The sheriff overseeing the search for missing 84-year-old Nancy Guthrie has now acknowledged, through his attorney, that he resigned from a prior law enforcement job more than four decades ago to dodge a suspension for insubordination, a fact that directly contradicts what he said under oath in a recent deposition.
Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos faces perjury allegations after he stated during a sworn deposition that he had never been suspended as a result of disciplinary action while working as a law enforcement officer. His own lawyer’s 12-page letter, dated April 21, tells a different story.
The admission landed two weeks after the Pima County Board of Supervisors voted on April 7 to demand that Nanos answer questions under oath. The board acted after the perjury allegations surfaced from his deposition in a First Amendment lawsuit brought by Sgt. Aaron Cross, president of the Pima County Deputies Association. Now the man tasked with leading one of Arizona’s highest-profile missing-persons investigations is fighting for his own credibility, and possibly his job.
Attorney James Cool sent the April 21 letter on Nanos’ behalf, responding to a list of concerns from local leaders. The letter’s central defense hinges on a narrow distinction: Nanos was never suspended during his time at the Pima County Sheriff’s Department. But he was suspended, and then quit, while working at the El Paso Police Department in Texas in 1982.
As Fox News reported, Cool framed the discrepancy as a misunderstanding:
“It is 100% correct that Sheriff Nanos was never suspended during his four decades of decorated and faithful service with the Pima County Sheriff’s Department (‘PCSD’). However, Sheriff Nanos was suspended more than forty years ago while employed by El Paso Police Department. In the context of his live deposition, Sheriff Nanos did not understand the question related to discipline with a different agency not governed by the Arizona Peace Officer’s Bill of Rights.”
The letter acknowledged that Nanos had been suspended repeatedly at the El Paso Police Department and resigned in 1982 specifically to avoid a three-day suspension for insubordination. After leaving El Paso, Nanos worked briefly in sales and then as a security guard before joining the Pima County Sheriff’s Department in 1984 as a corrections officer. Cool even attached a copy of Nanos’ 1984 resume, which listed his hobbies as “boxing, fishing, pool, crosswords and physical exercise.”
The resume was presumably meant to humanize the sheriff. But the real question isn’t what Chris Nanos did for fun in 1984. It’s whether he told the truth under oath in a deposition decades later, and whether a man who quit one police department to avoid discipline should be trusted to run another.
Sgt. Aaron Cross, the deputy who filed the First Amendment lawsuit that produced the deposition in question, did not accept Cool’s explanation. Cross called the 12-page letter “chock full of lies.”
He also raised a procedural objection that cuts to the heart of the matter. The Pima County Board of Supervisors had demanded that Nanos answer questions under oath. Cool’s letter was not sworn testimony. Cross put it bluntly:
“But did you notice it wasn’t a sworn statement, as required?”
That distinction matters. A 12-page letter from a paid attorney carries no legal penalty for falsehood. A sworn statement does. The board asked for the latter. It got the former. Nanos’ critics have every reason to view that as evasion, not explanation.
The letter also attempted to downplay concerns about retaliation against Cross and former PCSD lieutenant Heather Lappin, who was Nanos’ most recent election challenger. Cool’s letter accused both Cross and Lappin of having “sustained findings of misconduct.” Both have pending lawsuits. The mounting scrutiny around Nanos and his department has only deepened in recent months.
All of this plays out against the backdrop of one of the most closely watched missing-persons cases in the country. Nancy Guthrie, the 84-year-old mother of “Today” co-host Savannah Guthrie, is believed to have been abducted from her home in the Catalina Foothills north of Tucson in the early hours of February 1. A masked intruder appeared on doorbell camera video, and her back door was found propped open the following morning.
The search has stretched on for months. Nanos updated the media on the disappearance as recently as February 5, and law enforcement remained stationed outside Guthrie’s residence as of February 10. Savannah Guthrie visited the “Today” show at Rockefeller Plaza in New York on March 5 and has put $1 million toward the combined reward for finding her mother.
The FBI has advanced the investigation and, according to Fox News, zeroed in on two key dates before Guthrie went missing. The specific dates and their significance were not detailed. Nancy Guthrie’s whereabouts remain unknown.
For the family and for the community in Tucson, the stakes could not be higher. And the man running the local side of that investigation is now spending his time defending himself against perjury allegations, recall efforts, and multiple lawsuits from his own deputies. That is not a recipe for effective law enforcement leadership. The federal commitment to supporting law enforcement and holding officials accountable makes the contrast with Nanos’ situation all the more striking.
Cool’s letter also addressed a separate controversy involving election-related allegations in Pima County. Attached to the letter was a March 11 note from the Justice Department informing County Administrator Jan Lesher that the former U.S. attorney for Arizona under the Biden administration had found “no federal predicate” for a criminal investigation into the election allegations.
Timothy Courchaine, the current U.S. Attorney for the District of Arizona, stated that his office had nothing to add: “We have no further response to provide beyond what was already communicated in December 2024.” The inclusion of this note in Cool’s letter appeared designed to suggest the election concerns were meritless. But the fact that the finding came from a Biden-era appointee, not the current administration, raises its own questions about how thoroughly those allegations were examined. Readers following federal scrutiny of election records in other jurisdictions will recognize the pattern of institutional reluctance to investigate.
Cool’s letter also defended Nanos’ handling of the sheriff’s department budget and argued that the sheriff should not have to answer all of the board’s questions in a public setting. That argument may have legal merit in narrow circumstances. But when a county board votes to demand answers under oath from its own sheriff, after sworn testimony that now appears to have been false, the public has a right to expect transparency, not a lawyer’s letter.
Consider the timeline. In 1982, Nanos resigned from the El Paso Police Department rather than face a three-day suspension. Forty-plus years later, under oath in a deposition, he said he had never been suspended as a result of disciplinary action. When confronted, his lawyer said he “did not understand the question.” When the county board demanded sworn answers, Nanos sent an unsworn 12-page letter from his attorney instead.
At every stage, the pattern is the same: avoid the hard question, reframe the facts, and hope the distinction holds. Investigations into the conduct of those entrusted with law enforcement authority matter precisely because public trust depends on honesty, especially under oath.
Meanwhile, an 84-year-old woman is still missing. Her family is still waiting. And the sheriff leading that search has given the people of Pima County every reason to wonder whether he can be trusted with the truth, let alone with the case.
Accountability isn’t a luxury in law enforcement. It’s the price of the badge. When a sheriff can’t meet that standard, the public pays, and sometimes, the most vulnerable pay first.
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