Nancy Guthrie Update: ‘One Reason’ Her Family Isn’t Responsible, Nancy Grace Says
What To Know
- Nancy Grace stated at the Variety True Crime Summit that she does not believe the Guthrie family is responsible for Nancy Guthrie’s disappearance.
- Grace cited Savannah Guthrie’s genuine behavior and visible affection toward her brother-in-law Tommaso Cioni at a memorial as evidence against family involvement.
- Despite common investigative practice to suspect family first, Grace emphasized her personal conviction that the Guthrie family is not involved in this case.
Drawing on personal experience, Nancy Grace doesn’t suspect any family members in the disappearance of Nancy Guthrie, the mother of Today co-anchor Savannah Guthrie.
“For one reason and one reason only, I do not believe the Guthrie family is responsible,” Grace told the audience at the Variety True Crime Summit in Austin, Texas, on Friday. “Because although it was many years ago that I first met Savannah Guthrie, she is, I’d like to assure you, not a fake TV person. They’re horrible. They’re so nice on TV, then they’re crazy off the air.”
Grace, a former prosecutor and former HLN host, thought about the images of Savannah putting her arm around brother-in-law Tommaso Cioni, husband of her sister, Annie, as they visited the makeshift memorial outside Nancy Guthrie’s home earlier this month. Those images convinced Grace that Savannah doesn’t believe that Cioni is involved in the crime, despite Ashleigh Banfield’s reporting that Cioni may be a prime suspect.
“She’s real,” Grace said of Savannah. “She is real, just like she is on TV. She’s super smart. She’s a trained lawyer. … And I just do not believe — I find it impossible to believe that Savannah would do that if she suspected he was involved.”
Grace said the smell of carnations has sickened her ever since the funeral of her fiancé, Keith Griffin, who was murdered in 1979. And she doesn’t think Savannah could have been putting on any pretense of affection toward Cioni at the memorial for the Guthrie matriarch.
“And for that reason alone… I mean, you all know — you’re true crime legal eagles [and] aficionados — that you look at the family first,” Grace told the summit audience on Friday. “Of course you do, ’cause statistically that’s who did it, but I don’t think that’s who did it in this case. I reject that.”
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