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- [00:00]
Anne Emerson
Savannah Guthrie's mom did not just vanish into thin air. And now, more than 100 days later, the biggest clue in this case could still be sitting inside the FBI lab in Quantico. Hey, everyone, I'm Anne Emerson, and this is Criminally Obsessed Mommy.
- [00:18]
Tiffany Roy
If you are hearing this, you are a strong woman.
- [00:23]
Anne Emerson
Look, when the mother of one of the most recognizable women in America just disappears from her own home in the middle of the night, people expect answers fast. Instead, no arrest, no suspect publicly named. And now the Pima county sheriff is under fire for one major decision he made.
- [00:43]
Crime Scene Investigator
My team processed that scene. I'm going to say eight or nine o' clock that morning. They came in, gave a quick briefing. Here's what we got.
- [00:51]
Anne Emerson
Why was Nancy Guthrie's DNA evidence sent to a private lab first before the FBI got involved? Because in hindsight, a lot of people think that was a bad call. Now, investigators say that DNA is being analyzed at the FBI lab in Quantico. And let me tell you something. Cases do not end up there unless investigators believe something with that evidence could be critical to this case. I spoke with forensic DNA expert Tiffany Roy. She's worked on thousands of cases.
- [01:21]
Tiffany Roy
That was the most important thing at that time was to get some evidence tested and see if we could get that information in real time with the hopes of bringing Nancy home alive.
- [01:29]
Anne Emerson
So what did they find inside Nancy Guthrie's home that's taking this long to process? Are they trying to identify an unknown suspect? Could this case now stretch beyond the US let's get into it.
- [01:46]
Interviewer
Can you tell me what you do?
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Anne Emerson
What is your.
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Interviewer
What do you specialize in? Tell me what you do.
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Tiffany Roy
So my expertise is in forensic DNA analysis, and I review cases that have been processed by private and government labs, and I make sure that all of their procedures have been followed and that we come to the same conclusions and that the files or the testing has been free from human error. Because human people do this work, and human people make mistakes. So I'm kind of like a double check for the system. And then I also write some textbooks. I've written three textbooks that are used in colleges across the country and around the world to teach the next generation of forensic scientists how to forensic science.
- [02:30]
Interviewer
Now, you know, we are 100 days out from a case that has absolutely captivated everybody in America. I'm talking about the Nancy Guthrie case, you know, and. And it's been 100 days since she disappeared from her home. And DNA found in the home is. Is still being evaluated by the FBI at Quantico from what we understand and for people who are not scientists, can you explain to us why it's taking so long?
- [03:00]
Tiffany Roy
Well, there have been a lot of steps already, and there have been five different laboratories that have been involved in different stages of the. Of these samples. And so what happens when you have a case where you have DNA but you don't know who it belongs to, and you've searched it through the database, and we're using all the tools at our disposal to try to put a name with that piece of evidence. That can be very time consuming, and especially if they're in the genealogy process, if they have a sample that's suitable for genealogy. I know that they've discussed a mixed sample sample, and sometimes mixed samples are not going to be helpful for genealogy, but it's the building of the trees and doing the research and working back through people's genetic lines to try to link it with a family name and ultimately the name of a person, actual person. So that research takes the longest time. I would say also that they test in different rounds. We don't test everything all at once. They're performing genealogy. Sometimes that's. That takes a lot of time.
- [04:08]
Anne Emerson
Well, and why five labs?
- [04:10]
Interviewer
Like, why does it. Why is it like getting pushed from one lab to the next? Are they, like, getting through one lab and going, we don't have what we need. Send it over here. How does that work? How do they work together?
- [04:21]
Tiffany Roy
Sometimes? And that's. There's a lot going on. There's a lot of decision making that goes on behind that. But some laboratories are selected. Private laboratories can be selected because they can do things faster, often than government labs. They don't have backups, backlogs. And if you were going to be paying for it, you can pay for it to be processed ultra fast at a private laboratory. So sometimes speed is a factor. And certainly at the beginning of this investigation, everyone, and I think many people still would love to see Nancy Guthrie brought home alive. And so it was a race against the clock in the beginning. And then I know that the Pima county laboratory there, the government laboratory there, did some testing. And then some of the samples now have been sent to the FBI, and some of that for different types of testing. There's regular DNA testing that we would do in a routine case, and the kind of testing that you would do for genealogy is different, and I don't think Beaumont county has the capability to do that. So that's the reason why it's gone in so many different directions. Different labs have different Capabilities for time sensitive and for technology testing. And so there are a lot of people, you know, using every tool they have in the book to try to get information in this case.
- [05:36]
Interviewer
And, professor, there has been some criticism that the sheriff's office, you know, sent this to a private lab, as we were told, in Florida first before sending it to FBI in Quantico. Would you say that was a mistake on their part?
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Tiffany Roy
I don't think it was a mistake on their part. I believe they have a standing relationship with the lab here in Florida, and that might be why they did that. And so for speed purposes, you know, and. And recognizing that that was the most important thing at that time was to get some evidence tested and see if we could get that information in real time. With the hopes of bringing Nancy home alive, they made a decision to go with a lab that they trusted that could do it fast. So that's why they made that decision. They could move faster than their own government lab. And that was the. That was the call they made. It was time sensitive, so they sent it to the place that could do it the fastest. There's so much politics involved, especially in this case where everyone's being criticized for every decision that's being made. So I don't really know why they would start with DNA Labs International and then move on to the FBI lab, But it could be the genealogy searching. The quality of the genealogy investigations at the FBI is second to none. So they have the resources and the ability to do things, access databases that a private company would not have access to. They have access to law enforcement databases and criminal records. And so genealogy searching at the FBI is. Is next level.
- [07:11]
Interviewer
Well, they're testing this long. Are they pretty sure that this is the suspect as opposed to somebody that just happened to be in our in and out of the house, do you think?
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Tiffany Roy
I think they want to know that either way. And the only way you can do that is by getting to a name and then getting to the person and seeing if they have a legitimate reason for being there. If they, you know, were the lawn maintenance man or, you know, somebody who would routinely come to assist Mrs. Guthrie, deliver groceries, the Uber Eats guy, you know, if there's some reasonable explanation, they need to know that. So they have to do this research. And in order to get to know whether that's valuable or it isn't valuable,
- [07:48]
Interviewer
investigators haven't said what kind of DNA they're dealing with, what type of DNA they're dealing with. The Pima County Sheriff, Chris Nanas, has said it's Partial DNA, what does that mean?
- [07:58]
Tiffany Roy
And they, they haven't really said much about the quality of the DNA profile or you know, there it's been very tight lipped about what the actual evidence is. But some DNA evidence, let's say if we're taking it from Nancy Guthrie's home, we're looking for stuff that has DNA on it that doesn't come from Nancy Guthrie. So if we swab an item and it has a majority of Nancy Guthrie's DNA on it and but we see a foreign contributor, we might not be able to see all of their information, maybe some partial information from a foreign contributor. It really depends a lot on what the, the profile looks like and the item that was tested. And so sometimes we don't get full information. Sometimes if a person handles an item one time or contacts a doorknob one time, they might not leave behind a large amount of DNA or if they were wearing gloves, as we saw in the video in this case, that could prevent DNA from transferring. So, you know, there are a lot of reasons why we might get incomplete information.
- [09:01]
Interviewer
What do you think that it's going to take years to figure this out, months to figure this out? Is there any way to like sort of speculate on how much time are you, do you have like amount of time in your head right now that you think about this case and you're
- [09:17]
Tiffany Roy
like, yeah, I think I'm comparing it a lot to Coburger because they had. So I'll say in that case they had the best kind of DNA profile, right? They had a single source DNA profile that they were able to search into CODIS and it didn't hit. And then they went right to these for profit databases and it helps them to get to the end zone very quickly. We think it was 60 days between the time they tested that DNA profile and between the time they identified Brian Coburger, which felt like an eternity since four young people had been killed. But we're at 100 days now with Nancy Guthrie and that is depressing to me a little bit because there is a chance it could go unsolved and that this person was very careful and that they might not have the kind of evidence that is ever going to lead to a suspect like JonBenet Ramsey. So these kinds of things, it's really hard for me to know not having seen the evidence. But the passage of time is a concern because I know how desperately everybody was working and is working to try to bring this case to resolution.
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Interviewer
Is there any concern that when that bit of DNA we don't know how much. We don't know what type it is, but that DNA was sent. Is there any concern that it could have been damaged?
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Tiffany Roy
I mean, we were always concerned about the fewer hands, you know, the fewer chefs in the kitchen, the safer we are. But, you know, everybody's doing different things, and the people that are involved in these laboratories would be taking every precaution to make sure that nothing would damage this evidence, especially in a case this high profile. I think the evidence would. They would go out of their way to protect it and not to have consume sample that we. That we find precious so that we can get profiles later on and for different types of testing that we might need. So I think everybody's taking, you know, the highest level of care and precaution with the samples from the Guthrie case. I don't really have any concerns that it would be contaminated, but that can always happen because these are human people, and people sometimes make mistakes, especially in cases where it's very serious, you know, that sometimes can work against you. And, you know, the human. The human mind is involved.
- [11:36]
Interviewer
So, yeah, people get nervous and nervous.
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Tiffany Roy
Yeah.
- [11:40]
Interviewer
But, well, and. And I'm thinking, you know, already, like, down the line, we find a match, something happens. Oh, my gosh. We figured out, like, we have a suspect. Somebody gets arrested. That defense attorney is going to have a field day with five labs of one partial DNA that gets sent all over the map. I could see that, like that chain of custody becoming. And I just. It just popped up in my mind about it right now. But like, that. That could just be a nightmare.
- [12:11]
Tiffany Roy
It's something that they'll definitely be scrutinizing. And if I was a part of a defense team, I would be watching very closely, especially with some of the things that I saw happen in the Coburger case and some, some of the things that have happened in other FBI genealogy investigations. Sometimes the FBI doesn't really follow the rules of these databases, and they. Their goal is to catch their man, and somet they bend the rules to do that. So defense attorneys will absolutely be watching closely to make sure the terms and conditions of any genealogy databases that were searched have been followed closely. We, we all want to see a happy resolution to this case, or at least a resolution where the family gets their mom back. But, you know, defense attorneys are absolutely going to be looking at this stuff very closely. And, and especially in light of what we've seen with some other big cases, that's going to be a big concern.
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Interviewer
And when you're talking about the bri, the Brian Coburger case in Idaho. He wasn't in codis, but they were able to track him down by sort of narrowing down this DNA to his family living in eastern Pennsylvania.
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Anne Emerson
How is that done?
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Tiffany Roy
So it was done by genealogy searching. They had the data, they had the profile and they were able to test it. And there were matches that were in these profiles direct to consumer databases that were close enough where they could trace it back to the Coburger family line. And so we don't know a whole lot about how they, where they did that investigation or the documents and who exactly you know, they used, what relatives they used to trace it back to him. Because everyone that was involved in that case signed a very serious non disclosure agreement. And so the experts and the people who are involved in that case can never talk about what they saw when they reviewed the evidence even though the case is over and closed. There were legal reasons why everyone involved in that case signed a very serious non disclosure. So we'll never really know how exactly they did what they did in Coburger's case.
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Interviewer
Well, is it, is it highly unusual to sign an NDA?
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Tiffany Roy
I think experts and people involved in cases sign NDAs and it's not unusual. I do think the one in the Coburger case is a bit unusual because it just, it doesn't end ever and there's no, you know, there's no stipulation for when the case is over or you know, if somebody wants to write a book. You know, I, I don't know the details of the NDA. All I know is that I know experts who are involved and they can't speak about the evidence. And I think that's something in the scientific community we're all very interested to, to know like what happened and how did they do it and did they follow the rules. All the experts that are involved essentially have been very tight lipped and just not, they're not able to tell us. And that, that's frustrating to me because I want to know, I'm, I'm personally interested, professionally interested.
- [15:14]
Interviewer
I'm sure it would be incredible research to have and data, data points that you could be looking at. What. Let me just backtrack just for one second so everybody else understands too and, and myself what happens when a person is not in the CODIS system.
- [15:30]
Tiffany Roy
So if the CODIS search comes up and it, there's no hit, there are several steps that have to take place that are outlined in a certain procedure by, that was written at the DOJ and Essentially the sample will be tested with a different type of DNA testing and then uploaded to databases that allow law enforcement to search for investigations, for investigative purposes. So some databases like Ancestry.com and 23andMe, they do not allow that. They don't allow law enforcement to search. But there are some databases that do. So they'll take the DNA profile, this new DNA profile that they just generated and they upload it to see if there are any people that share pieces and parts of DNA with the perpetrator and then they will trace the lineage back to two known ancestors that are shared and build out the trees. When they'll figure out what who lived where in the country at the time, whether they're still living here, whether they would be within an age group that is possible to have committed the crime. And they do this with all public documents.
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Interviewer
Well, in what if,
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Anne Emerson
I guess in
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Interviewer
one of the worst case scenarios, the DNA shows it's from out of the country and the person isn't from here, from America.
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Tiffany Roy
They can, they can trace it to a family name and they can trace it to, they can trace it, it can follow outside of the country. I think that's becomes more of a legal issue about, you know, extradition or rendition. But even if someone's not living inside this country, they, there are documents that describe, you know, like I said, I built my Canadian side of my family tree out on Ancestry.com so there's information there. You can go all the way back. I can trace my ancestry all the way back to France. So it's. When you, you see what you can do with these, with the information that's online and birth and death records and marriage track records and it's really, you know, they, if they want to get a name, they, they can get a name if they have the right amount of matches if they in the databases.
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Interviewer
So if the, if the Guthrie suspect is out of the the country, could he still be caught?
- [17:52]
Tiffany Roy
Yes, if they find the right evidence and they find the traces they need. If they do have a DNA profile, he will be caught. It's very hard to get away with crimes. I the Long island serial killer. That case haunts me because I don't know how that man eluded the law enforcement agency as long as he did. It's possible. But eventually they caught him. I think the way that crime science is moving and, and how the high level people are conducting these investigations, especially the FBI, I do believe eventually they'll find their man.
- [18:27]
Interviewer
It's hard to, it's hard to get
- [18:28]
Tiffany Roy
away with murder, it sure is. It's harder than you think because human minds work funny and you're not always thinking about what you're touching and what you're picking up and putting down and what you're coughing on. And so, you know, it's really hard not to leave behind traces of yourself at a crime scene and on a victim.
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Interviewer
Do you think the Nancy Guthrie case is going to be solved with DNA still?
- [18:55]
Tiffany Roy
I think it's our best chance to solve the case. I think that DNA testing and fingerprinting and gloves were involved. And that always makes me weary that this person was thinking critically about what he was doing and trying to prevent the transfer of himself onto the crime scene. And that always makes it harder to find that needle in the haystack. But I think it is the best chance at identifying who that person would was at the time. And I'm, you know, I'm hopeful that the people that are, they have the best in the business working on it right now. So if they have anything, I, I know they're going to do the best with it.
- [19:35]
Interviewer
What do you hope that they're doing with the DNA right now, if you could advise them?
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Tiffany Roy
I hope that the FBI is doing a genealogy search. I hope if they have a profile that's suitable for that, that is what I would recommend them to do. They would have to exhaust all their CODIS options. And then if they have profiles that are not suitable for those databases, there are other things that they can do. But it makes it a lot harder if you don't have somebody to compare it to and everyone is a potential suspect. Where do you start? Where do you begin? So there are some things that, that officers are doing forensically that are digital forensics like geofencing and, you know, people, a lot of people carry phones and electronics on them that they don't even consider. You know, when you're wearing your Apple watch or so, there's a lot of digital things that can be done. And like the things that they were doing with the video camera and the scraping and the going back through the footage, you know, there are red light cameras there. You're on camera like once every five seconds. So there's a lot that can be done. But they have a big job and I know that because we're 100 days out and if they had the smoking gun, I think they, we would, we would know it by now. But I do think they're gonna, they'll solve the thing. It's just gonna take a little bit of time because this stuff is, it's intensive work. I think what would help, I think that everyone just needs to understand that we, there's a lot we don't know. So a lot of the people, a lot of my colleagues that are on here, we're trying to in the forefront of the news so that it's in the forefront of people's minds and we help try to keep it from going cold and for people from forgetting what happened and losing interest. But there's still a lot of things we don't know and they're being very tight lipped about the investigation and so that's a credit to them. It's a credit to all the people that are involved. All five laboratories. You know, it's a lot to keep people from releasing this kind of information, but there isn't a lot we know about the evidence that they have. So it's really hard that we're all just out here kind of speculating on what could be the thing. What could be the thing. And I, I don't know what it will be. I think that there will come a time when we know more, but we just don't know a whole lot now.
- [22:00]
Interviewer
Well, hopefully DNA will, will catch whoever did this and we'll, we'll come back to you when it happens.
- [22:08]
Tiffany Roy
I hope so. And I'll be happy to talk about it.
- [22:11]
Interviewer
Well, thank you. It's hard to get away with murder
- [22:13]
Anne Emerson
with the kind of DNA analysis that's going on in these major investigations.
- [22:18]
Interviewer
Drop a comment below and tell me,
- [22:20]
Anne Emerson
do you think that the investigators are finally getting a break in this case?
- [22:25]
Interviewer
And if you haven't already, be sure
- [22:26]
Anne Emerson
to like and subscribe and turn on
- [22:28]
Interviewer
your notifications to Criminally Obsessed.
- [22:30]
Anne Emerson
I don't want you to miss any of the updates. Here's your chance if you want to meet me in person. I'm going to be at Crimecon Vegas at the end of this month. I'm going to be hosting two live panels with two other amazing guests. One link to the Murdoch story, Blanca the housekeeper. So you do not want to miss this and I can offer you 10% off. Just put in Crimly Obsessed as a promo code at checkout on the Crimecon website. I can't wait to meet you there.