Experts say abductions for ransom are rare, despite dramatic portrayals on TV

Experts say abductions for ransom are rare, despite the prevalence of dramatic hostage crises on television. But the apparent kidnapping of “Today” show host Savannah Guthrie’s mother has raised questions about how law enforcement handles hostage negotiations in real life, and the risks of media attention for victims.

In the days since Nancy Guthrie, 84, was taken from her home outside Tucson, Arizona, a local television station received two messages that appear to be in connection with the case. One demanded money in exchange for Guthrie’s return and contained information about her Apple watch and floodlights on her property.

While law enforcement hasn’t named a suspect — or even confirmed definitively that the ransom note is authentic — Guthrie’s children have released two videos appealing to her apparent kidnappers, begging for proof that their mother is still alive.

Professional hostage negotiators from around the world say that kidnappings depicted on television — where police shout through a bullhorn at heavily armed hostage-takers inside a bank — often misrepresent the delicate touch required for real-world negotiations.

Abductions for money are uncommon

There are three types of hostage situations, according to Scott Tillema, a retired SWAT hostage negotiator in Illinois. The least common kind in the U.S., he said, are ones that involve kidnapping for ransom.

For this category, the abduction is intentionally used as leverage to achieve an outcome, like financial compensation, publicity or political changes, said Tillema, who declined to speak about the apparent Guthrie kidnapping specifically.

Scott Walker, author of “Order Out of Chaos: A Kidnap Negotiator’s Guide to Influence and Persuasion,” has dealt with hundreds of abduction cases in his decades-long career. Most of them involved international actors, but he said that regardless of location, most scenarios follow a similar sequence of events.

Typically the kidnappers will plan well ahead of the abduction — sourcing a clandestine location to hold the hostage and designating a specific person to communicate with authorities and the victim’s relatives.

The first step for law enforcement is confirming proof of life, Walker said. From there, authorities and the victim’s family will try to establish trust with the abductors to facilitate an exchange.

Walker didn’t speculate on Guthrie’s specific case. Broadly speaking, he said the victims of abductions that come with demands are not chosen at random.

“It’s very, very rare that someone is kidnapped for being in the wrong place at the wrong time,” Walker said.

One of the most notable historical examples that falls into this category is the 1963 kidnapping of Frank Sinatra Jr., where the FBI helped Sinatra’s parents pay his kidnappers $240,000 for the 19-year-old’s freedom. All three kidnappers were eventually convicted.

Arizona law enforcement has said it’s not clear that Guthrie was targeted, and if she was, investigators don’t know why.

Involvement of the family

Movies that depict hostage crises often gloss over how much time is involved, Walker said. Communication is often interrupted by long stretches of silence.

“There’s a lot more waiting going on in real life: Waiting for the phone to ring, waiting for the kidnappers to get in touch,” Walker said.

The Guthrie family appealed to potential kidnappers in two videos after the Tucson-based KOLD-TV says it received an email Monday night that appears to be a ransom note. The note included a demand for money by 5 p.m. Thursday and a second deadline for next Monday, investigators said.

The station received a second email Friday afternoon, but said, “We cannot share contents of the new message right now,” in a statement online.

Often silence is a strategy to put pressure on the family, Walker said. As a result, one of the most important assets for professional negotiators and family members alike is patience.

“We’re likely to make better decisions when we’re in a more positive, balanced, regulated frame of mind,” he said.

That’s easier said than done, according to Calvin Chrustie, a senior partner at the private security firm Critical Risk Team, which primarily handles kidnappings, blackmail and extortions in the U.S.

“I just think the public underestimates the huge psychological stressors on both the family and the police in these particular situations,” Chrustie said. He added that the national media’s insatiable demand for more information throughout an investigation only gives kidnappers more leverage and interferes with law enforcement operations — further endangering the victim.

Chrustie said in general he would suspect ransom notes sent to the press were possibly an attempt “to increase leverage” for kidnappers or “to mislead” law enforcement.

Other types of negotiations

There are two other types of hostage situations that are far more common in the U.S., according to Tillema.

The first is called “expressive hostage taking” and describes a situation when an individual takes a hostage in a moment of acute, intense emotional distress, Tillema said. Typically, these crises happen at home among family members when someone in a psychological crisis wants to compel law enforcement to leave.

The vast majority of mediations he brokered in his roughly two decades as a negotiator fell into that category, he said.

The second-most common is called “incidental hostage taking,” which is defined as a situation when a hostage is taken during another crime, like a bank robbery. In these cases, frequently sensationalized in movies like Spike Lee’s “Inside Man,” a person is usually confronted by law enforcement and then uses a hostage as leverage to negotiate freedom. Tillema said those situations are typically disorganized because the abduction is not premeditated.

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