Chris Nanos is in the middle of the biggest case in his career.
The Pima County Sheriff has become the face of the investigation into the disappearance of Nancy Guthrie, a mystery that has captivated the nation.
“This is about finding somebody who’s out there in our community who needs help,” Nanos said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal on Tuesday. “This is about finding a monster.”
Nanos is the sheriff of the sprawling desert county where 84-year-old Guthrie, the mother of “Today” co-anchor Savannah Guthrie, was reported missing on Feb. 1. The search for Guthrie, now in its third week, has put Nanos in a harsh spotlight.
“These investigations, particularly big ones like this, you’re gonna have those ebbs and flows,” he said.
On the third day of the investigation, he declared the scene at Guthrie’s home “done”—only to revisit the location later. Almost a week into the case, he was spotted in the crowd at a University of Arizona basketball game. He hasn’t held a press conference in nearly two weeks.
Nanos brushed off criticism of his handling of the case, saying barbs were politically motivated or coming from people without law enforcement expertise. “Haters are gonna hate,” he said.
The sheriff’s department said Tuesday that DNA evidence from gloves found about 2 miles from Guthrie’s home produced no matches in a national criminal database, and DNA found at her property is being analyzed.
Nanos said the glove was just one lead, out of thousands. “We’re not done. We’ve got a lot more in front of us,” he said, including testing the DNA against genealogy sites.
The sheriff’s department also said that investigators are working to locate Guthrie’s pacemaker device, coordinating with the manufacturer and experts, and are working with Walmart management to try to identify an individual who bought a backpack that was seen in footage from a security camera at Guthrie’s house.
Nanos said all siblings and spouses in the Guthrie family have been cleared and aren’t suspects in the case. He said making accusations against them is inappropriate, and it is his job to help protect them.
“I may be a terrible politician, but I’m still a good cop,” he said.
Nanos began his career in the El Paso, Texas, police department before joining the Pima County Sheriff’s Department in 1984 as a corrections officer, according to a biography on the department website. He was elected sheriff in 2020, running as a Democrat, and re-elected in 2024. He placed his opponent Heather Lappin on leave from her job in the department weeks before the 2024 election, a move she said “influenced the election outcome, and tarnished my reputation.” Nanos won by 481 votes.
In his time with the department, Nanos has led major investigations and also faced scrutiny, including over department spending and how he handled a sexual assault case brought by a deputy against another department employee.
The disappearance of Nancy Guthrie is the biggest case the Tucson area has seen since the 2011 shooting of then-Rep. Gabby Giffords (D., Ariz.) outside a Safeway supermarket. Six people died in the attack and 13 were wounded, including the congresswoman. Nanos was a captain with the sheriff’s department at the time.
He has been working in conjunction with the Federal Bureau of Investigation on the Guthrie case, but the relationship has seemed strained at times.
President Trump said Friday that local authorities “didn’t want to let go” of the case, though “progress has been made” since the FBI got involved.
Nanos has disputed media reports that he blocked the FBI from accessing evidence or that there are tensions with the agency. “The FBI has done us great,” he said.
Nanos’s decision to declare the crime scene at Guthrie’s home “done” so early in the investigation has drawn criticism from armchair pundits and former law-enforcement officials.
“If this was a test for police recruits in the academy, studying the elements of constructing a crime scene and preserving evidence, the recruit would have failed the test if his or her answer included what the sheriff publicly admitted he did,” said Richard Carmona, a retired Pima County Deputy Sheriff, SWAT team leader and former U.S. Surgeon General.
Nanos said investigators were at the house for “better than 20 hours.” They have returned since then, including on Tuesday.
Carmona recently penned an op-ed in the Arizona Daily Star, lamenting “a series of avoidable missteps in messaging, coordination, and tone from senior departmental leadership.”
There have been a few major twists in the case, most recently late Friday night when authorities executed a search warrant at a residence about 2 miles from Guthrie’s home. They also conducted a traffic stop, and questioned one individual.
But then it was over, with no arrests, and Nanos faced a new wave of ire and frustration from the public.
“So they’re criticizing the sheriff,” Nanos said. “How does that help? Does that get us closer to finding Nancy?”
Write to Isabella Simonetti at isabella.simonetti@wsj.com
