RIO RICO, Ariz. (AP) — A person was detained for questioning Tuesday in the kidnapping of Nancy Guthrie, hours after the FBI released surveillance videos of a masked person wearing a handgun holster outside Guthrie’s front door the night she vanished from her Arizona home.
Deputies detained the person during a traffic stop south of Tucson, according to the Pima County Sheriff’s Department. It did not immediately provide details about the person or the location. The FBI referred questions to the sheriff’s office.
A Phoenix, Arizona, television station, KNXV-TV, interviewed a delivery man who said he had been detained by police on suspicions of kidnapping Guthrie. He said he was innocent and that police released him after several hours. Local and federal authorities have not confirmed that the person who they had detained was released.
The department and the FBI were conducting a court-authorized search Tuesday night at a location in Rio Rico, about an hour’s drive south of Tucson, the department said in a statement. It was expected to take several hours.
Guthrie disappeared on Feb. 1 and since then the case has gripped the nation. Until Tuesday, it seemed authorities were making little headway in determining what happened to the 84-year-old mother of “Today” show host Savannah Guthrie or finding who was responsible.