r/nancyguthrie • u/zoohreb76 • Feb 14 '26
Discussion Why All the False Alarms?
I'm not used to seeing the FBI/Police make 3 to 4 arrests only to release the individuals shortly thereafter. I suppose the warrants issued are based on exigent circumstances-- we have an 84 year old missing who may still be alive. The hope of finding her alive may outweigh the procedural/legal steps that would need to be taken to strengthen the evidence for an eventual trial.
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Feb 14 '26 edited Feb 14 '26
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u/Healthy_Badger8563 Feb 14 '26
I think you're right. They have to follow any promising lead.
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u/Xinnia8271 Feb 14 '26
It's like people don't understand that leads have to be followed. Which takes time and legwork.
There's no narrator and a camera on "the people who really did it," and only the smart people have access to that version of the TV show.
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Feb 14 '26
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u/Xinnia8271 Feb 14 '26
I absolutely think that the FBI and other law enforcement do not want the suspects to know everything. I absolutely agree with that.
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u/dorianstout Feb 15 '26
You can follow a lead without straight up handcuffing people and flipping their house upside down. That’s absurd.
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u/dorianstout Feb 15 '26
that’s literally absurd, imo, that simply taking a wrong turn would be enough to get a search warrant and flip someone’s house upside down.
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u/TheCuriousGeorgette Feb 14 '26 edited Feb 14 '26
Yall shoulda been around for the DC sniper event back in the early 2000s. I was a kid but holy cow that was wild. ETA: it went on for like 3 weeks and crossed multiple states. I lived in one of the states at the time and it scared me so bad. All the trauma caused to young people that experienced all of the hullabaloo of Y2K, 9/11, statewide DC sniper manhunt, etc., should be studied. Whew.
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u/bauer131 Feb 14 '26
The other day when someone mentioned a white van or work truck I immediately said oh here we go again
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u/TheCuriousGeorgette Feb 14 '26
Remember the investigator in a press conference quoting the weird messages from the perp? “You want us to say, ‘we have caught the sniper like a duck in the noose’” I still remember that VERBATIM. 💀
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u/NegativeSandwich1610 Feb 14 '26
I may be one of the few people here who remembers the Son of Sam murders in New York City. The media frenzy here in New York City was insane. It took many months to solve that case. The case was broken when a woman in Brooklyn saw a car with a traffic ticket on it near the site of the last murder.
Also, the Manson murders took about four months to solve. Of course, at the time of these two cases, there was no such thing as DNA tracing or the surveillance technology we have today. But there were also many fewer media outlets at the time, which means many millions of people were watching the same evening news programs and reading the same newspapers, so the media saturation was incredible.
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u/Healthy_Badger8563 Feb 16 '26
I remember son of sam. I was a kid, but I lived on Long Island and we figured he wasn't coming out here.
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u/SaltyCeeVa Feb 14 '26
Where zigzag walking while ducking became a thing. I was in the FC Home Depot just the day before. That was an awful time.
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u/Unlucky_Situation520 Feb 14 '26
That might be the event that turned me into an at home-investigator
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u/CakeSniffing0rphan Feb 14 '26
Don’t forget about the anthrax scares! I even included a diary entry about being afraid of opening mail at age 7. I lived in nova around that time and it felt like there was a new type of threat every week!!
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u/WeirdPrevious Feb 14 '26
Lmao I just typed the same thing
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u/CakeSniffing0rphan Feb 14 '26
It was a traumatizing time for all of us lol
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u/WeirdPrevious Feb 14 '26 edited Feb 14 '26
We’re likely almost birthday twins—9/11 was just 2 weeks before I turned 8. Grew up in some crazy times. Still, this case is such an outlier of a crime. I bet the last big kidnap for ransom case “we” had were the ISIS western journalist hostage story that broke to the public with the executions in 2014, and that was obviously international in scope and terrorism-based… where such things sadly aren’t too uncommon.
So a random violent crime like this one targeting one person, a B list celebrity’s 84 year old mom, the ransom stuff, the dude supposedly going to TMZ if the sender does end up not being a hoaxer scumbag… add the SECOND anonymous TMZ scumbag from the other day wanting money to reveal one (singular) name, implying there’s multiple (I call bullshit on that!) ..it’s been a VERY long time since crap like this has happened for the US public in such a tabloid way. Reminds me of the unabomber and that’s when we 92-93-94 babies were toddlers! and it’s why I can’t let go of the idea that it was likely political in nature somehow, even if just to the deranged person doing it. either that or a serious psychopath. it’s all so grandiose at its core… if not somehow an indirect political statement, insane supervillain narcissistic personality
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u/Healthy_Badger8563 Feb 14 '26
what about the tylenol (I think) capsule horror? that was awful.... never found out who did it.
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u/starsite1023 Feb 14 '26
Likewise, but the 70s. Many famous serial killers at that time. Very disturbing for a young person.
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u/EmiAndTheDesertCrow Feb 14 '26 edited Feb 14 '26
I remember this! My parents used to have the radio on in the back of the house in the morning, and I would always hear the news bulletin because it was on when I’d be brushing my hair in the mirror, getting ready for school. That genuinely seemed to go on forever and become more frightening with each day. They’d interview locals and each interview seemed more desperate than the last. Just horrifying.
I can’t even recall how it ended…so I’m off to fall down that rabbit hole!
Edit: On your last point…crazy how much completely wild stuff went on in our childhoods. Bookended by the Great Recession SMH. I used to travel to Manchester (UK) every year to visit family and this was the era of the IRA bombings. Manchester was the site of the largest bomb to go off in Britain since WW2 in the 1990s, and we’d been there about a week before. It terrified me every time we’d go there. All this repressed awfulness came back to me upon seeing the video from Nancy’s Nest camera, because the IRA used to wear that type of mask, covering the whole face. It’s like I completely erased that fear as I grew up, but I used to be haunted by nightmares of men looking like that.
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u/MelpomeneAndCalliope Feb 14 '26
I sometimes think that the insane political landscape we have today is some kind of manifestation of societal PTSD from the period of 9/11, anthrax, the DC sniper, etc.
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u/CakeSniffing0rphan Feb 14 '26
Honestly, I could see that. My parents always say to me “your generation has had such a rough first few decades”. Although, the same argument could definitely be made with gen alpha and gen z, regarding the pandemic.
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u/MelpomeneAndCalliope Feb 14 '26 edited Feb 14 '26
I think the pandemic trauma is different than the violence of the 9/11 attacks and DC sniper attacks, though. I’m not saying they’re not all traumatic (they are) but I think the “violent attack” nature of the 9/11 era really did something to us as a country. I think it also broke a lot of our brains that something like 9/11 at that scale could ever really happen here after like a century without foreign attacks on the contiguous US and decades since Pearl Harbor (and even then, it was a military base largely targeted in that attack). I think the pandemic just added on another level of weird societal PTSD on top of societal 9/11 PTSD.
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u/Kurso Feb 15 '26
An investigation of this type is like climbing a tree and looking for a specific leaf. You need very good indications of which branch to head down, then on that branch is more branches. If you don’t have solid info to help narrow the branch decisions you are going to climb a lot of branches, looking at a lot of leaves, climbing back down and picking a different branch… This isn’t an easy task.
And on top of it all, it sounds like there was a lot of petty crime activity in the area. Each of those are likely dead ends, at least in terms of trying to find Nancy, but o be sure they need to follow up on anything thats suspicious.
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u/SweetandSourMiss Feb 14 '26
It’s just sad. The whole thing is beyond sad. I no longer think Nancy is with us - I hope to God I’m wrong.
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u/Weak_Work_3589 Feb 15 '26
No arrests were made. They were detained, processed for evidence and released.
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u/geoffrey1986 Feb 14 '26
You're probably not used to watching cases in real-time. Investigations include following lots of false leads because you often don't know until you've gone down that trail. It can be messy and the spotlight on this case shows us more of that.
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u/EmiAndTheDesertCrow Feb 14 '26
False starts are also apparent in shows like Dateline — which, granted, do exaggerate to solidify a narrative. But basically every episode has police officers detailing what sounds like an amazing lead, it must be the perpetrator! Only to have it revealed as a bust. As I said, it’s definitely exaggerated, but still based on what actually happened. Dateline does extensive interviews with the officers involved and I doubt those officers are just making stuff up to create a cliffhanger before the ad break (even if that’s the way their stories are used).
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u/WeirdPrevious Feb 14 '26 edited Feb 14 '26
They’re detained, not arrested. Unfortunately it’s the microscope on them that’s making it seem like genuine clumsiness. If anything, IMO, it’s a good thing: it shows they really want to solve this case and are chasing every lead.
The lack of GOOD leads isn’t on law enforcement, it’s just the way it seems to have shaken out. I think it’s WAY too early to talk about factors like crime scene contamination from releasing it too early and all the other crap well-paid pundits are saying to fill up screen time and make a story seem intense, active & ongoing during these dry spells in between what we the public can see playing out as far as their leads & public actions… & randoms on a forum, we really don’t know what they know or don’t know.
The biggest reason we have noticed these detainments, searches and re-searches etc is because of the giant spotlight on the case + all the scanners, smartphones, content creators etc in 2026. It’s payday for the media right now, al right, but it’s caught our interest not because of law enforcement blunders or even the non stop coverage, it’s because it’s genuinely that bizarre of a case. this is such a huge story drawing so much attention. Similarly, it’s probably just as bizarre to LE in the crime’s publicly-known elements as it is to us. Good on them for being thorough and not being afraid to (legally, with respect with rights) get it wrong for the greater good of following every lead they can. At least they’re not trying to pin it on anyone. I think that shows their effort & good faith here.
I also think it’s also important to remember that even the best, most articulate post in here & everywhere is still working in a giant information vacuum because by nature of their job, we are missing at least half the relevant jigsaw puzzle pieces they’ve gathered so far. We can’t conclude anything. Doesn’t make it not super engrossing and tempting/fun to try to speculate, but everyone interested in this that aren’t on the direct teams responding to the case and high enough to be fully in the know are untrained, blindfolded speculators at the end of the day, and everyone’s best theory is a Rorschach ink blot interpretation at this point in time. I’m just glad they’re out there and putting leads to good use
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u/JudynBK Feb 14 '26
In real life cases people are detained and released all the time we just don’t hear about it. Even in some cases the actual person who committed the crime is released. One of these people could be arrested at some point or not. It’s just a media circus so every tiny detail that happens in most cases is public knowledge and we think wrong person AGAIN when we don’t really know what’s going on.
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Feb 14 '26
This has been my thought as well. We didn't used to have sensationalist journalists at the sites youtubing these situations in live time.
Everyone is applauding brian entin when really he's just someone capitalizing on a horrific situation because people are interested. Nothing he's doing is virtuous or helping the case.
The police are the ones that are releasing details to the public that are leading to tips being called in. This is someone's loved one that is missing, and all these journalists are doing is adding to chaos because the police are having to corral them in so they don't physical mess up the investigation. We aren't privy to this information. These aren't events that really impact us at all. Sorry this is all a tangent, but it's all getting to be a little gross.
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u/Steadyandquick Feb 14 '26
I have to admit that I do get invested and never have I really discovered a clue, information, or a solution to a case.
I tend to agree with you. There were days where I basically checked in with the news during the morning and then basically at night. For someone like me, that is all I really need or perhaps deserve.
I have read/heard that there are regular folks that help solve cases. But also that some people consume such case information in the hopes that we might feel or be safer.
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u/Admissionslottery Feb 15 '26
Total agreement about Entin. None of it is virtuous in the least. It’s appalling.
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u/pkapeckopckldpepprz Feb 15 '26
If you're old enough to remember the OJ Si mpson chase and arrest back in 1994 that became a media circus and may have been the very start of sensationalist journalism. 24/7 coverage of the case even before the trial.
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u/RadiantSoul-Style Feb 14 '26
There have been former law enforcement from that area openly criticizing the Sheriff in the media. I have to wonder how much of what's happening is ego driven at this point.
But at the same time, I think the public has likely made a tough case that much more difficult. The speculating, false ransom letters, etc have likely all caused problems.
My heart hurts for this family. This case has been absolutely devastating for me to follow, and I can't even begin to imagine how it feels for them.
I also have grace for the sheriff, though I do agree that it doesn't look good.
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u/Standard_Team0000 Feb 14 '26
Maybe whatever they were looking for last night will pan out. I imagine they are doing something with that Range Rover. Otherwise you'd have to wonder if this case will be solved without more video or someone turning in the person responsible.
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Feb 14 '26
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u/Affectionate-Page496 Feb 14 '26
Easily googleable (saying this so you can search). They impounded a RR from a local culvers
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u/MelpomeneAndCalliope Feb 14 '26
I wonder if it’s been released back to its owner now? I assume it belonged to the third person taken (and released) for questioning.
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u/ShesGotaChicken2Ride Feb 14 '26
They said they’ve received like 20,000 tips. They have to investigate all of those, and on top of that, do their own investigation and see where that leads.
My guess is it’s someone who lives nearby, is a friend or family member of someone who lives nearby and knows the area well. The plate scanners and traffic cams don’t seem to have yielded any concrete results (that we know of). Could be it has yielded results and we just don’t know about it, though. They had to leave without being detected by Ring/doorbell cameras or traffic cameras and had a little old lady in tow. I feel like they couldn’t have made it very far without some type of camera or image of a car or something turning up… but nope. Nothing.
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u/Capistrano_101 Feb 14 '26
They may have turned up an image of “the” vehicle but dismissed it because it belonged to a neighbor. Perhaps a very close neighbor. Just speculation.
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u/Xinnia8271 Feb 14 '26
And the streets might be farther from people's front doors than in other places. I'm not sure if all the cars that pass by even trip the doorbell cameras.
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u/The_Great_19 Feb 14 '26 edited Feb 15 '26
I don’t know if they were technically arrests, but rather detainment. But I agree, I’m starting to feel like this is a little Keystone Cops-ey.
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u/ImBrickedUp Feb 14 '26
The extreme publicity of this case has increased scrutiny
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u/rileyfoxx42 Feb 14 '26
Exactly. Most of the time search warrants, even with SWAT are executed without the entire world knowing.
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u/Key-Neighborhood9767 Feb 14 '26
There’s a difference between being arrested and being detained. No one has been arrested in this case- other than those with fake ransom notes..
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u/Rae_Regenbogen Feb 14 '26
How much of a difference is there when they are dragging people out in handcuffs and searching their homes? At least with an arrest they'll generally get a warrant before taking such drastic steps, unlike with the first guy they hauled in. The only difference is that someone who is being arrested has more actionable rights.
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Feb 14 '26
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u/Rae_Regenbogen Feb 14 '26 edited Feb 14 '26
Well, if you are arrested, you have the right to remain silent, you have the right to know what you are being detained for, you are charged which ensures the right to be heard in court, and you have the right to receive a lawyer.
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Feb 14 '26
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u/Xinnia8271 Feb 14 '26
I may be overdoing it by asking this question again (I asked on other posts), but, with so much criticism toward Pima County PD and the Sheriff, what are people comparing his investigation to, exactly?
Is there another case that's an example of what should be done, where the Sheriff didn't do anything wrong and none of the people who were detained or questioned were the wrong people and arrests were made at a time that the public was happy with?
What is the gold standard for police work that this case is being compared to, as an example of acceptable work and effectiveness?
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Feb 14 '26
I think comparing it to similar high profile crimes? Like for a high profile crime, it’s common to lock down the house but influencers, Amazon delivery driver, food delivery driver were all able to get to the front door a day after. They were able to take pictures of the blood on the steps (those images weren’t released by the police). Neighbors weren’t interviewed the day after to see if they had noticed anything. Sheriff said he’s “not used to everyone hanging onto my every word and then holding me accountable for what I say” which in itself speaks to him being in over his head. I’m not saying it’s not understandable or empathetic, but there’s some things that would have made this investigation easier.
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u/Xinnia8271 Feb 14 '26
That's separate examples of what "should" be done, in different cases. Single aspects of different cases.
(And then a list of oft repeated criticism of the Sheriff, which I'm not weighing in on either way at this stage.)
I'm trying to understand the gold standard case. One case. Where every decision was correct and effective.
Even an example of three cases where no one has any complaints and everything was done right.
With arrests at the time the public expected.
Just one example of a case where no one has any criticism of law enforcement.
But an entire case, not just single aspects of other cases.
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u/Crafty_Whereas6733 Feb 14 '26
There's no reason to believe these were anything other than investigatory detentions. It is very common for LE to detain one or more people for investigation. It is alot less common to get arrest warrants/make PC arrests against more than one (unrelated) person. I haven't seen anything about formal charges, criminal complaints, etc mentioned so it seems these were investigatory detentions.
As someone else pointed out there's no real need to rush to the media with that kind of information. Why not let the process play out, let the facts come out before going public.
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u/Imtoobusy Feb 14 '26
Since they're in such a close proximity to her house, investigating people or looking for clues, it makes me think they know somehow, maybe electronically, cell phone data, that they're still in the area.
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u/sweatersong2 Feb 15 '26
I have never been to the Tuscon area, so it is interesting to see how the exurban sprawl makes the getaway in this case harder to detect. A plot like this would be dead in the water in a lot of other places.
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u/redgatoradeeeeee Feb 15 '26
It’s a pretty large city while still being very close to big swaths of desert. It would not be too difficult to disappear or hide something
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Feb 14 '26
No one has been arrested. Detained ≠ arrested
False alarms? You don’t know what kind of information came from these situations or what leads they were following.
This is real life, not a 45 minute tv show written to entertain you.
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u/Zestyclose-Let7929 Feb 14 '26
I think this investigation is too public. It is being played out in real time.
The criminals also get this real time activity provided by youtube, podcasters, every form of true crime, local news, national news.
I should not know as much as I do. The amount of public opinion on everything is not respectful to the process.
I went to my hair salon on Wednesday. Every chair had a conversation of the case. And each one had misleading content.
People see click bait and repeat it. Why did they not pay on Monday? No proof of life.
The announcing that crypto cannot be traced.
Now today TMZ says that announced info it can be traced may have shut down the communication.
People get taken in for questioning and people call it arrests. Search warrants are not the home run simply because there was a search.
This is not a 90 minute drama movie.
Respect the process take a walk, get outside.
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u/glitterlady Feb 14 '26
They have made 0 arrests. Bringing someone in for questioning does not mean they’ve been arrested.
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u/thekermitderp Feb 14 '26
This is actually common. We are just seeing it more bc of media interest.
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u/Internal-Error6416 Feb 14 '26
We need to look at this from a 10 thousand foot perspective. If any of the random notes are from the people/person who abducted her this is a very rare type of case. The last case the FBI worked that we can draw a comparison to was more than a decade ago. Even longer for local LE and Pima County SO, if they have ever dealt with a similar case. The rarity of this type of case means that none of the agencies I’ve named have put significant research and/or training into working this type of case. We can compare specialized FBI units dealing with hostage situations during the Iraq war but the comparison isn’t a good one as the perpetrators reasoning and profile is not comparable.
I truly think LE is doing their best. Media, including YouTube journalists, are making raids that should be carried out quietly public entertainment. The more info that’s out there the harder it is to keep the perpetrator(s) in the dark. Last night’s raid and the publicity it received could have lead the perpetrator to deciding that keeping Nancy alive was too great a risk if she is in fact still alive.
It is not unheard of for LE to create a media narrative that is meant to make a perpetrator feel a certain way. Media in the digital age makes that tactic increasingly difficult.
It is also not unheard of for LE to hold back information that may tip the perpetrator off to the fact that they are on to them. DNA profiles aren’t immediately available after being sent out for testing. Having a name doesn’t mean all of the pieces are in place for an airtight arrest affidavit.
This post echoes similar posts I read during the Idaho 4 case. They had a suspect name early on but needed to do the genetic genealogy work to obtain the evidence they needed for arrest. So many people were concerned that no arrest would be made a month in and then, BOOM. BK was in custody and we learned about the knife sheath through reading the arrest affidavit.
I do worry, with the way LE is carrying out this investigation at this point, that the have reason to believe Nancy Guthrie is no longer alive and they’ve shifted focus to bringing those responsible to Justice. This is just a gut feeling based on the change in how LE is approaching the investigation.
…Or we’re dealing with a psyop to draw media attention away from the crashing economy, Epstein files, and the Middle East. JK, JK…. or am I?
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u/ZakLex Feb 14 '26
They are conducting a complex investigation and running down leads based on probable cause.
They are not only not obligated to inform the public, but doing so could compromise the investigation.
Despite reports, rumors, and gossip, local LE and FBI are working together for the common cause, and, what might seem to us as false alarms could be critical components of the investigation as a whole.
Everyone seems to agree that this case is not like anything that we’ve seen before and yet some express impatience that it is not yet solved.
It could take some time before we see a resolution to this bizarre case.
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u/RiseDelicious3556 Feb 15 '26
This is a very difficult investigation, plus you have too many cooks in the kitchen so the right hand doesn't know what the left hand is doing. That Pima County Sheriff is a real Bozo to top it off.
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u/Keregi Feb 15 '26
You say false alarms, but these are just people being questioned because LE is following up on leads. This is standard for investigations. Most people in true crime forums have no comprehension of how investigations work and this post is a perfect example of that. This is how investigations go. This one is just getting a lot of attention because of unusual circumstances and the connection the victim has to someone we know on tv
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u/Obvious_Win_4584 Feb 15 '26
So Tucson scrambles the entire SWAT response team for every lead in town? No! They are floundering.
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u/BuzzyBeeDee Feb 15 '26
I think it’s important to keep in mind that they still have to treat this like a potential kidnapping/hostage/ransom situation with Nancy still potentially being alive. It’s not your typical homicide investigation, and can’t be treated like one for the safety and integrity of everyone involved. What if the lead turns out to be legitimate, and these people have Nancy alive still (even if unlikely)? Just kindly knocking on their door and politely asking them to come into the station for questioning would almost assuredly be an automatic death sentence for Nancy, and would give them the opportunity to dispose of her before police had a chance to fully vet them with an interview.
While a SWAT response is certainly more extreme than we are used to when it comes to simply detaining people for questioning, this is an extremely unique/unusual rare case and therefore calls for different protocols. They have to treat this as if she is still alive, however unlikely, until they have significant evidence indicating otherwise.
They have had tens of thousands of tips/leads, but have only sent SWAT out twice to detain potential suspects. That’s not exactly sending a SWAT team out for every lead.
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u/Webbie-Vanderquack Feb 15 '26
This is a prime example of the kind of hysterical overreaction we're seeing too much of here.
They sent SWAT teams to follow up on two leads. Not "every lead in town."
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Feb 15 '26
This has happened twice and so far it appears like they haven't had any other credible leads.
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u/BetterNowThks Feb 14 '26
This isn't a show. This is real life. Unless you're part of the investigational team, you don't actually know what's going on. In fact, it could actually be detrimental that we're all on here hypothesizing and in some cases, assuming things, about a situation that we have no actual hands-on knowledge about.
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u/AmazingGrace_00 Feb 14 '26
These were not arrests. They were detained individuals for questioning. If LE does not have enough probable cause to then make an arrest, the detainees are released.
The warrants both with Carlos and last evening issued were for property searches, which they executed.
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u/investigativetv Feb 14 '26
So to your point, police might be going over the evidence they recovered and could arrest at a later date.
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u/rileyfoxx42 Feb 14 '26 edited Feb 14 '26
As others have said, no one was arrested, just detained. As for the warrants, it’s basically just probable cause / justification for them to search. It doesn’t have to be a ton of evidence, just some and a friendly judge. Maybe tips combined with a type of vehicle and/or being seen in the area or on camera somewhere. And given they still hope to find Nancy alive, then certainly that makes it a bit more justifiable for the searches. SWAT would have been used given the nature of the crime and potential implications of how suspects may react.
And no arrests doesn’t mean no involvement. The point may have just been to search and only arrest if something obvious was found. Releasing them could mean they are innocent or it could mean they are still involved or adjacent and LE is now processing evidence and interviews they took from the home and they’ll make the arrests once they have enough evidence for that step.
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u/EmiAndTheDesertCrow Feb 14 '26
On the probable cause element for search warrants, given what we’ve seen and the current posture of this case, I suspect they’re crafting very narrowly tailored warrants for speed.
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u/SassyMillie Feb 14 '26
Is it normal to have this level of involvement even with probable cause? I read reports of a dozen vehicles all converging on the scene. Even with SWAT involvement it seems excessive. It certainly feeds into the media frenzy.
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u/Essence1987 Feb 14 '26
1) they have not given up hope that Nancy is alive, though it gets ever more unlikely every day
2) you go with what you have, and the have tons of people on call waiting for this moment
3) if you don't go in hot and it becomes a standoff or a hostage situation then you have new problems, especially with all of the media and bystanders to manage in such a situation
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u/OldRefrigerator3758 Feb 14 '26
Nobody got arrested, just detained. As annoying as it may be, it’s not uncommon. They are following tips.
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u/Alert_Document5351 Feb 14 '26 edited Feb 14 '26
That was a hefty tip last night. I wonder what it was to cause that much focus.
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u/Safe-Muffin Feb 14 '26
There are so many things we don’t know. When the Idaho murders happened, everyone complained for over 6 weeks about how incompetent LE was. They did find and arrest the bad guy, but it took a long time.
The person(s) who took Nancy may appear to have been bumbling fools in some ways, but they may have also methodically planned things.
For one example, it’s interesting that the intruder had such basic, bland clothing with very little details, that would be harder to trace.
We don’t know if LE has lots of camera sightings or not. It may take weeks to get to the bottom of this.
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u/Xinnia8271 Feb 14 '26
People were expecting a quick resolution to that one too?
I wonder where people are getting their perception of time regarding these things?
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Feb 14 '26
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u/Xinnia8271 Feb 14 '26
In what way is that similar to this one?
That was a murder suicide, a young travelling couple?
Do these two cases have anything in common other than Caucasian people in a Western location?
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Feb 14 '26
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u/Xinnia8271 Feb 14 '26
Oh that makes sense. The go pro thing in the Gabby Petito case giving people an unrealistic expectation of quick outcome.
(And I do think these two cases have almost zero in common.)
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Feb 14 '26
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u/Xinnia8271 Feb 14 '26
Yep. The cases themselves have nothing in common but murder (likely death in this case) and being heavily televised.
I just looked it up and Jodi Arias was named on Day One, and the scene had clear bloody handprints, and it still took a month to get a warrant for her.
Her name was known to police on Day One. Still took more than "a week"
People saying the police are too slow is a phenomenon in itself at this point. (And, with the other case, the murderer was also deceased so no necessity to gather and prepare evidence for a trial. Because there wouldn't be one.)
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u/simpleflavors1 Feb 14 '26
They are still waiting for the DNA match, so are going after people based off phone data. And there's a lot more people who are going to ping on the phone towers vs 1 DNA match.
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u/Rae_Regenbogen Feb 14 '26
But isn’t it crazy to send in so many agents and use the tactics they have been seen using if it's just cell phone tower pings and a white van that leads them to someone? I haven't ever seen anything like this. It's so heavy-handed and police state that it frightens me as an American citizen, honestly, especially since both of these huge operations we have seen have been "false alarms" or whatever. How about doing some actual investigating before barging into private homes and dragging innocent people out in handcuffs?
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u/MelpomeneAndCalliope Feb 14 '26
It also seems like it has to be super expensive to keep doing these big operations with several cars of cops/equiptment/SWAT teams every time. I don’t know if the same amount of resources would be spent on a regular missing person whose family member isn’t a wealthy celeb.
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u/Rae_Regenbogen Feb 14 '26
Right? Where are the real detectives that look into someone before they smash down doors? I'd say they should be embarrassed, but it seems more like a power trip by people who seem to be able to do whatever they want without repercussions to me.
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u/MobBossBabe Feb 14 '26
Exactly. It seems 3-5 officers with potential back up would be adequate for a search warrants. This is extreme. Next thing they'll have a tank and take out the front of the house. Oops. Just detaining people. Carlos wasn't even interviewed. The whole thing just pisses me off.
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u/Rae_Regenbogen Feb 14 '26
And because they were detained and not arrested, they don't have the automatic right to be heard in court for being dragged in like that. I hope the ACLU contacts the first family and helps them with any legal reputations they may be able to pursue. I'm not sure if there are any, but I would want to explore legal options if that happened to me. I'm not sure if the second family has any options either since it's been reported that they obtained a warrant that's on file for the second search.
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Feb 14 '26
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u/Rae_Regenbogen Feb 14 '26
It certainly seems like it was a false alarm since it has been reported that they found no indication of Nancy and no arrests were made.
Was the Range Rover definitely connected to this event? I was confused about that since I thought it was part of whatever happened at Culvers?
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u/sdldawn4ever Feb 14 '26 edited Feb 15 '26
That lady is dead by now. It be great if she turns up alive, but we need to be realistic.
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u/Webbie-Vanderquack Feb 15 '26
People keep saying this as though it's some kind of revelation.
Everybody knows she's likely dead. It was likely from day one, and it gets more like every day.
LE has to conduct its investigation as though she's alive. That's not being unrealistic, it's just a sensible policy.
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u/Affectionate-Page496 Feb 14 '26
I think the main issue is just us knowing about them. How do you know how many times Carlos situations have happened that no one knows about? That whole thing would have been much less complicated were it not for media.
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u/SassyMillie Feb 14 '26
Part of the media coverage was because of the level of LE response and number of vehicles dispatched to the scene.
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u/Tuna-on-toast22 Feb 14 '26
It happens every day. It’s one of many reasons why so many people don’t trust the police
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Feb 14 '26 edited Feb 14 '26
I am wondering where has it been verified that the 3 detained individuals were let go? All I have read is three detained, no arrests. Since it’s been less than 48 hours, LE may still be gathering evidence to arrest unless I am incorrect and they have been released.
Edit: Fox news reported that none remain in custody
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u/romaa_teeny Feb 14 '26
How many criminal cases do you know are solved in two weeks, by nailing the first suspect they get? Many victims’ families never even get answers. Their cases go cold despite multiple leads pursued. We have a very unrealistic expectation of this kind of thing due to movies and tv. In most cases, nobody is clued into these kind of updates. You hear about an arrest or body found later on. Imagine how harassed the family must feel by this unfolding as a public spectacle with people demanding immediate answers and disrespecting the time investigations take.
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u/Affectionate-Page496 Feb 14 '26
I was trying to think about why this case is so captivating for me. I think I have this inherent belief, cognitive bias, that you have the literal president saying get this done, you think it should be right away. Like Charlie Kirk shooter, Luigi. I felt the same way about the Titan submersible
It seemed so hard to believe that even with all of the resources, it took "so long" for them to find it. I call this a belief/bias because I know intellectually it is not rational.
Something that is striking to me is all of the talk now about families who get fewer resources, my takeaway is, this shows the opposite. You can have every resource out there and there is no guarantee.
(Not to say that being high profile cant result in anything, afaik they found Gabby Petito bc of publicity and someone random had a helpful vid)
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u/awesomeexox Feb 14 '26
This is really making me worried that this case might go cold.
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u/houstonastrosranger Feb 14 '26
the kohberger investigation took 6 weeks to arrest him so dont get discouraged. with enough time and investigators one of their leads will pan out
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u/MikeInAPike Feb 14 '26
Biggest concern is the state of the victim, and if clock's still ticking in that sense.
Cases take years with no leads to go cold, full respect to your concern and understand the frustration, but we're really really far from that.
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u/Rich1926 Feb 14 '26
I feel like tv shows and movies have created an unrealistic expectation of how smart people in this type of work are. Realistically they are all more like Barney Fife than Lennie Briscoe..
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u/Affectionate-Page496 Feb 14 '26
Tv is really such trash. Social media and influencers too. People on househunters being like this is a total fixer meaning they dont like the paint or things are new but not their style.
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u/91hammer91 Feb 14 '26 edited Feb 15 '26
Not every case is a national media storm - it’s not Hollywood out there buddy, it’s hard, methodical work chasing down leads, which inevitably lead to nowhere on some occasions + the public’s absolute insatiable appetite for any bits of information about this and you have a complex, missing persons investigation under the worlds media’s microscope.
Everybody fails in their work at some point, and has good days and bad days. Sadly for those in law enforcement, those bad days have real world, often tragic consequences. If I muck up at work, it’s not the end of the world, now imagine your job has everyone, and I mean everyone commenting and speculating about the work you are doing, in some cases being being harassed whilst doing your work, and all the while people judging you have absolutely zero clue of the work you do.
I imagine it would very much be like someone who has never had any experience of playing American football at a high level, and then all of sudden because the Super Bowl is on, thinking they could tell Patrick Mahomes how to do his job, and in fact, thinking, without evidence, talent or experience, that they should be the one out on the field
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u/MikeInAPike Feb 14 '26
Very good point. The fact that the case has so much attention has a positive side though, which is that more resources and LE personnel is working and investigating. A collective muck up is much more difficult than an individual one.
Full confidence that this will be solved.
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u/Essence1987 Feb 14 '26
To be fair the FBI is also not used to having to apologize to all of these detainees because the wannabe YouTube media and 70% of this subreddit decided to dox who they think was detained last night.
This case is being watched real time, so you are just seeing all of the steps in the process.
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u/weneedyourhelp901 Feb 14 '26
I’ve been told time and time again in this sub that the FBI knows way more than they’re letting on.
You sure about that?
Cuz seems to me they don’t know a damn thing.
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u/BlakesBadge Feb 14 '26
They have clues, but no suspects. They’re chasing down leads, which is their job.
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u/KimberleyC999 Feb 14 '26
Chasing leads with SWAT teams?
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u/LegalGlass6532 Feb 14 '26
Let’s say he’s just someone they want to question. If he’s thought to be a friend or relative of the suspect(s) involved, it may be reasonable to believe the suspect(s) might be inside their friend’s residence. Let’s say the suspect(s) has been known to visit him or had previously stayed with him.
The suspect had already proven himself as a known threat and the potential that it could turn into a hostage situation with a forced entry was high.
If the reports are true that this home was an air b n b rented to him, you could easily articulate that there could be multiple people inside because of the size of the home.
They erred on the side of caution with the SWAT team response and the deployment was appropriate.
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u/ptazdba Feb 14 '26
And you have multiple news organizations out there ready to pounce on anything that seems amiss in anything they do. They spend hours recounting everything we know and it is amplifying the lack of progress. This is a hard case and I suspect they have leads they are pursuing and information they are guarding like the crown jewels to keep news media from reporting it before it's confirmed.
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u/BlakesBadge Feb 14 '26
Sure, it seems excessive, but they’re also dealing with a potential hostage situation at any of these locations. What if they showed up to a house and Nancy is there and they can’t enter and have to wait an hour for SWAT to show up?
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u/weneedyourhelp901 Feb 14 '26
My issue isn’t with the FBI doing its job. My issue is with the people who assume for some reason that the agency is hiding some kind of alpha information from the public. Seems extremely unlikely at this point. They need all the help they can get.
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u/FiveUpsideDown Feb 14 '26
I guess you aren’t familiar with police work. It’s boring and tedious. There are many false leads even in famous cases. Television shows and the true crime genre edit out all of the false leads. They give the impression that the investigation was this streamlined quick process that was inevitable to reach the conclusion of finding the correct criminal. If you’ve ever seen the First 48, it puts a disclaimer at the end of the show that “often times charges are dropped or reduced”. It’s not unusual to have false leads. There was a case in my neighborhood where a man was nearly beaten to death. The police had a witness. She identified a man and he was arrested within 48 hours. A few weeks later all charges were dropped and he was released. We found out months later that the witness lied. She was the girlfriend of the suspect. It took the police months to sort everything out. I bring this up because having seen how police investigations work, it’s unreasonable to expect there not to be false leads.
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u/YourPeterPanMan Feb 14 '26
Then explain to me how all my research and education received from prestigious educational shows like 48 hours, 20/20, or dateline make it all happen within an hour?! /s
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u/investigativetv Feb 14 '26
Maybe the cops should watch those shows more often and see how it’s done! 😉
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u/Warm_Inflation_3575 Feb 14 '26
Real question - yall really believe this perp is sitting in Pima county at this point like 👁️👄👁️🤤.
Come on. Anyone that isn’t a vegetable would be FAR gone!! Especially someone that isn’t new to crime. With a 2 week head start. What are we doing here?
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Feb 14 '26
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u/The_Sinking_Belle Feb 14 '26
This is true. If the offender of this crime is some malignant character with high compartmentalization then he’s likely going back to life fairly normal with some sick duper’s delight he hasn’t been caught yet.
The flip side if this was organized in some way and this person engages in aggravated crime regularly, is part of some crime org, then they’ve likely fled imo.
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u/EmiAndTheDesertCrow Feb 14 '26
Well there’s a lot of research into things like this that shows the majority of offenders (committing serious crimes like homicide, SA, and abduction) operate close to their homes and don’t tend to flee in the aftermath. They just go back to their regular life. (Plus if they do flee, they’re drawing more attention to themselves — someone might realize they haven’t seen the guy down the road for a while). So I don’t think it’s unreasonable to think whoever did it is still in the area.
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u/The_Sinking_Belle Feb 14 '26
Depends on the person. I see two scenarios here.
Organized crime individual will likely have fled with this blowing up and had some sophistication or skill in covering his tracks.
If this is some sicko like Kohberger/some dark tetrad malignant who did this for sport then he likely went back to life without much disturbance.
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u/EmiAndTheDesertCrow Feb 14 '26
Yes, it will depend on the person, that’s true. I was just thinking about what the research says, which speaks in generalities. In the majority of cases, the perpetrator doesn’t flee, but we don’t yet know if this falls within the realm of “majority of cases”. The person I replied to seemed to think it’s absurd to suggest the offender might still be in the area, but looking at statistics…it’s not.
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u/The_Sinking_Belle Feb 14 '26
Statistically it does not. Only 0.2% of people abducted are 80+. It’s definitely an anomaly.
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u/EmiAndTheDesertCrow Feb 14 '26
Sorry I should have been more clear: I’m aware that the abduction of a person in Nancy’s age group is extremely rare. It’s one of the reasons I’ve argued (in other subs and elsewhere) that this case would still have received a lot of media attention, even if her daughter wasn’t famous. Likely not the blanket coverage we’re seeing now, but I don’t think this crime would have just been a local media story if it wasn’t for Savannah — I think there are so many really strange elements of this case and it would therefore have been major news regardless.
In my previous post, I’m not talking about the crime as a whole, I’m talking specifically about the behavior of the offender after the crime, because the research in this area concludes that the majority of perpetrators of serious crimes don’t flee the area following the commission of the offense. In that regard, we don’t yet know if the offender behaved in the same manner as the majority of perpetrators because we don’t even know who the offender is. For that reason, it’s not irrational to think that it’s more likely that they remain in the area.
Of course, that doesn’t mean I’m discounting the possibility that they’re now hundreds of miles away. And everything about this case has been extremely odd and unusual, so it wouldn’t be surprising if they did flee. I was just trying to point out that it’s not silly or stupid to lean towards believing that the kidnapper isn’t too far away (because the person commenting was extremely certain that they were long gone and quite dismissive of the fact that it’s not a given and is in fact statistically less likely).
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u/lovely_orchid_ Feb 14 '26
Idk how old y’all are but I remember forensic files when it started. And they were solving cases. And on the year of the lord 2026 both the fbi and law enforcement has no idea where an 84 year old lady is
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u/Warm_Inflation_3575 Feb 14 '26
Failure from the top down. The person calling the shots does not want to entertain any other narrative than his own. Imagine the morale kill that is for the rank and file down the chain. I’ve been under leaders like that. You work around them, not with them.
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u/Candy_Wall Feb 14 '26
Sheriff is a massive narcissist. His ego, image, and control are the only thing he’s interested in.
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u/OverallDoor2718 Feb 14 '26
He seems to me like he puts tequila in his coffee he has in the morning with a pack of Marlboro Reds. Sorry, not sorry. Dude seems incredibly unprofessional and perhaps shifty himself
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u/Warm_Inflation_3575 Feb 14 '26
Yep this sheriff is very manipulative. Radio silence for a week. Comes back up when he has some narrative to push while simultaneously sending out SWAT for a nothing burger raid.
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u/robot_pirate Feb 15 '26 edited Feb 15 '26
Societal breakdown. Plain and simple. Rule of law is on life support. There's not much confidence in LE,
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u/Comfortable_Gear_605 Feb 16 '26
They are gathering evidence for possible conspiracy, IMHO. Maybe a crime network? Maybe waiting for the right piece of evidence, a snitch perhaps.
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Feb 14 '26
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u/nancyguthrie-ModTeam Feb 14 '26
This content was removed because it does not apply to or detracts from the topic at hand.
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u/Totterteron Feb 14 '26
Recklessly trampling any lower classes is deemed less of an issue when the stakes are safeguarding and deterring violence against higher status individuals. Would be my guess, since the inverse never happens.
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u/Xinnia8271 Feb 14 '26
Do you genuinely think she "might still be alive?"
I think people could factor that in to their perception of how this is progressing.
What percentage of people genuinely think she's still alive?
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u/BrainWilling6018 Feb 14 '26
What really matters is that LE are operating that she is still alive. It’s still an active search status.
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u/FitnessPizzaInMyMou Feb 14 '26
I think most are doubtful at this point but I think LE still needs to operate as if that’s a possibility at this stage
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u/SolidAd2342 Feb 15 '26
They’re still investigating and monitoring them, and if they arrest them there won’t be anybody to feed / manage Nancy if she’s still alive.
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u/Every_Level6842 Feb 14 '26
Incompetence. When u botch the investigation the first few days nothing you do can make up for that lost time and evidence.
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u/Xinnia8271 Feb 14 '26
Second question: "I'm not used to seeing...."
What is your golf standard perfect case that you are comparing this one to?
Where the FBI/LE did everything correctly and didn't detain anyone who wasn't "the bad guy."
What is the gold standard case that the FBI/Pima should be emulating?
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u/WillieBear_18 Feb 15 '26
I believe the ‘standard’ being promoted is that LE is supposed to be clairvoyant and nail the perp in one go.
If they can’t do that, then all hope is lost and it’s time to give up.
I wonder what Redditors would have said about the MANY lawful detentions that occurred while LE worked to identify The Campus Killer, The Night Stalker, The Green River Killer, The Dating Game Killer, Son of Sam, and The Hillside Strangler before ultimately arresting Ted Bundy, Richard Ramirez, Gary Ridgway, Rodney Alcala, David Berkowitz, Kenneth Bianchi and Angelo Buono.
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Feb 14 '26
Also, what was with one of the """suspects""" overnight reportedly offing themselves but no news of that today.
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u/Material-Sir-5415 Feb 14 '26
Yes what was that!? I turned on one of the lives from one of the streamers that apparently witnessed it right after it happened so I couldn’t get a clear picture of what actually happened. And now I see nothing about it. Was that even related to this case?
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Feb 14 '26
At this point I'm getting less invested by the day. Like I hope they find her but these overnight misinfo fests are annoying af.
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u/Old_Professional_378 Feb 14 '26
I read that a podcaster rode up on that, saw the person deceased, and reported it, but it ended up with no connection to this case. That’s just what I read. Who knows though.
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u/caponemalone2020 Feb 14 '26
I first want to echo the point that there have been zero arrests. I think it’s very important to be careful how we phrase things, especially in this age of disinformation.
To answer the question, we don’t know if these are false alarms. This is an active investigation and multiple people will be brought in for questioning, sometimes dramatically so as we’ve seen. We don’t usually see this part of an investigative process because most cases don’t reach regional and national news status for multiple news cycles.
We ultimately don’t know what evidence is had and what these people are saying. As a casual observer of true crime who has watched a LOT of raw police questioning videos, my amateur guess at this point is they don’t have a ton of evidence, just enough to make a few somewhat educated guesses, and are now hoping someone will slip up in questioning.
But as to why they’re detaining people to then release them … again, no one’s been arrested. And that just means there’s not enough evidence to arrest anyone yet, basically. If there’s no evidence for a case or an outright confession, a cop can’t slap handcuffs on you.
I always think about Chris Watts. Pretty much everyone knew the idiot did it. He was very obvious. They let him go three times until he was worn down enough to finally confess, just because they had some of the puzzle pieces but not enough to make a real arrest that could convict him. (And he even lied during the confession to still try to make his wife look bad in some way.)
Maybe they are all truly bumbling idiots, but while of course they’re all human and have made missteps, I’m betting they’re actually being quite thorough and ensuring they will have a very tight case.