Nancy Guthrie sheriff under pressure as petition demands access for United Cajun Navy
The United Cajun Navy, a nationally known volunteer search and rescue group, is offering to revise its planned search for Nancy Guthrie and make any changes necessary to win the approval of local authorities.
Meanwhile, an independent journalist has launched a petition imploring Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos to give the group his blessing.
“We want permission from the lead agency,” said Josh Gill, an incident commander at UCN who was on the ground in Tucson, Arizona, in February but unable to kick off his search. “I don’t think there would be any harm, I think it would be one step closer to providing some closure not just to the family or the community, but to the nation.”
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Gill submitted the plan to the sheriff’s department in the days after Guthrie’s suspected abduction in the early hours of Feb. 1, hours after she came from dinner at her daughter’s home nearby. Guthrie’s other daughter is “Today” co-host Savannah Guthrie.
According to the 41-page document, the UCN would have no independent authority and operate under the sheriff’s command.
Read the plan:
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“We have not been contacted on the plan that we provided,” Gill told Fox News Digital. “I’m open to developing a new plan with law enforcement.”
Fragments of surveillance video show a masked man at her front door, where blood drops were found the following morning. Her back door had been propped open. No valuables were taken. Although the family offered to pay a ransom demand in the early days of the investigation, Guthrie has not been returned.
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Last week, authorities revealed that a hair sample was found inside the home and has been sent from a private DNA lab in Florida to the FBI for more advanced testing.
The initial plan called for the use of certified cadaver dogs over land in around local bodies of water, a tracking dog trained to find specific scents, heat-detecting drones and GPS-tracked volunteers for a grid search from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. daily.
The plan even included volunteer EMTs on standby in case any searchers suffered injuries from the terrain or sun and heat.
Gill said the group had also proposed deferring all media inquiries to the Pima County Sheriff’s Department.
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“We’ve got some of the best and brightest, and our network is huge,” he told Fox News Digital. “Let us work [with the sheriff’s department] to do what’s best.”
He proposed searching the desert outside town, many drainage ditches known as “washes” in the area, a series of “remote access areas” and abandoned structures. Searchers were preparing for harsh conditions including extreme heat, wildlife hazards, uneven terrain and dark nights due to local ordinances designed at limiting light pollution.
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According to the plan, if volunteer searchers find any evidence they would not handle it and report it to the sheriff’s department.
UCN has submitted similar plans for other searches to law enforcement agencies around the country.
Cherise “Pebbles” Wilson, an independent journalist who focuses on missing persons and human trafficking cases, is behind a Change.org petition calling on PCSD to accept Gill’s plan.
“I lost my vulnerable grandmother a couple of years ago, and Nancy Guthrie’s disappearance pulled at my heartstrings,” she told Fox News Digital. “Knowing that somebody took advantage of a loving lady, an elderly lady like that, is really disturbing.”
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