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Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos ruled out the theory that the disappearance of Nancy Guthrie, the 84-year-old mother of TODAY Show anchor Savannah Guthrie, was a burglary gone bad while speaking to the Daily Mail.
“This is somebody who disappeared from the face of the Earth, and now we have a camera that says here’s the person who did this,” Nanos said.
The sheriff still believes Guthrie was kidnapped as authorities are no closer to finding the missing woman after the search entered its third week on Sunday (February 15) and no clear motive has been determined.
“That’s what makes me say this is a kidnapping. The motivation for it is where we get stuck, right?” Nanos said. “Is it for money? I mean, we had the one demand where they asked for money. But is it really for money, or is it for revenge for something?”
Savannah Guthrie made a plea to her mother Nancy's alleged kidnapper, claiming "it's never too late" to "do the right thing" in a video shared two weeks after she went missing on Sunday.
“I wanted to come on … it’s been two weeks since our mom was taken and … I just wanted to come on and say that we still have hope and we still believe,” Savannah said with tears in her eyes. “And I wanted to say that to whoever has her or knows where she is, that it’s never too late. And you’re not lost or alone, and it is never too late to do the right thing."
Savannah's plea came after discarded gloves were found by the New York Post in the same area where a black glove was previously located near Nancy's home amid an ongoing investigation into her disappearance. Three more gloves were found in Catalina Foothills, about two miles from Guthrie's Tucson home, Sunday afternoon.
It hasn't yet been determined whether any of the abandoned gloves are connected with Guthrie's disappearance, but the area has been a focus of investigators since the 84-year-old was reported missing two weeks prior. The Post said it alerted the Pima County Sheriff's Department of the glove findings which were reported as investigators work to determine whether DNA on a black nitrile glove matched the pair worn by Guthrie's suspected potential kidnapper in doorbell camera footage recorded on February 1.
Each of the gloves found by The Post was located close enough to the highway to have potentially been tossed from a speeding car and along a road a possible kidnapper would have likely taken had they fled Guthrie's home toward Tucson or Mexico. The three gloves were described as a leather work glove, a woven blue glove and a red glove believed to have possibly been peeled from a hand, each out in the open and easily visible from the highway when they were discovered in the secluded area where no houses or buildings were present, but various side streets leading to suburban subdivisions.
Nanos had previously told the New York Times that it could take years before Guthrie is found in connection with her kidnapping case.
“Maybe it’s an hour from now,” he said. “Maybe it’s weeks or months or years from now. But we won’t quit. We’re going to find Nancy. We’re going to find this guy."
Investigators haven't named a suspect nor made arrests in the case. Authorities have swarmed a home near Guthrie's on a warrant that was "based on a lead we received" and reports previously indicated that multiple people were detained but the department later confirmed that no arrest were made from that activity.
Nanos also confirmed to the New York Times that DNA from someone other than Guthrie was collected from her property but wouldn't reveal where it was located as investigators are still working to identify it. Last week, authorities expanded their call for video showing "suspicious activity" within a two-mile radius of Guthrie's home, with the Pima County Sheriff's Department saying "several items of evidence, including gloves" were collected and submitted for analysis, though it's unclear whether they believe the gloves were the same worn by the person shown in surveillance footage released.
The FBI said it was searching for a suspect reported to be “approximately 5’9” - 5’10” tall, with an average build" last Thursday (February 12) afternoon. Guthrie was last seen at around 9:45 p.m. on January 31 after being dropped off by her daughter Annie's husband Tommaso Cioni following dinner with the couple and officially reported missing around noon the following day after not showing up to a friend's house to watch an online church service.