(NewsNation) — 84-year-old Nancy Guthrie has been missing for over a month in a case that’s sent shockwaves throughout the nation for all the wrong reasons.

The mother of “Today” show host Savannah Guthrie was reported missing from her Tucson, Arizona, home on Feb 1.

As a criminal defense attorney of over two decades, allow me to break down the investigation and whether the Pima County Sheriff’s Office has failed, and if so, can anyone hold them legally accountable?

From crime scene contamination to internal issues to an unwillingness to cooperate with the FBI, here’s everything we’ve heard about lead investigator Sheriff Chris Nanos and the case so far:

Crime scene contamination

So first, we have the idea of a crime scene contamination.
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The crime scene was reportedly left open and unprotected: There was no security tape or perimeter, and two reporters allegedly were allowed access to the crime scene area, which is a big no-no.

The scene has been described as grossly contaminated, which can destroy a prosecution long before it even begins.

Pima County deputies also reportedly overlooked a roof-mounted camera during their very initial inspection. So a lot of lost time initially.

Thermal plane delays

Nanos is accused of failing to deploy a thermal-imaging search plane until three hours after Guthrie was reported missing.
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The reason? He reportedly clashed with the only deputy who knew how to fly this plane.

What did he do? He reassigned the guy to street patrol. Three hours in a kidnapping case is a lifetime.

Cooperation issues

What really irks me is that Nanos has turned away federal resources; he should’ve immediately deferred to the FBI, but didn’t.

Nanos should have allowed the FBI to use its infinite resources in a timely way, but instead took critical evidence and sent it to a private lab rather than the FBI lab in Quantico, Virginia.
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We have recently learned that the nonprofit United Cajun Navy submitted a detailed, 41-page operational plan to Nanos in late February offering to assist in the search for Guthrie.

The plan offers dozens of search dogs and advanced drone technology to sweep the rugged Catalina Foothills terrain around where Guthrie was last seen.

Nanos still hasn’t signed off, citing concerns about contaminating a live criminal investigation. Well, sir, you’ve already contaminated the crime scene. What are you talking about?

The president of the Pima County Deputies Association has even said publicly that more bodies are always better than one.
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Internal struggles

It’s becoming increasingly evident that Nanos has had inconsistent messaging and has made many missteps, failures, omissions, and untimely responses, yet he is still not letting go of this investigation.

Retired SWAT commander Lieutenant Bob Kreider has said that 98% of the department had given Nanos a no-confidence vote, meaning “please step down from your position.”

And the most, I think, experienced homicide detective has only three years of experience in this Pima County Sheriff’s Department, because all the really good veteran detectives have left because of Nanos.

Legal analysis

Okay, so now let me give you some legal analysis.
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There’s a Supreme Court case from 1989 called DeShaney v. Winnebago County that basically says that the government has no constitutional duty to protect you from private harm, and that the Constitution protects against government action, but it’s not a guarantee of government services.

Law enforcement’s failure to solve a crime does not automatically create civil or criminal liability.

There’s also qualified immunity that shields law enforcement from personal liability under conduct that violates clearly established law. There is an extraordinarily high bar, and courts routinely dismiss these cases even when there’s absolute negligence, incompetence or sloppy law enforcement work.

And then you have Arizona, as a state, its own sovereign immunity, the idea that government entities enjoy sovereign immunity for discretionary acts. He can very well say, “Well, in my experience, according to my discretion, I did everything that I was supposed to do in this investigation.”

So the law may not give the Guthrie family a lawsuit, but it cannot take away the truth.

Sara Azari is a practicing criminal defense attorney and became a legal analyst for NewsNation in March of 2023. The views expressed in this article are those of the author and not necessarily of NewsNation.