sound like it, or it could be

what's called a Ramey warrant, potentially for the guy. That's what we call it in California. But I think he was driving south for the border, if I'm not mistaken, if I read that correctly.

No.

The guy was actually delivering food for a food delivery service. And the way his mother-in-law described it, his wife and children were in the car doing a food delivery. And the way the man who was detained described it, his wife and children were in the car doing a food delivery. And the way the man who was detained described it, his name is Carlos. He said, I saw them following me.

I just pulled over. They didn't even have to pull me over. I actually pulled over voluntarily. They approached the car and they threw me down, put me in cuffs and threw me in the back of the car. Weirdly, they also he also said they didn't speak to me at all, didn't ask me any questions.

Yeah, you know, look, I wanna be fair.

I really wanna be fair to the sheriff.

But working in a vertical unit, it means you've got a lawyer. When we would do murder cases, Ashley, when I was involved in an investigation, which is the way it works in Orange County is, you have a prosecutor who's assigned to each city in the county. And so you're working with legal advice with every step of the way.

And when you have the person who's going to make the filing decisions that's involved in something like that, really good detectives are loath to ever put handcuffs on anybody unless either a flight risk, which sometimes you have to do, which is why I asked was he heading for the border, or you don't want to do that because if that person is related to the case, you want a green light that they're going to stay in custody and you're going to file against them. And if you're not going to file against them, in other words, there isn't enough evidence, it's just unnecessarily aggressive.

Now, I don't know what they know. I don't know if the tips came from the FBI. It sounds like he's a delivery driver. When I first heard that, I thought, okay, his car was picked up on some sort of reader or he was in the area and they wanted to look at him,

but you can do a knock and talk for that. So, like a lot of things, Ashley, that's come from the sheriff, that was a head-scratcher to me. A court-authorized entry or whatever he said, I don't know what that means. I mean, if a judge reviews it and they have a right to enter a home, that's what we call a search warrant

or an search warrant.

So or an arrest warrant. So here's here was my guess. It's either one of those things. I want to put this guess by you. The video was released and it was harrowing. I mean, honestly, the only way I can describe it is terror in the night. The videos, the images that we saw of this perpetrator, it just chilled me. And I think it jarred a lot of people. It went out everywhere. You'd be hard pressed in America to not know about that video, the number of sources where it went out. And the FBI got 4,000 tips after that video. And so my thought is that somebody called in a tip, said something about this poor guy Carlos, and the sheriff took off with those with the heavy guns

and that the exigent circumstances of believing they might find Nancy tied up in that basement meant no warrant needed.

Okay, yeah. So that's not what he said. He said it was court approved or words that affect, right?

Court authorized. You know why I think that, here's the semantics. Because we have legislation in this country that does allow for that. The courts have allowed for this kind of exigent search, exigent circumstance search.

So I almost wondered if it was just fancy language to say, the courts allow what we did. And I wonder if we're not going to see more of it in this case.

Yeah. The problem with that is that when you kick in a door, and it is litigated and the court finds, hey, you could have spent the two hours to get a warrant here after however many days and That's determined to be unreasonable search and you find a goldmine of evidence and that gets suppressed. You've just blown the entire case Like the entire case and imagine that if they go in they find They kick in a door under an executive instead of just writing paper on it, which doesn't take that long. You got a DA next to you who approves it and it goes to the night judge. Every county

has a night judge on duty 24 hours. There's a judge available. We did that on every single case that we did just in case because if you kick the door down and they find a dead body in there and that's that all of that would get suppressed. So that's that is kind of worst case scenario and that's that's the advantage of a vertical unit where you have the actual prosecutor who is sitting there at the table with the detectives working hand in glove without I might add the last thing you want ever when you're at three in the morning, when you're

the assigned prosecutor and you're working with the actual lead detectives, what you want your leadership to do is give you the support you need and get the F out of the way. And that's what you want. And I don't know what's going on behind the scenes here and this sheriff may be doing exactly that. I think the basketball game was a pretty bad look but hopefully he's

doing that. But you want, this is the advantage of having a prosecutor there who can sign off on that because they write a warrant. The prosecutor can read it, sign it, it goes to the night judge and it comes back. We did that before, I mean we had 7-11 murders where the criminal suspect is going to have zero reasonable expectation of privacy in those premises or the videos. We would do it anyway, just because it's the person's reward.

You have to act. Now, if she is inside and they have a tip that she's inside, of course, saving the life is more important than the case, right? And under those circumstances, you know, great. But look, the FBI here, the FBI, actually, I had the privilege of working a bunch of missing cases with the FBI and they are top notch.

Those field agents are some of the most dedicated and smartest law enforcement professionals I ever had the honor of working with. But they're playing a supportive role in this. This is Pima County. Right now, there's no information. This is a federal case. This is going to be a Pima County prosecution if they ever catch anybody. Which is another interesting part, not to jump ahead here, actually I know you got plenty of questions, but you know in Southern California,

if you got a body into the Pacific Ocean or you got a body out into the desert, typically, we would not find those bodies. And I've personally prosecuted five no body homicides and they can be done. But you got to you got to do it right. And you have to you have to you have to make sure that you have a professionally competent investigation.

Now, they don't have that many murders in Tucson. Yeah, especially.

Yeah. competent investigation. Now, they don't have that many murders in Tucson.

Especially, yeah. And in Pima County area, they don't have a lot of violent crime. I think I've been mentioning this a few times. The biggest case they had prior to this might have been Gabby Giffords, like 15, 20 years ago.

This is an experience on homicides really matters. It is very important.

And listen, there's been criticism. A former homicide detective with Pima County Sheriff told Brian Enten, there's been a race out of that department in the last five years. And we all know that the police have taken it on the chin for the last five years.

That may be a factor here, I don't know. But that there are a lot of experienced people who left the department and that it has back filled with a lot of inexperienced people. So I just want to know as we go forward, the balance that has to be achieved between the exigency of getting a tip

that Nancy might be in someone's basement and then going about it through the magistrate, the night court judge, whoever it is to get the warrant, as opposed to just racing there with the SWAT team.

Yeah, I didn't like that at all. And sometimes as a prosecutor, you'll have a very eager detective who means well, who really, and they're dedicated to it, they understand the case, they wanna put handcuffs on somebody.

And sometimes you gotta fight that fight, but at the end of the case when the bad guys held accountable for what they did and the jury comes back all is forgiven. So that's an internal battle in a well-run department in a well-run county that happens and it's natural and it's normal. I don't think I in 17 years in homicide I don't think we ever did that. I don't think I in 17 years in a homicide. I don't think we ever Did that I don't think I ever had my guys kicking a door and and arrest somebody and then go okay, never mind

It's ideally that's just that's not how it's not how it's on now again even when the file I don't all the information

And maybe the hot tip was you the woman is dying inside That's what I, so even when a tip might be just so incredibly timely, and again, the exigency, that's the key word here, is dire. This is why I wonder going forward in this missing persons case, how many more times might we see this

if in those 4,000 tips there's something else that comes out about somebody who somebody believes is holding Nancy?

Yeah, look, I personally tried 133 jury trials. When I heard that they arrested somebody, my first thought was they got the guy. Because there's no way they're hooking somebody unless they've got really good information. In my experience, you get a prosecutor sitting at the table with them, There's no way they're hooking somebody unless they've got really good information.

In my experience, you get a prosecutor sitting at the table with them, he's giving them the green light, because that's the way ideally it's supposed to work. But I was surprised when they released him, I gotta tell you.

Oh, and it was what, a couple hours? You know, he said he was hooked up for two hours. And here's the weird thing, Matt, I couldn't understand this, help me navigate. He was very forthcoming, right? When he did his interviews with the local press. He said, they put me in cuffs,

they put me in the back of the car, they kept me for two hours, they hurt my wrists, he's all swollen. And he says, they didn't ask me anything. They didn't ask me any questions.

What is that?

Well, I would need more information, but maybe they were able to get his phone and with that information, somehow they were able to geolocate him as not being at the door when they knew that happened. But clearly they got some sort of information. Maybe it was inside the house.

Maybe they got permission to search some sort of computer.

They took everybody's phones. They took his phone. This is what his mother-in-law said at least. They took her phone. They took his phone. They took his wife's phone and they took all the children's phones as well.

Okay. So what the FBI has, the FBI has wonderful tools available to them. And one of the things they can do is what's known as an administrative drop warrant. And if you remember my Samantha Runyon case from way back in the day, a little girl who got kidnapped, the FBI came in on that. Those agents were fantastic. But also in that case, just to give you an idea, we had the FBI involved within hours because it was an abduction. And that's really what the FBI is really good at that. I don't know how long it took in this.

And maybe you know.

Longer than most people think is appropriate. There's been a lot of criticism that they were, that the feds were left out of the fold for too long.

Yeah, that's a, and I don't know the timeline. And again, I'm relying on you for that. Now you're relying on other people's information. That's a friggin problem like like this is an all hands on deck situation and You you bring in all the resources you have available And the thing is is that they appeal to the public very quickly as you recall

Every time you do that it is it's it's a semi desperatedesperate move because you essentially get three groups of people coming forward. You get well-meaning folks that really want to help. And they tell you about, hey, I heard screams down, but maybe it was my neighbor's wife again. Or I heard weird noises, and it's

the raccoons in the trash can. You've got to sift through those, and you've got to devote resources to every single one of those. Then you've got your loons. You got the people that have come out and it's like, you know, it was the vampires, I know.

And that's an element every time you appeal to the public. And I think the third group is, you know, I think in the modern day, Ashley, and this is terrible, but I think we now have scammers who are gonna come in and go, give me money right now already arrested a guy in Hawthorne, California You know, and I think that's I don't know how many scam phone calls Do you get a day actually, but I probably get I I don't know if these if the spans are all also scams

But I get half a dozen of those a day a day Easily and you know when you when you're some of that stuff some of the language in that was that we want American dollars. That sounds like the guy that I talked to at Christmas that somehow for some reason I answered. And it was like, hey, your state bar license is in jeopardy. Just give us all your information. And that guy definitely was not from the United States or at least his accent. So that seems to be a third group.

And by the way, I can't think of anything lower or more parasitic than somebody trying to make money on the backs of Savannah Guthrie and her family. And that is the lowest of the low.

And I look-

In their time of horror.

Right.

In what they're going through to add this layer onto it of trying to extort them.

It's infuriating to me. That's a subhuman thing. And I think that the person who benefits most from that is the killer. Because the resources have to be devoted to that. And that brings the family in and you have to be devoted to that and it brings the family

in and you have to treat them like they're real because in the 1% chance that they are, by the way, I don't think any of these are real, in this case myself, just my opinion, but you have to devote resources to that. And I think they shall be prosecuted as accessories after the fact of murder. I really do.

I think they should be.

Wow.

Is that possible? I sure think so. I think there's some laws that should pass. Maybe some good will come out of this and they'll stiffen the laws. There are independent laws. Like, hey, if you give us money,

we're gonna kill somebody, which is what they all did. That's extortion. So that's a separate crime and its own punishment. But I think that some legislatures need to come together here and catch up to the modern era of absolutely ubiquitous scamming

in America and probably the world. And I think when they catch, like this guy in Hawthorne, he should be just me here and I'm not on this case so I can express an emotion or two. That guy should be frigging hammered in my view. And the FBI should devote resources to tracking every one of these people down that tries to take advantage of it. And like I said,

I hope I'm wrong, but I think every one of these things is fake. They took too long to do it. It makes no sense. And look, actually also I've been I've been saying this all along So I might as well say say here I've I've always believed this was a body removal that she you know that she was dead inside the house and You know when you have blood like that and this is through my twisted

very jaundiced lens of the cases that I worked on. But I've you know, I've one of the nobodies I did was a man named Pete Terrio, Vietnam vet, wonderful person who got murdered by his girlfriend. Her name was Judy Villott. And she got him out of out of his house in Irvine. She was like a hundred and ten pound woman. And he was like a 220 pound guy.

And she dragged him out and the blood drops from that seed just in my head. It was almost flashbacks They it even looked like the same tiles to me and I don't know that that's sheer speculation by me But there's just so many things about this case that don't add up with the with the kidnapping narrative And again, I hope I'm wrong. I hope I Pray I'm wrong and that this poor lady is found, but it's not looking good.

So, I mean, I'm fascinated to hear that there might be some possibility that legislation could come out of this because I do sense that we're in a new age of these parasites upping their scam game to this kind of thing.

It's an unusual circumstance, clearly with Savannah being a high profile, but it's not the last time a high profile person's going to be a victim of crime. But let's talk a little bit about something that the FBI released yesterday that it took me a little bit to digest it, and I finally sort of figured it out today. One of the images shows the guy not wearing the backpack and not carrying the gun. All the images and the video show this

backpack that's overstuffed and a gun that's, you know, very awkwardly placed in the front of his crotch, which is a very strange place to carry a gun and a holster and a strange holster at that. But then one of the images shows he's got no backpack and no gun. And I am flummoxed A, by why the FBI would give us that image without any context and B, what you think that is. Is that prior to the initial walk up with the backpack? Is it after?

What are your thoughts about that?

Well, look, she's 84 years old and the thing that struck me first is why is the gun in his waistband? And I mean, that's anybody who's familiar with firearms, it's called, it's basically an appendix carry, but that is a, that's a good way to blow off a part of your body that you're not, you don't want to lose.

He's unskilled. He's not a pro.

That'll like, yeah. It's either really amateurish or it struck me as something that he wanted the camera potentially to see. It also to wear a balaclava like that and the gloves, that was also striking to me. But the backpack is what jumped out the most, Ashley,

because, and this is again, look, before I was in homicide, I spent four years in sexual assault. And that is a, that's a place where your, your head can get pretty twisted. There's a thing in law enforcement and murder investigations, not as a rape kit. I'm sure you've heard of that before, where serial rapists will come prepared.

They'll have duct tape, they'll have things to bind with. That backpack was stuffed. And I don't, I had the same question you did. It's on, it's off. I don't know. I don't know.

And that's, I should probably say that as well. Look, I've had cases where, you know, like my Tom and Jackie Hawks case out of Newport. I was watching the interview of Scott Ardeleon, the guy was such a good liar. I'm sitting there going, well, I guess I'm doing the loops on my own head going, maybe that kind of makes sense. And the detectives were like, don't be an idiot. It's not real. And they were exactly right. And I mean, I'm kind of embarrassing myself by saying this, but same thing on my Daniel Daniel Wozniak case, he set up, that was a guy who murdered his war vet neighbor that's got some media, and then staged that scene, lured another poor, innocent young woman named

Julie Kobayashi, murdered her, and framed his first murder victim for it to make it look like he'd done it. And I am in there going, okay, well, this is pretty obvious, this is a dispute between the two of them. And again, different police department, the detectives were like, nope, this is not right. And they were absolutely right.

So that gut of the police. But in both of those cases, Ashley, one of the things that is very different than this one, those were grizzled, hardcore, multi-year homicide detectives that had been on the job for 10, 15 years and they'd seen it all and so they developed that gut. My understanding with the

average in the Pima County Homicide Unit is less than two years experience. And I'm not criticizing the rank-and-file police officers at all because the politics, the exodus, that is not their fault. But experience really does matter. So look, when I saw that backpack, I thought that is a rape kit. And people think, well, she's 84 years old. That's too old.

That's not too old. That is not too old. First case I ever worked on as a junior law clerk was a woman named Mary Ward. It was a 79-year-old Jehovah's Witness who was very similar circumstance. Guy broke in her house in the middle of the night, raped her. She went into rape trauma syndrome and died 31 days later. So, and another thing...

Do those kinds of criminals take the person with them typically?

That's the thing that is so unusual here. So, no, they don't. Usually it's sloppy, it's drunken, it's ham-fisted when they go in. But one of the big red herrings on this case that I think has thrown a lot of the commentators off, and a lot of the commentary I've seen in this has been excellent. Brian Enton, you mentioned, I think has done a phenomenal job. Josh Ritter, phenomenal. Jesse Weber, phenomenal.

I've been really impressed with the coverage. And pretty much everybody. But one of the key things here, people have been thrown off a little bit by the idea that her pacemaker was still communicating with her Apple Watch.

Pacemakers continue to send that signal, even if the person is dead and as morbid as that is. So that the fact that her pacemaker was still working does not mean that she was alive when she left the house. I pray to God she was and she still is. But that is, you know, and then I don't know.

You have to be able to get creative in situations like this. And that's where experience comes in. And one of the questions that I had right off the bat was can't they get like a helicopter and have that Apple watch or her iPhone and fly looking for a connection, you know,

because the pacemaker right now, wherever she is, it is still on and it is still working. Those things continue to work until the battery dies. And it's a big deal in funeral homes for anybody. And it will still reach out to the iPhone? Yeah, no, I don't know the distance. I don't know how far away it has to be. But yeah, it is still, her pacemaker is still transmitting a signal. So I don't know if that has to be, you know, if that has to be three feet away, or if that is, if it's the type of thing

that it can travel a mile, I don't know the answer to that question. But I do know her pacemaker right now, as we speak, is still zapping away.

That's, I never thought of that. You know, if those, you know, those deputies who are going or they could be agents. I don't know if they're sheriff or they're FBI. There's both at work. They've been going door to door. They have been walking and wandering and spending a lot of time, you know, on foot in the area.

Do you think it's possible they might be doing that?

Well, no, that's what's known as a canvas. And that is something that you always do. Couldn't you have Nancy's phone on you to see if it connects to the pacemaker? See, I've never had a missing with a pacemaker quite like this. So that could certainly be something that they could do. Maybe you can somehow clone it. I would be very interested in trying to take advantage of that technology.

But again, I don't know the answers to those questions. The FBI certainly would. But with all of the media that's been on this case, Ashley, the one thing I haven't heard of is helicopters. And maybe it just means that I just haven't seen that report. But we used to do, there's a helicopter, they named it Duke in Orange County,

and it's the Regional Air Command, where, and there's different cities that contract, it's the police helicopter. And one of the things you get to do as a DA, which is kind of fun, is you get to do ride-alongs in a helicopter.

And I did a couple of those, and they have a thing called FLIR that I'm sure you've heard of, and that's called forward-looking infrared. And it's like these war videos that you see. It's the black and white images where they can see a heat signature. And I don't know if they did that or not. Looking through the immediate area,

and look, every investigation like this-

Well, Matt, here's the problem. This search was called off 30 hours after she was reported missing. On Monday, the sheriff said that the search was called off and was called off permanently unless or until, you know, the situation warrants,

which we were all really bewildered by. I mean, at the very least, they're searching her front yard today. You know, agents showed up at Nancy's house today and searched her front yard and the vicinity around the house.

And we're at day 11.

Yeah. And I think that was FBI at her house, if I'm not mistaken. Right. So let's not forget. And again, I want to be fair. I want to be fair.

I've had those high profile cases before and there's, I never liked, I never liked it when a talking head criticized any of my guys and so now I'm a talking head, right? But they returned that scene

in less than two days. And that- Well, it was 30 hours. I mean, honest to God. It was Monday. That was- By six o'clock Monday, that scene was returned to the family and Nancy was reported missing at 1156, I want to say, AM, the morning before on Sunday.

Yeah. Look, mistakes are made in every homicide investigation. And as a criminal defendant has a right to a fair jury trial, nobody has a right to a perfect investigation or nobody would ever be convicted of murder. So I want to say that mistakes get made.

None of that is necessarily fatal. However, come on, man, 30 hours. That is insanity in my view. Again, just my opinion here. I know they went back, but I've had crime scenes,

Ashley, where we've processed them three or four times where you send, you know, the investigation will develop and then you send your team back in to swab, hey, maybe there was, it looks like maybe they stole this. And so you swab areas that you didn't know when you first went in.

So you keep the premises for a while. And she did it by herself. It's not like there was a family that needed to get inside. This is-

Right, like the Idaho, you know, 1122 King Road was a crime scene for months upon months. And even after it wasn't a crime scene, it was walled off and no one was able to, you know, that also tells me about today's report. There was a glove that was found on the side of the road a mile and a half from Nancy's house, one of the black gloves that's similar as seen in the video. And then

after that, Fox Digital reported that a pair of gloves was found in the area. That's all I can tell you. I don't know more than that, but I mean, that's shocking. I can tell you right now

that there's always a glove found, Ashley. Every time you look, there's always a, when you get into the garden, there are gloves everywhere. And it's a weird feature. There's gardening gloves, there's workers gloves. I was in Central Park last week, despite the cold, there's one mitten everywhere you go, there's gloves. Okay. So when you-

I just find it weird that they're finding it 11 days later, that should have been found within the first few days

But when you're when you're doing that and you're collecting that information as a prosecutor when like

when you send people in to to and you got a search, but

We found gloves that weren't related to the case and then the defense comes in every single time and it's like, look at the DNA in this glove. It's not my client. This is the real killer. So, you're handing nuggets to the defense. So, it must be thoroughly searched. That's something that the lawyers at trial, if they ever get a suspect in charge, somebody will have to navigate through. But there's the investigation. It's like the beginning of Law & Order. There are two equal parts, the investigation and the prosecution. They got to be mindful of that.

And I don't know where the DA for Pima County is. I would expect that he would be up on that stage. I would think the agency or her agency would be responsible for taking that baton and getting justice in the case if they ever get a suspect. And I don't know what's going on with that.

Let me ask you something else. I'm super fixated on that Ozark trail hiker backpack like you mentioned, because now, you know, the whole world has zeroed in on it and it's something that you can see in a Walmart. But that's all we have in terms of video. And it seems as though they must have a lot more

because they've given us a still shot without the backpack on and without the gun. So it feels like there's a lot more video that we haven't seen. Cash Patel was on Hannity and said, I mean, this really stood out to me

when Cash Patel said this, we were able to exploit information pursuant to our private sector partner engagement that showed us that there might be persons of interest in and around the area related to this event. Our priority is to find Nancy. And of course, right behind that is to find anyone

and any others involved in this kidnapping. And yet we see video with one person and Kash Patel says persons of interest. What do you make of that?

That's right. And look, this is a driveway and you're right. They've got, you know, I guarantee there's some group of FBI agents probably as we speak that are going through every video for miles around Pima County, every potential route, every Circle K gas station, every, you know, gas and sip, they're going through all of those things trying to find,

and the modern era-

He's saying this, Kash Patel is saying this right after they've released the single person on the doorbell cam, right? And he's saying, you know, there might be persons of interest in and around the area related to this event. And of course, right behind Finding Nancy

are priorities that find anyone and any others involved in this kidnapping. It just sort of stood out to me that he's talking in plural right after they're releasing a video of a singular image.

That's right. And another thing, just to remember, you know, Cash Patel was a criminal lawyer for a long time and that is a, that you're, you're right to pick up on that. And I, and I think that that is a, if that's a point of precision by a him or hate him. He's a smart guy and he has a lot of experience in criminal law. So, they may very well have information that somebody else might have been driving the car. I hope so because if this is some... and it could be anything right now,

but if this is some sort of rapist or serial killer, you know, they tend to act alone, not always, but they certainly tend to act alone if there's another person in driving a car, then that kind of that potentially adds, you know, fuel to the idea that maybe this really is a kidnapping. And, you know, maybe there's some hope against hope that this poor lady is still alive, although

I am very skeptical of that. So, you know, there's been a lot of attention on Annie Guthrie's house. Yet again today, there were, it's hard to describe whether they were agents or whether they were bodyguards, and the reporters who were there could not tell. All they could tell was that these are people who dress like the FBI but did not have sidearms, did not have insignia, were in unmarked vehicles, but a vehicle had yellow lights in the grill. These two guys went into Annie Guthrie's house

and then emerged with blue gloves, blue latex gloves on, carrying a plastic, white plastic bag and a Whole Foods paper bag, put that into the vehicle, then went to Annie Guthrie's mailbox and cleared out the mail, and then put that into the vehicle, then went to Annie Guthrie's mailbox and cleared out the mail, and then put that into the vehicle

and drove off and wouldn't speak to anybody on the premises. What does that say to you?

Well, I saw that video too. I mean, they look like cops to me. And that very well could be FBI, could be another federal agency. You know, the Border Patrol has bought into this right at the very beginning. But look,

every case like this, you know, this is a, it's a whodunit. It's a, you know, I mean, first it's a what is it, but I think it's pretty clear, you know, tragically, with every second that ticks by on the clock that this is a homicide case. And then it becomes a whodunit. And the way you handle these is you start in the people closest. And you and I've talked about this before in other cases. You start with the people closest and you expand the ring and you methodically and systematically eliminate every single person in her immediate orbit, then her next immediate orbit. And

you go through family. And that's a part of the process. Doesn't mean anybody had anything to do with it, but you have to go through and go through cell phones, go through, look at geolocation, you look at cell phone towers and it's very labor intensive, but they have the resources now that the FBI is involved

and they're very, very good at that. Then you go to the cool guy and to the, and I'm not suggesting anybody.

No, no, but they said they've taken the DNA from all contractors and people who worked

for her. Yeah, that's right. Every contractor, every gardener in the area, not just her house, but the neighbors, the pool guys, the neighbor's pool guys, the roof guys. You do that and you systematically and very carefully and methodically eliminate everybody you can and you just keep broadening the circle. The way you prosecute these cases in court,

you do the same thing but in reverse. When it's a whodunit, you start out with the population of the earth, and we can eliminate, okay, everybody's a suspect. Okay, we can eliminate everybody who wasn't in the state of Arizona,

and then we can eliminate everybody who wasn't in Tucson, and we can eliminate everybody who has no apparent connection or knowledge of this woman. And you, and that's, you know, I've prosecuted cases that way before and that's, you know, that's how you do it. And that's, and I think that they're methodically going through that.

So whoever those guys were, and look, I didn't notice that it was a Whole Foods bag, but, you know, the plastic evidence bags that we see on TV are a little misleading. Paper for whatever reason, when it's breathable, it is more forensically sound a lot of times to put biological evidence in paper bags for proper testing than plastic.

So that, you know, that struck me when I saw the paper bag in that video that that was just kind of your typical evidence collection.

No, it's Whole Foods.

But you never know whether it was a bag that existed in the house as is, and they were bringing it up. But I would think they put the bag in a bag, if that were the case. It's just an unusual thing to see the Whole Foods bag.

Yeah, everyone might have been. It might have been a evidence bag with evidence written on it and they knew everybody was going to be watching, so they grabbed a Whole Foods bag, which would be good

police work if they did. That's a good point. Okay, last question, and that's about Harvey Levin gets another communication today. This one is different, comes from a different address. It has a Bitcoin wallet that is a different number than the first. And this person is asking something totally different, suggesting that they know the whereabouts of Nancy and that they're prepared to give that information for one Bitcoin, which is around $66,000, give or take the day. But they included, Matt, an email address and a name. So when will we be seeing that person in cuffs?

You know, that's somebody that, that's a door I'd like to see kicked down, actually, because I'm pretty sure that wherever that person lives, this poor woman is not inside that house. Yeah, that's just for lack of a better term, that's just awful, right? That's another person who's attempting to profit from the grief of these people. And if that's real, if they actually did have evidence, you don't have an obligation, believe it or not,

if you have information, to cooperate. But as soon as you do something like that, you are now directly interfering because they have to go interview you, and that is a crime.

Tell me, what is that crime? Is that interference in an investigation? It's obstruction of justice.

It's obstruction of justice. If you don't have that, if you don't have information like that, and now you are asking for money in exchange for information, they have to devote resources to that.

They're gonna have to devote officers. They're gonna have to track you down. That is invaluable time, energy, and resources devoted to your greed and your attempt to profit from the most apoplectic grief that another human being could ever experience.

You're not a human if you do that, and you deserve to be hammered. Just me, my opinion here alone.

No, I've said it to fullest extent of the law. I think 20 years wouldn't be enough for someone like that who put somebody through that kind of pain and trauma. I want to ask you this. A lot of people who are watching the case who don't work in the business that you work in or that I work in have said, well, this is stalling. We're only on day 11.

I mean, you've worked cold cases for years. I've seen cold cases solved after 30 years. I certainly don't think 11 days is very long, not for a case like this. I wanted to get your thoughts about those who think that, well, we don't have anybody yet,

and we don't seem to have any announcements or any news conferences. They must be going nowhere.

You know, I look, I put this in my book. I was in the cold case unit for about 15 of my 17 years. I was one of the deputies who was assigned to the cold case unit. I brought in an alcoholic case. We were prosecuting murders from the mid 70s, Ashley. You know, I was I worked on a case from 1968. So cold case is a misnomer, just the entire

term, in the sense that there's no statute of limitations on murder cases in any state in America. There's no statute of limitations, which means those cases are they're never closed. They are they're always they're always active. Now, again, want to be fair here. But, you know, as as not flash, as they would say, I think the sheriff has been in the mistakes that he's made. He's not going around forever.

This is going to be this case will be investigated for years and years and years. And look what just happened last night. They released this image. I hope that it just took a while because of course they're going to get thousands of tips and they have to chase every one of those down. The FBI has the resources to do that. Again, remember the three groups. You're going to have people who just really want to help and they're in good faith providing information. You've got your crazies and I guarantee they got hundreds of those. And then you got Harvey Levin's friend who wants a Bitcoin.

The criminals.

That's just part of the modern landscape. And they brought in more FBI agents. I think last night, I think I read 200 new FBI agents, if I got that right.

I've heard 100, I've heard 200, and then I've heard the full force of the federal government and the law and whatever is needed. So who knows if it's, you know, it can ebb and flow as well depending on what's happening in the days and the weeks and the shifts, right?

Yeah, that's right. But they're gonna work it. And the FBI, like I said, the rank and file agents are absolutely wonderful. And they're really smart. And a lot of people aren't honest. A lot of them went to law school.

So they're not that that makes you smart, trust me.

Makes you smarter, I'll tell you that much.

Well, at least you have the academic discipline to stay in school for seven years. So they-

And pass the bar.

They are, in my opinion, they're some of the best law enforcement that exists. They're smart, they're dedicated, they're tireless. I really have a very high opinion of the FBI agents that I worked with. And I, for better or worse,

I worked on many cases where we had to bring in the FBI and, you know, I had good experiences with them every time. So hopefully, the locals, again, this is a state case, are treating them right. I have no doubt that the rank and file detectives in Pima County are. I hope that their brass is doing the same thing, the brass being their leadership, I hope. And I hope that behind the scenes,

we're seeing more confidence than we've seen in front of those cameras. Very tough job to be up there. The questions can be tough, but yeah, I just honestly, actually that basketball game pissed me off.

That was a bad look.

I think it was a mistake. You're not the only one.

But that's not good leadership. That undermines the public confidence in the competence and professionalism of law enforcement. And that's not good for anybody. So hopefully that's a lesson well learned. I know that's why he hasn't been

in a press conference since then, because somebody's going to hit him with that. I don't know him. He may be a wonderful guy. As you know, I defend police officers professionally now.

A large part of my practice is defending police officers. So I've got a soft spot for cops that make mistakes and get in trouble. But come on, dude. The whole country is losing sleep over this. Well, hope is entertainment.

So hope springs eternal for me. I'm still I'm not only hoping for some kind of legal resolution on this. I'm hoping that Nancy is alive and that we see one of those remarkable images like Elizabeth Smart returned to Ed and Lois Smart. I still hope for something like that because I do believe that we all need it as a country. We need it.

Yeah, that's right.

I've had crazy cases where I am like those two I told you about. I'm convinced it's one way and it turns out to be something completely different. So you know, if there's one thing that got knocked into my head over all those years was you gotta keep an open mind, never key in too closely on one theory because you may be completely wrong. And I've seen it, I've lived it.

And so there is still hope. I'm skeptical, but I'm as jaded as they come.

And who knows if that was the case early on with the news that I got, they were keyed in and maybe that's changing. So far it hasn't, my source hasn't said anything different. Otherwise, who knows, but we're certainly seeing this investigation going in a lot of different,

you know, in a lot of different directions. Matt, I can't tell you how much I appreciate your wisdom and that you're just so, you know, magnanimous with your time and your-

Oh, any time for you.

Any time for you. And your health.

I love the show. I love your fan base too. Everybody has been, all of your followers, like everybody's hit me up on Instagram has been really nice on the different appearances.

So- I'm so glad.

You can count me as a resource. My opinions and my thoughts may be worth every penny you pay for it, which is nothing. So yeah, and look, like I said, I just, I hope I'm wrong about everything on this one.

So I always love talking to you. Thanks, Matt. Thank you so much. Okay, so here we are, day 11. Man, I think we all feel the same way. I think we all go to bed at night and even if you're agnostic

or atheist, you're praying for Nancy Guthrie's safe return. Number one, I cannot imagine if this was my mother. I cannot imagine what this family is going through. Right? I cannot imagine what they're going through, knowing that the investigators are in their homes too. It's just compounding a very, very sad and frantic story. And each day, there just seems to be a slate of these developments that kind of yank your chain one way or the other, right?

But in the end, what Kash Patel said is true. The number one priority is to find Nancy. And then after that, the priority is to find the fuckers that did this and then throw the book at them. And if Nancy is dead, I hope it's death penalty. Thank you everyone for listening and watching. Thank you everybody for being a part of this podcast. And I always say this and it couldn't be more true. The

for being a part of this podcast. And I always say this and it couldn't be more true. The truth isn't just serious. It is drop dead serious.