A hair sample recovered from inside Nancy Guthrie's Tucson home failed to produce a usable DNA profile, a setback in a kidnapping investigation now approaching six months with no arrests and a $1.2 million reward still unclaimed.
Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos disclosed the lab result in an interview with Fox News Digital on Thursday, confirming that a California laboratory returned the hair sample without extracting any genetic material. Investigators sent the sample in partnership with the FBI, hoping it might connect to the masked suspect captured on Guthrie's doorbell camera the morning she vanished.
It didn't pan out. Nanos told Fox News Digital:
"It came back... there's no DNA. But does that mean the hair isn't that of the suspect? We won't know that till we have the suspect's hair. You don't just destroy it."
The sheriff said the result came back "a matter of weeks ago." He stressed that the hair has been preserved and could still prove useful once investigators identify a suspect for comparison. But for a family and a community waiting since February 1 for answers, weeks of silence followed by a dead end is difficult to absorb.
Nancy Guthrie, 84, is the mother of "Today" co-host Savannah Guthrie. She disappeared from her Tucson home on January 31 or February 1, and blood was found at the front entrance. FBI-released images show an armed individual appearing to tamper with the Nest doorbell camera at her front door the morning of her disappearance. The bureau described the suspect as a man between 5 feet 9 inches and 5 feet 10 inches tall, with a medium build, carrying a black 25-liter Ozark Trail Hiker Pack backpack sold at Walmart.
Saturday marks six months since Guthrie went missing. No one has been arrested. No suspect has been publicly identified. A combined reward exceeding $1.2 million, including a $100,000 FBI contribution, has drawn no taker willing to come forward with information leading to an arrest.
The slow pace of lab processing has been a persistent frustration in the case. Nanos confirmed that investigators are working with multiple crime labs to analyze evidence collected from the home, and that investigative genetic genealogy research, a technique that builds a family tree from DNA markers to identify potential suspects, is also underway.
Earlier in the investigation, a glove found in a field roughly two miles from Guthrie's home appeared to match gloves worn by the masked suspect on porch surveillance footage. The AP reported that preliminary DNA results from the glove were received, though official confirmation remained pending at the time. The sheriff later said gloves and other evidence were sent to a Florida lab where existing DNA profiles and markers were already stored.
That chain of custody drew scrutiny. Nanos pushed back on reports suggesting he had blocked key evidence from reaching the FBI, insisting both agencies mutually agreed on the testing arrangement.
The friction between Pima County and the FBI has been a recurring subplot. The sheriff has publicly accused FBI leadership of spreading inaccurate claims about the investigation, while the bureau has continued to release suspect imagery and maintain its own tip line.
Despite the hair sample producing nothing, the sheriff struck a forward-looking tone. He told Fox News Digital that DNA remains central to the investigation and that the broader testing effort gives him reason to believe the case will be solved.
"Anything we can grasp onto with DNA is a part of this investigation. That's really where some of my optimism is, that I just know that we're gonna get this thing resolved."
Optimism is not a substitute for results. An 84-year-old woman who requires vital daily medication, she has a pacemaker and heart-related conditions, has been missing for half a year. The family has made repeated public appeals. Savannah Guthrie has pleaded with whoever took her mother to come forward.
In an earlier Instagram video, Savannah Guthrie said:
"It is never too late to do the right thing. And we are here. And we believe in the essential goodness of every human being, that it's never too late."
Sheriff Nanos echoed that appeal Thursday, saying investigators share the family's conviction that someone out there has information.
"We believe, just as the family does, just as Savannah does, somebody knows something. We need that person to call us."
The list of what remains unknown is long. Investigators have not publicly identified the suspect seen on the doorbell camera. A black Ozark Trail backpack visible in the footage has not been reported as recovered. The New York Post reported that no arrests have been made since the February 1 kidnapping, and the broader DNA investigation, including genetic genealogy, has not yet produced disclosed leads.
Nanos has previously claimed investigators were close to solving the case. Those assurances have yet to be borne out by a public arrest or a named suspect.
Anyone with information can call the FBI tip line at 1-800-CALL-FBI or the anonymous reward tip line at 520-88-CRIME.
Six months is a long time for an 84-year-old woman to be missing. It is an even longer time for a family to wait on a system that keeps promising answers and delivering inconclusive lab results.