Arizona Sheriff Responds to Claims He’s Blocking FBI From Evidence in Nancy Guthrie Case: ‘Not Close to Truth’

Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos is hitting back at claims that he is blocking the FBI from accessing key evidence in the search for Savannah Guthrie’s missing mom, Nancy Guthrie.

In an interview with NBC Tucson affiliate KVOA on Thursday, February 12, Nanos said the allegations were “not even close to the truth.”

Earlier on Thursday, both Reuters and NewsNation reported frustration among federal agents over the handling of evidence, including a glove found inside Nancy’s home. A law enforcement official told Reuters that Nanos had sent evidence to a private laboratory in Florida for testing instead of making use of the FBI’s national crime lab in Quantico, Virginia. “This is dumb. … It’s insane,” NewsNation quoted an anonymous FBI source as saying.

However, Nanos told KVOA’s Jacob Owens that he spoke with the FBI as recently as Thursday morning about where to send evidence for DNA testing. He said that the FBI and Pima County law enforcement agreed to use the private lab in Florida, which Nanos said has worked with the department for many years and is handling the case pro bono.

“Actually, the FBI just wanted to send the one or two they found by the crime scene, closest to it — mile, mile and a half,” Nanos said of recently discovered gloves in the area surrounding Nancy’s Catalina Foothills home in Arizona. “I said ‘No, why do that? Let’s just send them all to where all the DNA exist, all the profiles and the markers exist.’ They agreed [that it] makes sense.”

Us Weekly has reached out to the FBI and Pima County Sheriff’s Department for comment.

Nanos told KVOA that he remains committed to searching for the Today show cohost’s mother.

“When this is all done with, offer your critiques all you want, but right now we have work to do,” the sheriff said.

Nancy, 84, was first reported missing on February 1. Law enforcement believes she was abducted from her home outside of Tucson. She was last seen on January 31.

On Thursday, the FBI released new details about a potential suspect caught on doorbell camera footage outside of Nancy’s home on the night of her abduction. The department also doubled its reward for information in the case.

“Today, the FBI is increasing its reward up to $100,000 for information leading to the location of Nancy Guthrie and/or the arrest and conviction of anyone involved in her disappearance,” FBI Phoenix shared via X. “New identifying details about the suspect in the kidnapping of Nancy Guthrie have been confirmed after a forensic analysis of the doorbell camera footage by the FBI’s Operational Technology Division.”

“The suspect is described as a male, approximately 5’9” — 5’10” tall, with an average build. In the video, he is wearing a black, 25-liter ‘Ozark Trail Hiker Pack’ backpack,” the post continued.

Earlier this week, FBI Director Kash Patel released surveillance footage and photographs of a potential suspect outside of Nancy’s home in the early hours of February 1. The images show an individual in a ski mask carrying a backpack and what appears to be a gun holstered in the waistband of their pants.

“Working with our partners — as of this morning, law enforcement has uncovered these previously inaccessible new images showing an armed individual appearing to have tampered with the camera at Nancy Guthrie’s front door the morning of her disappearance,” Patel wrote via X on Tuesday, February 10. “Anyone with information, please contact 1-800-CALL-FBI or visit http://tips.fbi.gov.”