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Major Updates in the Nancy Guthrie Investigation | Suspect DNA Found?!
Crime Weekly's 32-minute breakdown, the fullest single telling on file.
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What happened
Nancy Guthrie, an 84-year-old resident of the Catalina Foothills area near Tucson, Arizona, was reported missing on February 1, 2026. She is the mother of the NBC News journalist and Today co-anchor Savannah Guthrie. Relatives discovered that she was gone from her home that morning after she did not appear for a church service she normally watched online; her phone and other personal belongings were left behind.
The Pima County Sheriff's Department said that evidence at the scene indicated Nancy Guthrie had been taken from her home against her will. Investigators recovered blood inside the residence that DNA testing confirmed was hers, and they noted that a doorbell camera at the property had been disconnected during the early-morning hours. Sheriff Chris Nanos, who said Guthrie had limited mobility, described the case as an abduction.
On February 10, 2026, the FBI released images and video from a home security camera showing a masked, armed individual outside the residence around the time of the disappearance, and asked the public for help identifying the person. The FBI offered a reward of up to $100,000, and Nancy Guthrie's family later offered a reward of $1 million for information leading to her recovery.
In the weeks that followed, several notes were sent to Tucson news outlets. Some contained ransom demands, and one, reported by NBC News, asserted that Guthrie had died after being taken; investigators had kept that note private during the inquiry. Law enforcement treated the communications cautiously, publicly describing some as extortion attempts, and, according to news reporting, later assessed certain ransom notes to be fabricated. No claim about her death has been confirmed.
As of mid-2026, Nancy Guthrie had not been found and no one had been charged in connection with her disappearance. Two people briefly detained during the investigation were released without charge, and a separate arrest of a man accused of posing as an abductor was described by authorities as unrelated to the case. The FBI and the Pima County Sheriff's Department continued to investigate.
