Nancy Guthrie Update: Expert Raises Concerns About Search Efforts

A veteran homicide prosecutor is raising concerns about the lack of continued searches in the Nancy Guthrie case.

During an interview with NewsNation’s Brian Entin, “no body” homicide expert Tad DiBiase said searches serve a critical purpose beyond locating remains. According to DiBiase, investigators can use search efforts to eliminate alternative explanations for a person’s disappearance and strengthen a potential case if charges are eventually filed.

“Even given the suspected circumstances of this case…the most common disposal area for a ‘no body’ murder is in water. Second most is what I call, sort of buried in the woods or left behind in the woods,” Dibiase continued, clarifying that he’s referring to the outdoors in general.

Guthrie has been missing since Sunday, Feb. 1. Investigators believe that Guthrie was abducted in the middle of the night.

Entin noted that the Pima County Sheriff’s Office called off cadaver dog searches about five weeks after Guthrie’s disappearance and asked DiBiase whether that could create challenges in a future prosecution.

“To me, there’s two reasons why it’s problematic not to do a search,” DiBiase said. “One is, because you overlook the opportunity to find the body, which is critical. But two, when you go to trial, you want to be able to say to the jury, here’s all the searches we did and we confirm that there’s no way that she walked away on her own, there’s no way that she escaped, there’s no way that she committed suicide.’ Any of those things. Because you don’t know that unless you’ve done a very thorough search and you’re able to say to the jury, ‘we can knock out these other possibilities of things happening and all that’s left is this guy appeared on the camera the night she went missing at the time she seemed to have gone missing and that’s the only logical thing.'”

While investigators have not publicly indicated plans for additional large-scale searches, DiBiase believes continued efforts could serve an important purpose—both in the search for answers and in any future prosecution.

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