Federal agents are walking into gun shops across the Tucson area carrying photos, names, and a question: Do you recognize any of these people? The FBI now has photos and names of people they believe may be the suspect seen on surveillance video outside Nancy Guthrie's front door with what appears to be a gun in a holster. Phillip Martin, co-owner of Armor Bearer Arms in Tucson, told Fox News that an FBI agent visited his store with three pages of approximately 18 to 24 individuals with corresponding photos and names.
The agent asked Martin to check whether any of those people had purchased a firearm from his store within the past year. None of the names returned a match for firearm purchases.
It's a methodical move, and it signals something important: investigators have faces. A gun shop owner in the Tucson area told CBS that authorities brought driver's license photos and pictures from social media to inquire. That's not a fishing expedition. That's a net closing.
According to the U.S Sun, Martin said the FBI agent visited his gun shop between Feb. 10 and 12 and asked him to review a packet of roughly 18 to 24 images and names to check if any had purchased a gun from the store in the last year. Martin didn't recognize anyone on the list. The last names were also uncommon, and none were familiar to him as a Tucson native.
But something else caught his attention. Martin told KOLD that the images bore a resemblance to the masked figure captured on Nancy Guthrie's doorbell camera:
Based on that video I saw of the kidnapper at the house who was caught on camera, the facial hair that I saw on the video reminds me a lot of these photographs.
According to Martin, the agent told him investigators planned to visit additional gun stores to determine whether anyone on the list had recently bought a weapon. Other gun stores around Tucson were unable to confirm they were approached by the FBI.
Martin's willingness to cooperate was immediate:
If I had information that would help, you know, the case, you know, and hopefully get that lady back to her family, I would be more than happy to help, but I don't really feel like I helped at all.
That's the response of a decent citizen and a responsible gun store owner. No hesitation. No lawyers. Just a man who wanted to help bring an 84-year-old grandmother home.
Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos disputed reports that authorities have narrowed the suspect pool to a few dozen individuals, denying during an interview with Fox News that investigators had focused on a specific group. "That's not true," Nanos said when asked whether authorities had identified around 40 people as potential suspects.
We haven't narrowed it down to anything other than we have pieces of evidence that we're looking at to try to find this individual.
There's an obvious tension here. The FBI is canvassing gun shops with a packet of two dozen faces, but the sheriff says there's no narrowed suspect pool. CBS News reported the latest from sources, but there is no confirmation from law enforcement. Either law enforcement is being appropriately cautious about tipping off a suspect, or the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing. Given the stakes, the former is the charitable read.
The investigation's forensic track has produced evidence but not answers. DNA evidence from gloves found approximately two miles from Nancy Guthrie's residence was submitted to CODIS and produced no matches.
The glove appeared to match those worn by a suspect recorded in doorbell camera footage outside her home the morning she disappeared. It was one of approximately 16 gloves that investigators found near Guthrie's home, most of which the FBI said belonged to searchers who discarded them while working in the area.
No CODIS match means, at minimum, that whoever wore those gloves doesn't have a prior DNA profile in the federal criminal database. The shift to public genetic databases follows, with investigators now attempting to identify potential suspects by searching for distant relatives through DNA profiles recovered at the scene. It's the same technique that brought down the Golden State Killer. Slow, painstaking, but historically effective.
The sheriff's department released information Wednesday about "biological evidence" being found at the scene of the crime. "Investigators are currently analyzing biological evidence found at Nancy Guthrie's residence. DNA profiles are currently under lab analysis. The number of profiles, and other related details remain part of the active investigation."
The physical evidence trail extends beyond DNA. The suspected abductor in the doorbell footage is seen wearing a black, 25-liter Ozark Trail backpack, according to the FBI. This has led authorities to check retailers in the Arizona area that sell the same brand of backpacks. Ozark Trail is Walmart's private-label outdoor brand.
Investigators have been reviewing surveillance video footage from local Walmart locations, and the company has provided authorities with records of all Ozark Trail Hiker purchases from the past several months, Nanos said. The sheriff's department also said it is working with Walmart to identify who purchased the backpack worn by the person in the footage.
Then there's the ring. The department has uncovered new leads from the doorbell footage, including a possible ring the suspect was wearing underneath his glove. Nanos acknowledged the detail but tempered expectations:
I look at the same photo you look at and I get, I see it. I'm going to give that to my team. They'll look at that. They'll analyze it and we'll see. Maybe, maybe it is.
Every detail matters in a case with no named suspects, no confirmed motive, and a missing woman who has now been gone for nearly three weeks.
On Wednesday, approximately 400 personnel remained in the field searching for Guthrie. The Pima County Sheriff's Department and the FBI have fielded around 40,000 to 50,000 leads so far. Sheriff Nanos confirmed that Guthrie's family, including all siblings and their spouses, have been cleared as suspects.
Concerns for Guthrie's safety remain high, as she requires heart medication. Authorities have attempted to track her location by pinging her pacemaker, but those efforts have been unsuccessful.
The total reward for information leading to Guthrie's location has increased to $202,500 following a $100,000 anonymous donation to 88-CRIME and a separate $100,000 offer from the FBI.
The private sector involvement in this case is notable:
The FBI has also reached out to Mexican authorities to make them aware of Nancy Guthrie's disappearance, though there is no evidence she was taken across the border. It's an avenue investigators are exploring given the proximity to Tucson.
Here's what investigators have publicly established about the person on that doorbell camera:
Her doorbell camera was disconnected at 1:47 a.m., followed by unusual movement detected on surveillance. Data later showed her pacemaker app disconnected at 2:28 a.m. Her blood was found by investigators on the front porch.
An 84-year-old woman, taken from her home in the dead of night by a masked, armed individual who methodically disabled her cameras. This wasn't a crime of opportunity. It was planned.
Nancy Guthrie was last seen at around 9:45 p.m. on Jan. 31, when she was dropped off at her home by family members following dinner. She was reported missing around noon the next day after she did not show up at a friend's house to watch an online church service.
Nearly three weeks. An 84-year-old grandmother who needs heart medication. A community wrapping trees in yellow ribbons. Hundreds of investigators chasing tens of thousands of leads. And now the FBI is walking into gun shops with faces.
Tucson is waiting. The whole country is watching.
