By Isabella Torregiani
12:44pm PST, Feb 16, 2026
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Speaking to the Daily Mail on Monday, February 16, Chris Nanos said he is unfazed by the "haters," who claim he mishandled the case by releasing the crime scene too soon.
He added that his team was thorough in processing Nancy Guthrie's home and backyard before the FBI arrived and resealed the scene.
"My officers were there for almost 20 hours, and they processed their scene, got it done, and brought in all the evidence," he said. "Then the FBI came and did their thing."
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Authorities were alerted on February 1 when a family member called 911 to report Nancy Guthrie, 84, missing. She had last been seen the day before while having dinner with her daughter Annie Guthrie.
Chris Nancy and her late husband Charles Guthrie, who died at 49 from a heart attack, were parents to daughters Savannah Guthrie and Annie, plus son Camron Guthrie.
Nanos has said that since her disappearance, investigators remain unclear about the motive behind Nancy's alleged abduction. He told the Daily Mail that, in his view, Nancy was kidnapped rather than the victim of a botched burglary.
"This is somebody who's disappeared from the face of the earth, and now we have a camera that says here's the person who did this," he said, noting the photos released last week of a masked figure outside Nancy's home.
"And that's what makes me say this is a kidnapping. The motivation for it is where we get stuck, right? Is it for money? I mean, we had the one demand where they asked for money. But is it really for money, or is it for revenge for something?" he wondered.
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Savannah Guthrie, who has not appeared on the
Today show during the search, has used social media to speak out about her mother's disappearance.
On Sunday, February 15, she shared a heartfelt video in which she spoke directly to her mother's alleged abductor or abductors.
"It's been two weeks since our mom was taken and I just wanted to come on and say that we still have hope and we still believe and I wanted to say to whoever has her or knows where she is, that it's never too late," she said on
Instagram.
"And you're not lost or alone. And it is never too late to do the right thing and we are here. And we believe and we believe in the essential goodness of every human being. And it's never too late," she continued.
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Earlier the same day, Fox News Digital reported that authorities were using a digital scanner to locate Nancy Guthrie's pacemaker.
The outlet noted that a "high-tech Bluetooth scanner placed on the bottom" of "helicopters" flew low in grid patterns to detect the device's signals.
A helicopter was also spotted flying "near Guthrie's home" three days after she went missing.
