In an interview that aired in three parts this week, Savannah Guthrie sat down with NBC’s Hoda Kotb to discuss her mother, Nancy Guthrie, for the first time since she was reported missing from her Tucson, Ariz., home on Feb. 1.

In the wide-ranging interview, she recounted the moment she learned her mother was missing, discussed the validity of the ransom notes her family received and shared what Nancy is like as a person.

“My mom is so incredible,” Savannah said, describing how the 84-year-old raised three children alone after their father died when Savannah was 16. She said her mother viewed her Tucson home as a “safe haven” and said seeing it violated was especially painful.

Former FBI special agent Harry Trombitas told Yahoo that the timing of Savannah’s interview is probably not coincidental. With no major breakthroughs, no suspects identified and no motive publicly released, Trombitas said it was probably coordinated with authorities and the Guthrie family.

These were the main takeaways Trombitas took from Savannah Guthrie’s Today show interview — and the ongoing investigation.

'Today' interview was likely coordinated with authorities to bring case back into public eye

Trombitas said, “As far as the timing of the interviews that Savannah has done, I really believe that that's most likely coordinated between the sheriff's office, the FBI and the Guthrie family.”

He said as a former FBI special agent, some of the interview's goals were to humanize Nancy Guthrie as a person, persuade the suspects to do the right thing and to keep the case in the public eye.

“I know I've done that in the past,” Trombitas recalled. “We've done that multiple times when we're working a case, and it seems like it's kind of slowed down. We'll hold a press conference, or we'll orchestrate something so that it gets the case back out into the public again and keep it fresh in people's minds.”

Trombitas said there are still people out there who likely have no idea that Nancy Guthrie is missing. “We've got to keep getting that information out there because it may finally come across the right person, and all of a sudden they realize that what they saw or the information that they have may be significant to the case.”

Humanizing Nancy Guthrie was a key element of the interview

In the sit-down, Savannah described her mother as “resolute and strong” and as having “quiet strength, quiet faith, but hard fought.”

“She’s funny and a little mischievous, I would say, in her humor. She’s a noble creature, she does what’s right,” Savannah added.

Trombitas explained that FBI agents would always try to “humanize our victim.”

“Any time that we can go before the media and therefore the public, and talk about, in this case, Nancy, and what a great mom she was, and how she was well-liked, all these thoughts that Savannah portrayed, really helps to humanize Nancy,” he said.

“This is someone's mom, someone's grandmother. Get it across to the individuals involved and or anybody that may know who's involved to kind of soften their heart a little bit,” Trombitas explained, adding that it’s in hopes that it will convince them to come forward to law enforcement.

2 or more people might have been involved in Nancy Guthrie’s disappearance

In the interview, Savannah recalled speaking with her sister Annie during the first moments she learned her mother had gone missing. “She was in a panic. I was in a panic.” Annie told Savannah that she had called 911 and that authorities were already at Nancy Guthrie’s home.

“We thought that she must have had some kind of medical episode in the night and that somehow the paramedics had come because the back doors were propped open,” Savannah recalled. “That didn’t make any sense. We thought maybe they came and there was a stretcher and they took her out the back, but her phone was there, and her purse was there, and all her things, and it just didn’t make any sense.”

Early in the investigation, Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos disputed reports that there were signs of forced entry into Nancy Guthrie’s home.

Trombitas told Yahoo that Savannah’s interview was the first time he heard that the back doors of Nancy Guthrie’s home were propped open. “Who did that? Was that Nancy? Because it was hot? I find that hard to believe, but it also could have been the perpetrators who did that,” he said.

Trombitas also believes more than one person was involved in Nancy’s disappearance.

“To control somebody, even if it's an 84-year-old woman who's not in the greatest health, that's a lot to try to accomplish as one person. So I truly believe that there were two or more people involved.”

Ransom notes must have included something believable

Authorities said that multiple ransom notes were sent to various media outlets and the Guthrie family in the days after Nancy Guthrie was reported missing.

The Pima County Sheriff’s Department and the FBI said in February that they were investigating the validity of the ransom notes, but have not said publicly whether those notes were believed to have been from any person who may have abducted Guthrie.

Savannah weighed in on the validity of the ransom notes during her interview.

“There are a lot of different notes, I think, that came,” Savannah said. “And I think most of them, it’s my understanding, are not real. And I didn’t see them, but a person that would send a fake ransom note really has to look deeply at themselves — to a family in pain. But I believe the two notes that we received, that we responded to, I tend to believe those are real.”

Trombitas said that while we don’t exactly know what was in the notes, “There must be something that indicated, that was put in the notes, that made not only the Guthrie family but also investigators believe that these might be from legitimate individuals.”

Trombitas pointed out that there has been no public announcement that any ransom has been paid.

“That's a curious thing too. If they thought maybe the notes were authentic, why hasn't any — at least we don't know of any money that's exchanged hands or anything.”

Nancy Guthrie’s disappearance was likely a planned event

In a statement shared with KVOA in Arizona, the Guthrie family asked the Tucson community to “search their memories, especially around the key timelines of January 31 and the early morning hours of February 1, as well as the late evening of January 11.”

We know that the night of Jan. 31 was the last time Nancy Guthrie was seen, and Feb. 1 was the day she was reported missing, but why Jan. 11?

Sheriff Nanos previously said investigators were seeking surveillance footage from Jan. 11. Google, which owns Nest, initially indicated that one of the FBI-released images of a person of interest without a backpack was from Jan. 11. Nanos later clarified that the date that image was captured couldn’t be confirmed.

“I truly believe this was a planned event,” Trombitas said. “Whoever is involved in this would most likely do some type of surveillance. If they've got a plan to abduct Nancy, they're going to check the residence out ahead of time.”