MYSTERIOUS DEATH OF: Jeannette Bishop May & Gabriella Guerin

The gist

Jeanette Bishop May, a London-based interior designer and ex-wife of banking heir Evelyn de Rothschild, and her friend Gabriella Guerin disappeared November 30, 1980, in Sarnano, Italy after telling a surveyor they'd drive into the mountains despite an impending snowstorm. Their car was found buried in snow three weeks later in a ravine, and their remains were discovered in January 1982, but the circumstances surrounding their deaths remain contested and deeply suspicious after 44 years.

Key takeaways

• Over 700 people were abducted for ransom by Italian organized crime syndicates between the 1960s and 1990s, making Jeanette's Rothschild connection a potential target despite her modest actual wealth (she received only a London home and small investment fund in her divorce settlement).

• Multiple mysterious telegrams were sent to Christie's auction house and families of abduction victims from the same Rome address days after the women disappeared, directing recipients to go there—but police dismissed this as a hoax, despite connecting the address to a known kidnapper and a shady Christie's director with an alarm system diagram in his apartment.

• A mysterious caller named Ian Sayer contacted the Daily Mail with details about the telegrams that hadn't been made public yet, including specific information about a telegram to Christie's, but denied involvement when questioned. The call originated from an Austrian hotel where Ian was staying, but his connection and knowledge remain unexplained.

• A fork from a remote shepherd's house was found with the women's remains, along with evidence they sheltered there, yet investigators couldn't explain how they could have located the house in a severe snowstorm with zero visibility—suggesting someone took them there intentionally or it was a planned meeting point.

• The women's watches stopped a week apart (Jeanette's manually-wound watch on December 12 at 7:20 AM; Gabriella's battery-powered watch on December 19 at 7:30 AM), but their watches were found with intact purses and valuables, contradicting typical robbery scenarios.

• An Italian antiques dealer named Sergio Vicari, who dealt stolen Christie's heist pieces and allegedly knew Jeanette, was stabbed to death in September 1982, and a journalist claimed Sergio's associate showed him photos of both Roberto Calvi (Vatican banker who died under suspicious circumstances) and Jeanette together in Sergio's bag.

• The official cause of death was ruled accidental exposure to snow, but the theory that two women independently decided to leave a functioning car and hike eight miles through a blizzard—with one wearing a skirt—to a house invisible in whiteout conditions strains credibility and contradicts mountain rescue volunteers' assessments.

• The case was reopened as a double murder investigation in November 2024 based on "inconsistencies in witness statements," but after eight months, authorities have released minimal information despite Gabriella's daughter Gioia expressing that her family has been failed by the investigation repeatedly over 44 years.

Notable quotes

"If someone thought a member of the Rothschild family was alone in a small town village, like that is a potential gold mine for the wrong person." — Ashley Flowers, on kidnapping-for-ransom trends in 1980s Italy

"You're not setting fires on anything" when a helicopter can't spot smoke because storms keep searchers grounded and bodies become buried under successive snowfalls — explanation for why evidence at the cabin wasn't discovered during initial searches

"Knowing the truth, whatever that truth is, might finally lift the burden that she's carried for over forty years" — Gabriella's daughter Gioia, on why the reopened murder investigation matters to her family

Worth a full listen?

Listen to the full episode if you're interested in Cold War-era organized crime history, complex multi-jurisdictional investigations with legitimate red herrings, or cases where official conclusions feel contradicted by physical evidence—this demands the deep detail Crime Junkie provides.