MUGO ODIGWE:
00:00:00
But we begin with the desperate search for Nancy Guthrie, now entering its third week. Investigators are focused on the gloves, mask, and clothing the suspect wore when seen in that doorbell camera video from the night Guthrie disappeared. The 84-year-old was last seen on the night of January 31 when she was dropped off at her Tucson, Arizona, home. Police believe she was abducted in the middle of the night. And last night, Savannah Guthrie posted a new plea to whoever has her mother. It's never too late, 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. And you heard her there. It is never too late to do the right thing. Let's go to CBS News reporter Andres Gutierrez, covering this for us in Tucson, Arizona. Andres, what are police saying about the gloves and the clothing of that suspect? Well, Mugo, let's start off with the latest reporting regarding the mask and the clothing worn by that suspect. The Pima County sheriff is telling CBS News that they believe that those items were purchased at Walmart. They are still in the process of identifying which brands. We were the first ones to tell you that the backpack that he was wearing is that Ozark Trail Hiker backpack sold exclusively at Walmart. Biggest question now is did he purchase it online or did he buy it in person? Online, there's a bunch of digital evidence they can pull. In person, you know you step into a store, and there's a bunch of cameras there at Walmart. So even if he shoplifted these items, it's very possible that they can go look through the surveillance cameras of that specific area of the store. They're right now in the process of checking different Walmarts. We were at one last week, and you could see that some of the masks have actually been removed from the shelves. Again, they have been spending several days. This is one of the leads that they're working. The other is the glove. It's apparently 16 have been recovered, and one of them, according to the FBI, matches the one that was seen on that security camera from Nancy's doorbell. And so they have been able to recover some DNA off of it. It belongs to a male. They're right now in the process of doing a quality-control test because this was initially sent to a state lab that the county contracts out of Florida. Once they go through that test, they'll send it over to the FBI, who will run it through their national DNA database. And if there's a hit, it could possibly lead to a possible name. But remember, the FBI national database is only based on people who have been charged or convicted of crimes. It's the fingerprints that you have to do if you ever are committed a crime. So experts say that is only about 6% to 7% of the US population. So again, they're very hopeful that this may lead them to a break in this case. But the other avenue that they also have to go down, now that they have DNA, is the genealogy route, right? They can reach out to a company like 23andMe and see if there's perhaps a hit there. So this case, even though we're now going into the third week of the search, looks very promising regarding leads, Mugo. And, Andres, there was a flurry of police activity on Friday night. Can you bring us up to speed on that and what we could expect in the coming days? Yeah, there sure was. So on Friday night in the evening around 7, 8 o'clock at night, they were working on a tip, which led them to a house about 2 miles west of where I'm at right now from Nancy's house. It's a subdivision called Shadow Hills. There's a house there, the 6200 block of Placita de Rojelio. They ended up serving a search warrant there. They talked to the people at that house. No one was arrested. But at the same time that was playing out, about 7 minutes south of that house, the Pima County Sheriff ended up pulling over a driver in a Range Rover. They pulled him into a Culver's parking lot. For those on the East Coast who don't know what a Culver's is, it's a fast-food joint. Happened in the middle of the rush. I talked to the store manager. He had no idea what was going on. Neither did the crew there. But they pull into the parking lot. They start talking to the driver. They start pulling stuff out of the vehicle. A lot of people are questioning, why did they put the tarp around the back of the SUV? Well, it's part of the investigation process. All the cameras, a lot of media spotlight attention on this. They don't want to, obviously, compromise the integrity of the case. They don't want to know what was pulled out of that vehicle. But that vehicle was processed. The driver was questioned and released. Very similar to the circumstances happened last week. Just hours after those surveillance videos-- that video came out, about an hour south from here in Rio Rico, they ended up pulling over a delivery driver named Carlos. He was DoorDashing at the time. And they essentially pulled him over, wanted to know if he was involved in the kidnapping of Nancy Guthrie because besides delivering food, he also delivers packages. And they believe that, at some point, he may have delivered a package to Nancy or somewhere in the neighborhood, and they wanted to know more about his whereabouts. At the same time that was all playing out with him being talked to, they were also busting the front door of his house and talking to his family and searching his home. He was not the guy. They eventually released him, but it left him traumatized. But again, I talked to a retired FBI agent. He says that this is all part of the investigation process. All of this will be playing out. We are, obviously, getting more of an inside look because of how high-profile this case is. However, he also does point out that they're going to come in hot and heavy because at that search on Friday night at the house, we saw these armored vehicles go in. They're operating under the impression that Nancy is alive out there, and so they also want to rescue her. So besides going and searching in for evidence, they're under the belief that Nancy could possibly be held captive in any of these locations, and so they're going to go in with all the resources at their disposal. Yeah, it certainly seems like they're trying to make sure all their bases are covered. Andres Gutierrez in Tucson, Arizona, thank you so much for that report.
