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Local authorities have responded to FBI director Kash Patel’s allegations that the bureau was kept from helping with the investigation into Nancy Guthrie’s disappearance.
“Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos is aware of FBI Director Kash Patel’s recent interview and statement,” a spokesperson for the police force told Us Weekly in a statement. “Sheriff Nanos responded to the scene the night of the incident, providing immediate local leadership and oversight.”
The rep continued, “A member of the FBI Task Force was also notified and present at that scene working alongside our personnel. The FBI was promptly notified by both our department and the Guthrie family. While the FBI Director was not on scene, coordination with the Bureau began without delay.”
Nancy, the mother of Today anchor Savannah Guthrie, was reported missing from her home in Arizona in February. The case still remains open.
Patel, 46, recently claimed on Sean Hannity’s “Hang Out” podcast that the FBI were pushed out of the investigation.
“It is a state matter. It’s a state and local law enforcement matter,” Patel alleged on the Tuesday, May 5, episode of the Fox News show. “What we, the FBI, do is say, ‘Hey, we’re here to help. What do you need? What can we do?’ And for four days, we were kept out of the investigation.”
According to Patel, the investigation made great strides once the FBI were let into the room.
“We went in and got the Ring doorbell. And we said, ‘Hey. Is anyone talking to Google?’” Patel claimed on the podcast. “I called the leadership at Google, and I said, ‘Look, we know that there was not [a] subscription service to capture all of the data that would have been captured had there been a subscription service. But can we go into the cache? Can we go into the data before it’s deleted and see what we can find?’ That’s why you have that image, because the FBI worked with Google to put that image out.”
The Pima County Sheriff’s Department, meanwhile, asserted that all personnel decisions were made “based on operational needs” at the moment.
“Decisions regarding evidence processing were made on scene based on operational needs,” the statement continued. “The laboratory utilized by the Pima County Sheriff’s Department and the FBI Laboratory in Quantico have worked in close partnership from the outset and continue to collaborate in the analysis of evidence. We remain committed to a thorough, coordinated and fact-based investigation and will continue working closely with our federal partners as the process moves forward.”
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