More than one hundred days after 84-year-old Nancy Guthrie vanished from her Tucson home, Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos told the Daily Mail he is no longer personally communicating with the Guthrie family, a disclosure that raises fresh questions about the sheriff's handling of one of the highest-profile missing-persons cases in the country.
When People magazine asked Nanos whether he still speaks directly with the family, his answer was blunt: "I personally am not." He said detectives and FBI agents remain in contact with the Guthries, but he has not sat down face-to-face with Savannah Guthrie, the NBC Today Show host and Nancy's daughter.
The admission lands at a moment when the investigation appears stalled. No suspect has been publicly identified. No arrest has been made. Physical evidence remains thin. And the family, which posted a $1 million reward for information, is still pleading with the public for help.
Nancy Guthrie was last seen on January 31 after spending the evening with her daughter Annie and son-in-law Tommaso Cioni. They dropped her off at her home in Tucson's affluent Catalina Foothills neighborhood. By the early hours of February 1, she was gone.
Federal investigators later recovered surveillance footage showing a masked man carrying a backpack on Nancy Guthrie's doorstep during those same early morning hours. Her doorbell camera had been disconnected. A separate image, dated April 29, showed a masked man driving up to a home in the same Catalina Foothills neighborhood, though whether the two incidents are connected has not been disclosed.
Page Six reported that investigators uncovered limited physical evidence near the home: a single strand of hair and a glove. DNA evidence recovered near the scene was initially processed by a private laboratory in Florida before being sent to an FBI crime lab for further testing.
Nanos acknowledged the pace of that testing has been a problem. "That testing moves at a snail's pace," he said. He added that there is "way too much work to be done" with the physical evidence, and that investigators would not give up "just because it's been 100 days."
Authorities also revealed that ransom letters tied to the case were mailed to TMZ and local media outlets, a detail that has only deepened public confusion about the nature of the crime. The content of those letters has not been released.
Nanos has faced mounting criticism over the trajectory of this investigation. The FBI Director Kash Patel previously accused the sheriff's office of locking federal agents out of the case for four critical days at the outset, a charge that raised serious concerns about whether early cooperation failures cost investigators precious time.
Nanos has defended the pace and secrecy of the investigation. In an earlier interview with KOLD, he said investigators are intentionally withholding certain information from the public, not to hide failures, but to preserve the integrity of the case.
"It's not done because we got to keep it secret. It's done because we got to protect our case."
He told reporters he believes an arrest will come eventually, and that whoever is charged will have a right to a fair trial, a standard law-enforcement framing. But the gap between that confidence and the visible results has left the Guthrie family and the public with little to hold onto.
That tension has surfaced in other ways. A Pima County official previously said Nanos rebuked her for sharing a case tip with the FBI, an episode that did nothing to quiet concerns about turf disputes between the sheriff's office and federal authorities.
Six days after Nancy Guthrie vanished, Nanos said he and Savannah Guthrie had been communicating by text and occasional phone calls. Now, more than one hundred days later, he says the direct line has gone quiet.
"We text or, every now and then a phone call," Nanos said of his earlier contact with Savannah Guthrie. "But no, I've not even sat down with her face-to-face. She's got a lot on her plate."
He framed the arrangement as routine. "The FBI and my detectives and those, they've been talking with her face-to-face. She doesn't need to talk to me," he said. He added that when investigators need the family for anything, "they get in touch with them and the family. It works both ways."
That may be standard procedure in some investigations. But this is not a standard case. Nancy Guthrie is the 84-year-old mother of one of the most recognized television anchors in America. The disappearance drew national attention. The family offered a million-dollar reward. And the sheriff himself previously said investigators were "getting closer", a claim that rings hollow when the lead law-enforcement official cannot point to a suspect, a motive, or even a confirmed crime scene.
Savannah Guthrie, who returned to co-hosting duties on Today while continuing to publicly plead for information, posted a Mother's Day tribute on Instagram earlier this month.
"Mother, daughter, sister, Nonie, we miss you with every breath. We will never stop looking for you. We will never be at peace until we find you."
She followed with a direct appeal: "We need help. Someone knows something that can make the difference. Call 1800CALLFBI. You can be anonymous and the reward remains available. Please keep praying. Bring her home."
Investigators reportedly combed through "thousands and thousands" of hours of video footage from traffic intersections and Ring doorbell cameras across the Tucson area. Nancy Guthrie's home, valued at roughly $1 million, sits in a neighborhood where security cameras are common. Yet the surveillance haul has not produced a publicly identified suspect.
The sheriff has deflected criticism as the family begs the community for answers, insisting that patience and confidentiality will pay off. "When you have the best minds of the country working on problems, I think they're gonna solve them," Nanos said. "It just takes time."
Time is exactly what an 84-year-old woman may not have. And the public record, disconnected doorbell camera, masked figure on the doorstep, ransom letters mailed to media outlets, a strand of hair, a glove, reads less like a case moving toward resolution than one stuck in place.
Meanwhile, the sheriff previously told volunteer searchers to stand down even as civilians recovered a backpack near the Guthrie home, another decision that fueled public frustration with the pace and transparency of the investigation.
Nanos projects confidence. He says an arrest will come. He says the best minds are on it. He says the secrecy is to protect the case, not to cover for its shortcomings.
But confidence without results is just talk. And when the sheriff of a major county admits he isn't even in personal contact with the family of a missing 84-year-old woman whose case has drawn national attention, the question isn't whether investigators are working hard. The question is whether the person at the top is treating this case with the urgency it demands.
A hundred days is a long time. For Nancy Guthrie's family, it must feel like a lifetime. They deserve more than assurances. They deserve answers, and a sheriff who picks up the phone.
