TUCSON, Ariz. (AZFamily/AP) — A black glove recovered last week in connection with the Nancy Guthrie disappearance appears to be the same worn by the man captured on surveillance video at the 84-year-old’s Tucson-area home, the FBI confirmed.
In a statement sent to Arizona’s Family on Sunday, the FBI says the gloves were found about two miles away from Guthrie’s home in a field near the side of the road.
They were sent to a private lab in Florida on Thursday and arrived Friday. The agency reports they received preliminary results of a DNA profile on Saturday, and they’re now awaiting “quality control” and official confirmation before putting the profile into the FBI’s national database, CoDIS. The process reported takes 24 hours from when the FIB receives DNA.
Federal officials say investigators collected 16 gloves in various areas around the house, but that most have been determined to have been worn by searchers who discarded them.
“The one with the DNA profile recovered is different and appears to match the gloves of the subject in the surveillance video,” part of the FBI’s statement read.
It’s unclear if additional information will be released on Sunday regarding the glove.
Meanwhile, investigators have confirmed that a person of interest in Guthrie’s disappearance was questioned and released following a traffic stop in Tucson late last week.
On Sunday, Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos told Arizona’s Family sister station KOLD 13 News that a traffic stop at a fast food restaurant at 1st Avenue and River Road on Friday night was related to the Guthrie investigation. He added that a man was a “person of interest” in Guthrie’s abduction, and that he was cooperative and has since been released.
Video from the scene Friday night showed a Range Rover being towed from the restaurant parking lot. The sheriff said that was a standard practice and was included in the search warrant.
When asked if the man was still a person of interest, Sheriff Nanos told 13 News that “no one has been eliminated.”
Sunday marks the 15th day of the search for Guthrie.
AP coverage:
Law enforcement agents have been gathering more potential evidence as the search for “Today” show host Savannah Guthrie‘s mother heads into its third week.
The 84-year-old was last seen at her Arizona home on Jan. 31 and was reported missing the following day. Authorities say her blood was found on the front porch. Purported ransom notes were sent to news outlets, but two deadlines for paying have passed.
Authorities have expressed concern about Nancy Guthrie’s health because she needs vital daily medicine. She is said to have a pacemaker and have dealt with high blood pressure and heart issues, according to sheriff’s dispatcher audio on broadcastify.com.
Here’s what to know about her disappearance and the intense search to find her:
Video of masked man
The Federal Bureau of Investigation released surveillance videos of a masked person wearing a handgun holster outside Guthrie’s front door in Tucson the night she vanished. A porch camera recorded video of a person with a backpack who was wearing a ski mask, long pants, jacket and gloves.
On Thursday, the FBI called the person a suspect. It described him as a man about 5 feet, 9 inches tall with a medium build. The agency said he was carrying a 25-liter “Ozark Trail Hiker Pack” backpack.
Investigators initially said there was no surveillance video available since Guthrie didn’t have an active subscription to the doorbell camera company. But digital forensics experts kept working to find images in back-end software that might have been lost, corrupted or inaccessible.
Studying DNA
Investigators collected DNA from Guthrie’s property which doesn’t belong to Guthrie or those in close contact with her, the Pima County Sheriff’s Department said. Investigators are working to identify who it belongs to.
Evidence requiring forensic analysis is being sent to the same out-of-state lab that has been used since the beginning of the case, the department said.
Investigators found several gloves, the nearest about 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) from Guthrie’s home, and submitted them for lab analysis, the sheriff’s department said. It did not specify what type of gloves.
The sheriff stressed his department is working closely with the FBI.
Sorting through tips
The Pima County sheriff and the FBI announced phone numbers and a website to offer tips. Several hundred detectives and agents have been assigned to the case, the sheriff’s department said.
The FBI said it has collected more than 13,000 tips since Feb. 1, the day Guthrie was reported missing. The sheriff’s department, meanwhile, said it has taken at least 18,000 calls.
The sheriff’s department has not said whether any tips have advanced the investigation.
Intensive searches
Late Friday night, law enforcement sealed off a road about 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) from Guthrie’s home as part of their investigation. A parade of sheriff’s and FBI vehicles, including forensics vehicles, passed through the roadblock.
The investigators also tagged and towed a Range Rover SUV from a nearby Culver’s restaurant parking lot late Friday.
The sheriff’s department said Saturday the activity was part of the Guthrie investigation, but no arrests were made.
On Tuesday, sheriff deputies detained a person for questioning during a traffic stop south of Tucson. Authorities didn’t say what led them to stop the man but confirmed he was released.
The same day, deputies and FBI agents conducted a court-authorized search in Rio Rico, about an hour’s drive south of the city.
Family pleas
Savannah Guthrie, her sister and her brother have shared on social media multiple video messages to their mother’s purported captor.
The family’s Instagram videos have shifted in tone from impassioned pleas to whoever may have their mom, saying they want to talk and are even willing to pay a ransom, to bleaker and more desperate requests for the public’s help.
The latest video on Thursday was simply a home video of their mother and a promise to “never give up on her.”
A quiet neighborhood
Nancy Guthrie lived alone in the upscale Catalina Foothills neighborhood, where houses are spaced far apart and set back from the street by long driveways, gates and dense desert vegetation.
Savannah Guthrie grew up in Tucson, graduated from the University of Arizona and once worked at a television station in the city, where her parents settled in the 1970s. She joined “Today” in 2011.
In a video, she described her mother as a “loving woman of goodness and light.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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