Volunteers in Mexico searched the Mariposa area west of Nogales on Thursday after an anonymous caller said Nancy Guthrie’s remains might be buried there, but the renewed sweep came up empty. The effort pushed the search for the missing 84-year-old mother of Today host Savannah Guthrie back into the borderlands, where every new lead has carried the weight of more than 100 days without answers.
Buscando Corazones Nogales said the tip placed Guthrie in a grave over a stream in Mariposa, near the Arizona border, and the group returned to a stream it said it had not fully explored during its first pass. Ramona Guadalupe Ayala Ortiz said the caller was specific enough to send volunteers back into the area, adding that they went to check the waterway they had missed before. The renewed nogales search anonymous tip gave the team a new target, even if it did not deliver the result the family was hoping for.
That hope has become part of a larger cross-border search effort. Buscando Corazones Nogales works to locate missing people in Mexico, and its earlier search in the same area from April to May uncovered more than 25 unmarked graves containing the remains of at least 32 individuals. The latest trip was another attempt to see whether Guthrie, who vanished after authorities found blood near the doorstep of her home in the foothills outside Tucson in February, might have been left in the Mariposa area as the caller claimed.
The empty result leaves the central question unchanged: whether the tip was wrong, or whether Guthrie is still somewhere else in an investigation that has not gone cold. The Pima County Sheriff's Department said it had not been contacted by Mexican authorities, though it added that the case remains active and ongoing and that it will keep following credible information. Savannah Guthrie and her siblings have shared multiple videos on social media and offered a US$1-million reward for information leading to their mother’s recovery, a sign that the family is still trying to pull the case forward one lead at a time.
For now, the search team is not stopping. Buscando Corazones Nogales said it plans to continue operations in the area, which means Mariposa will stay on the map until someone proves the tip was either true or nothing more than another cruel detour.
