A former special agent with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is sharing her assessment after investigators revealed new surveillance photos of a potential suspect in Nancy Guthrie’s ongoing disappearance.
“A couple of things that stand out to me [are] you don’t see a vehicle in the background,” Tracy Walder, also a former CIA officer, exclusively shared with Luxury Handbag Shopping on Tuesday, February 10. “Whoever got here was either dropped off, which would have been pinged, but either they were dropped off out of the camera’s view, they walked there, biked there or whatever. I think that’s the first thing we are seeing.”
Walder continued, “I think the second thing we are seeing and what these videos tell me is what I have said from the beginning. This was definitely targeted and this was definitely planned.”
Earlier in the day, FBI Director Kash Patel shared photos and videos showing an “armed individual” who appeared “to have tampered with the camera at Nancy Guthrie’s front door the morning of her disappearance.”
The images showed a person standing at the entryway of Nancy’s house in Tucson, Arizona, wearing a ski mask, a backpack and gloves while seemingly attempting to cover a security camera before dismantling it entirely.
“This person, in my opinion, had the intention of kidnapping her because in the backpack — I think — were things to subdue her or restrain her, one of the two,” Walder, who is not part of the ongoing investigation, shared with Us. “Those can be so many different things. It can be rope, zip ties, handcuffs, a blanket.”
One black-and-white image released by Patel on Tuesday showed the alleged kidnapper standing outside of Nancy’s home with an object that appeared to be a gun in his or her waistband.
After viewing the images, Walder believes a gun does in fact appear to be in the individual’s waistband.
Walder also noticed how dark the neighborhood was at the time of the alleged kidnapping, adding, “They have a local regulation that reduces light pollution. … Lights cannot be above a certain emittance level. It’s pitch black.”
Nancy, 84, was last seen on January 31 after attending dinner with family members. She was reported missing the next day after she failed to join friends to watch her Sunday church service virtually.
Although it’s been more than a week since Nancy was seen alive, Walder doesn’t believe police authorities were withholding video and images from the public.
“They have to go through these companies and through privacy laws to obtain data on the backend,” Walder explained. “That doesn’t happen overnight, and it sounds like they literally received it this morning and turned around and sent it right now. This isn’t some conspiracy to keep videos from the public. I truly think they just received them and want them out to the widest audience possible.”
Soon after the FBI shared the images, Nancy’s daughter, Savannah Guthrie, posted the images to her 1.7 million Instagram followers.
“We believe she is still alive. Bring her home,” Savannah wrote via social media. “Anyone with information, please contact 1-800-CALL-FBI (1-800-225-5324) or the Pima County Sheriff’s Department 520-351-4900.”
Now that the images have been made public, Walder believes investigators are currently analyzing the footage even more closely to determine the individual’s height, weight, gender and other potentially identifying features.
Detectives also want the public’s help in identifying the individual who may hold clues to what happened to Nancy.
“Is there someone in the public that recognizes this jacket? Is there someone in the public that recognizes this backpack? Is this my friend that has this backpack? What the heck? I am gonna call the FBI,” Walder said. “That’s what I think they are looking for. … When I was an agent, that is what we would do if we couldn’t get a break. Let’s get this out and our techs will deal with the rest because that is going to take time.”
