Person reportedly detained for questioning in Nancy Guthrie disappearance

A person has been arrested for questioning by the Pima County Sheriff’s Department in connection with the disappearance of Nancy Guthrie, ABC News and Fox News reported Tuesday.

According to reports, the person was arrested Tuesday south of Tucson, Arizona. A search of a location linked to the individual is planned by law enforcement, ABC reported.

Earlier Tuesday, the FBI released new photos and video footage of a person the agency’s director described as “an armed individual who appeared to have tampered with the camera outside Nancy Guthrie’s front door the morning she disappeared.”

Journalist Savannah Guthrie, host of NBC’s Today show and Nancy’s daughter, wrote on social media: “We believe she is still alive. Bring her home.”

FBI Director Kash Patel released the images as the search for Nancy Guthrie, 84, entered its second week, saying the images were “previously inaccessible” but were later obtained from “residual data located in back-end systems.”

The black and white images depict a masked figure wearing gloves and a backpack approaching the door of Guthrie’s home. In one of the images, the person is waving what appears to be a plant – and in the other, they are starting to take apart the Nest camera.

“By working with our partners, from [Tuesday] “This morning, law enforcement discovered these new, previously inaccessible images showing an armed individual appearing to have tampered with the camera outside Guthrie’s front door the morning she disappeared,” Patel wrote on X.

Savannah Guthrie issued a desperate plea Monday for anyone who may know anything about her missing mother to contact law enforcement. “We are at an hour of despair,” she said. “And we need your help.”

The FBI has yet to identify a suspect, a day after the deadline set by a ransom demand from the octogenarian’s alleged kidnappers expired.

The Guthrie family said Sunday they would pay the kidnappers to ensure she returned home safely. Authorities have not confirmed the veracity of this ransom demand.

Efforts to contact the kidnappers appear to have failed, with officials saying Monday evening that they were “not aware of any ongoing communication between the Guthrie family and the suspected kidnappers, nor have we identified any suspects or persons of interest in this case at this time.”

The FBI said the agency was sending more agents from its field offices across the United States to Guthrie’s hometown of Tucson, Arizona, outside of which his blood was found.

“We currently operate a 24-hour operational command post, which includes crisis management experts, analytical support and investigative teams. But we still need the public’s help,” NBC News quoted the FBI as saying. “Someone has this information that can help us bring Nancy home. We need that person to share what they know. Please call us at 1-800-CALL-FBI.”

Separately, Guthrie family pastor Michael Rudzena described Nancy on television as a “strong woman” and “fiercely loving.”

“Prayer opens possibilities in our own hearts,” he told Today. “Leaving a door open to hope is a way of fighting against this inevitability. »

Authorities believe Nancy Guthrie was taken from her home early on February 1.

They had said one of the obstacles in the subsequent search for Guthrie was the fact that someone unplugged her doorbell camera when she went missing. And because she wasn’t actively subscribed to the doorbell camera service provider, they couldn’t get footage immediately, they said.