{"id":16365,"date":"2026-07-25T03:28:33","date_gmt":"2026-07-24T22:28:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=16365"},"modified":"2026-07-25T03:28:33","modified_gmt":"2026-07-24T22:28:33","slug":"elizabeth-smart-speaks-on-nancy-guthrie-case-message-to-savannah-guthrie","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=16365","title":{"rendered":"Elizabeth Smart Speaks on Nancy Guthrie Case, Message to Savannah Guthrie"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div data-testid=\"adp-vgallery-title\">\n<h2\/>\n<p>Police Thought They&#8217;d Never Find Elizabeth Smart After Suspect Died in Custody<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"segment-text-only\">\n<p><strong>Richard Ricci<\/strong>, a contractor who&#8217;d done some work at the Smart home, was arrested for an unrelated parole violation on June 14, 2002.<\/p>\n<p>After police found some of Lois&#8217; jewelry in Ricci&#8217;s possession, he was charged with burglary and became the prime suspect in Elizabeth&#8217;s abduction.<\/p>\n<p>As seen in police interview footage, Ricci denied knowing anything about the kidnapping. Yet he also refused to explain how he&#8217;d put several hundred miles on his Jeep within a day of her being taken.<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, after seeing him on the news, Mary Katherine maintained that the man who&#8217;d been in their bedroom that night was <em>not\u00a0<\/em>Ricci.<\/p>\n<p>Then, \u00a0on July 24, 2002, an attempted break-in was reported at the home of Elizabeth&#8217;s aunt and uncle. Police found a hole in the window screen and two chairs outside their 18-year-old daughter&#8217;s room.<\/p>\n<p>Still, police thought they were close to cracking the case. &#8220;Desperate&#8221; for answers, Lyman recalled in the doc, they offered Ricci immunity if he could help find Elizabeth\u2014on condition that he wasn&#8217;t guilty of kidnapping or homicide. But Ricci suffered a brain aneurysm in jail and died on Aug. 27, 2002.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I was sick to my stomach,&#8221; Lyman said. &#8220;Our most likely suspect died. Everything he knew was gone with him. And it left us at a dead end that was very difficult. As law enforcement, you do set an emotional wall, and that wall started to erode for me.&#8221;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Police Thought They&#8217;d Never Find Elizabeth Smart After Suspect Died in Custody Richard Ricci, a contractor who&#8217;d done some work at the Smart home, was arrested for an unrelated parole violation on June 14, 2002. After police found some of Lois&#8217; jewelry in Ricci&#8217;s possession, he was charged with burglary and became the prime suspect&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16366,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/akns-images.eonline.com\/eol_images\/Entire_Site\/20260724\/444e21fc-c1a0-4544-9e49-3fe14dd7469d_1784920610.jpg?fit=around%7C1200:1200&output-quality=90&crop=1200:1200;center,top","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16365","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pics-news"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16365","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=16365"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16365\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/16366"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=16365"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=16365"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=16365"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}