Colorado sheriff’s Lt. Jeremy Muxlow has firsthand experience with high-profile kidnapping investigations and is closely following the search for Nancy Guthrie, the mother of “Today” show co-host Savannah Guthrie.
“Those are the big moments in law enforcement. Those are the ones that demand 100% perfection because someone’s life is potentially hanging in the balance,” Muxlow told Scripps News.
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Four years ago, Muxlow and the Rio Blanco County Sheriff’s Office were called to a well-known property in their community — the sprawling ranch owned by former New York City mayor and onetime presidential candidate Michael Bloomberg — to investigate a reported car crash. But the deputies soon learned a housekeeper was missing, and had been taken by force by an intruder who used a truck to ram his way onto the property.
“My mind was in battle mode,” Muxlow recalled. “We’ve got to find the lady, we’ve got to ID the suspect. We’ve got to start getting direction of travel and location.”
Muxlow, like the rest of the nation, is following the search effort for Nancy Guthrie in Tucson. The 84-year-old was reported missing on Sunday. He said in his experience, the element of celebrity can add pressure to an investigation.
“The reality of the situation is that high-profile cases add layers of complexity. There’s increased attention, media interest, and outside pressures, but the fundamentals don’t change. They can’t change,” Muxlow said. “I had to turn off whose ranch it was ... no offense to Mr. Bloomberg whatsoever. All that I was focused on 100% was just finding our victim.”
In the Rio Blanco case, authorities said the kidnapper forced the victim to drive him out of state to a motel in Cheyenne, Wyoming. The SWAT team there executed a rescue operation and brought the victim home uninjured.
The suspect, Joseph Beecher, was convicted and later took his own life in prison, according to Muxlow. Prosecutors said he went to the ranch intending to kill Bloomberg, then committed the kidnapping when he discovered the politician wasn’t there.
Muxlow said Beecher made a critical mistake that led authorities to track him down, but he would not elaborate on what that misstep was. He said revealing it might give clues to the person who took Nancy Guthrie, and he’s holding out hope that investigators in Tucson will experience a similar break.
“It’s going to take a lot of patience,” Muxlow said. “Prayer, honestly, is huge, and just know that the best of the best in our nation are focused in Arizona right now doing what they can do.”
