TUCSON, Ariz. (AP) — The disappearance of “Today” show host Savannah Guthrie’s mother three weeks ago has inspired a small number of volunteers to launch their own searches in the dense desert near her home in hopes of cracking the case.

The Pima County Sheriff’s Department said while it appreciates the concern for Nancy Guthrie, it asked people inquiring about volunteering to give investigators space to do their jobs.

“We all want to find Nancy, but this work is best left to professionals,” the agency said in a statement over the weekend.

Nancy Guthrie’s disappearance

Nancy Guthrie, 84, was last seen at her home just outside Tucson on Jan. 31 and was reported missing the following day. Authorities believe she was kidnapped, abducted or otherwise taken against her will. Drops of her blood were found on the front porch, but authorities haven’t publicly revealed much evidence.

Despite the sheriff’s request for people not to search on their own, volunteers have continued to look. A small group reported finding a black backpack on Sunday, but it wasn’t the same brand as one identified in video surveillance that the FBI released of a masked person at Guthrie’s home the night she disappeared.

A sheriff’s spokesperson told Tucson television station KOLD that the bag and its contents didn’t appear to be viable leads. The Associated Press reached out to the sheriff’s department for comment on Monday.

Volunteers begin to search

Two women from the group Madres Buscadoras de Sonora, or “Searching Mothers of Sonora,” who were carrying digging tools Sunday outside of Guthrie’s home, said they, too, would join the search. They posted fliers on Guthrie’s mailbox with her picture and their contact information.

Lupita Tello, who joined the group after her son disappeared in Mexico in 2020, said Monday she and two other volunteers will continue to post flyers on bus stops and utility poles near Nancy Guthrie’s home. Members of the group plan to do the same in Nogales, Mexico.

She said the group was contacted by a friend of one of Nancy Guthrie’s daughters who asked them for help because of their experience. The group has found the remains of more than 5,000 people in Mexico since it was started 10 years ago by mothers with missing children.

“We know the soil. We know when someone has dug deep or when there is a shallow grave,” Tello said. “We hope we can help because we understand the pain of having a missing relative.”

She said group members have received training by Mexican forensic experts on how to conduct their searches.

The sheriff’s department said in a statement late Monday that it’s aware of differences in the masked person’s clothing depicted in various images that were released, namely with and without a backpack.

“There is no date or time stamp associated with these images,” the department said. “Therefore, any suggestion that the photographs were taken on different days is purely speculative.”

Authorities say search parties need to coordinate

Tony Estrada, the former long-time sheriff in neighboring Santa Cruz County, said volunteer searchers have good intentions in wanting to help and can serve as a force multiplier, but it’s crucial that their efforts be coordinated with law enforcement.

“You can’t have people all over the place looking for something and not reporting to anybody or letting them know that they’re going to be in that area,” Estrada said. “They may be trampling into things that may come out to be helpful in the future.”

Nearly all search operations for U.S. law enforcement agencies are staffed with volunteers, said Chris Boyer, executive director of the National Association for Search and Rescue.

Untrained volunteers who show up to help in a search may mean well, but experts say they could end up contaminating a crime scene.

“It’s painful for law enforcement when that happens,” Boyer said.

Volunteers should undergo background checks, be trained in things like administering first aid and preserving crime scenes, and work under the direction of law enforcement authorities, said Boyer, whose group provides education, certification and advocacy for search and rescue efforts across the United States and other countries.

Hundreds are working on the investigation

Several hundred people are working the Guthrie investigation, and more than 20,000 tips have been received, the sheriff’s office has said. The FBI and other agencies are assisting.

The sheriff’s office has watched around the clock lately at Guthrie’s house. It also enacted a temporary one-way flow on the road so that emergency vehicles and trash collection trucks could get through. The constant presence of news crews, bloggers and curious onlookers has drawn mixed reaction from neighbors.

Some appreciated the attention the case has been getting. Others have placed traffic cones and signs on their properties to keep people off.

Meanwhile, the tribute to Nancy Guthrie outside her home keeps growing, with flowers, yellow ribbons, crosses, prayers and patron saints for older adults and in desperate situations.

Aran Aleamoni and his daughter Ariana picked out a bouquet of red, pink and white flowers and placed them at the edge of Guthrie’s yard, alongside a sign that read “Let Nancy Come Home” and a statuette of an angel.

“My heart goes out to the entire family,” said Aran Aleamoni, who has known the Guthrie family for a long time. “We are all pulling for you. We’re with you in your corner.”

MEXICO CITY (AP) — The Mexican army killed the country’s most powerful cartel leader and one of the United States’ most wanted fugitives on Sunday, notching a major victory while cartel members responded with a wave violence across the country.

The killing of Jalisco New Generation Cartel leader Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes during an attempt to capture him in Jalisco state was the highest-profile blow against cartels since the recapture of former Sinaloa cartel boss Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán a decade ago.

Following Oseguera Cervantes’ death, gunmen unleashed violence across the country. Cars burned out by cartel members blocked roads in 20 Mexican states and left smoke billowing into the air. People locked themselves in their homes in Guadalajara, Mexico’s second-largest city and Jalisco’s capital, and school was canceled Monday in several states as security forces were placed on alert all over the country. Even Guatemala reinforced security on its border with Mexico.

The killing could give the government a leg up in its dealings with the U.S. Trump administration, which has been threatening tariffs or unilateral military action if Mexico does not show results in the fight against the cartels.

But the long-term effect on Mexico’s security landscape remains unclear.

Here’s what to know:

‘El Mencho’ was the leader of a fast-growing criminal group

Oseguera Cervantes, better known as “El Mencho,” was 59 years old and originally from the western state of Michoacan. His ties to organized crime went back at least three decades.

In 1994, he was tried for trafficking heroin in the U.S. and sent to prison for three years. Upon returning to Mexico, he quickly rose through Mexico’s drug trafficking underworld.

Around 2009, he founded the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, which became Mexico’s fastest-growing criminal organization, moving cocaine, methamphetamines, fentanyl and migrants to the United States, and innovating in violence with the use of drones and improvised explosive devices.

The cartel earned a reputation for brazen attacks on Mexican security forces, including downing a military helicopter in Jalisco in 2015 and attempting a spectacular, but unsuccessful, assassination of Mexico City Police Chief Omar García Harfuch, who is now Mexico’s federal security secretary.

It recruited aggressively, experimenting with new ways to reach potential members online, and generated revenue through fuel theft, extortion and timeshare fraud, among other activities.

Oseguera Cervantes died in a battle with troops sent to capture him

Oseguera Cervantes was killed during an attempt to capture him, as his followers attempted to fight off Mexican troops.

Mexico’s Defense Department said in a statement that the army launched an operation in the southern part of Jalisco state to capture Oseguera Cervantes, involving the Mexican Air Force and special forces.

The cartel counterattacked, and in the ensuing confrontation, federal forces killed four members of the criminal group, and wounded three others, including its leader, who died later during transfer by air to Mexico City, according to the statement.

Three soldiers were injured and two people were detained in the action. Rocket launchers capable of shooting down aircraft and destroying armored vehicles were seized at the scene.

Mexico is keen to show Trump results in the fight against cartels

Oseguera Cervantes’ will help Mexico’s government show results to the U.S., which is pressuring its neighbor to pursue drug cartels more aggressively. Both countries said intelligence collaboration helped lead to Sunday’s operation.

Oseguera Cervantes was facing multiple indictments in the United States and the U.S. State Department had offered a $15 million reward for information leading to his arrest. The Trump administration designated his cartel and others foreign terrorist organizations a year ago.

U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau, who was U.S. ambassador to Mexico during the first Trump administration, applauded the operation via X, writing “The good guys are stronger than the bad guys. Congratulations to the forces of law and order in the great Mexican nation.”

Mike Vigil, former chief of international operations for the DEA, said Mexico had sent a “a strong message to Donald Trump’s administration that they are fighting aggressively and effectively” against the most powerful cartels. He added that “the majority of the information came from the Mexican armed forces and all credit goes to Mexico.”

Cartel leader’s death leaves a power vacuum

It’s not clear who will succeed Oseguera Cervantes, or if any one person can.

The Jalisco cartel has a presence in at least 21 of Mexico’s 32 states and is active in almost all of the United States, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration. But it is also a global organization and the loss of its leader could be felt well beyond Mexico.

“El Mencho controlled everything, he was like a country’s dictator,” Vigil said.

His absence could slow the cartel’s rapid growth and expansion and leave it initially weakened against the Sinaloa cartel on several fronts where they or their proxies are fighting. The Sinaloa is locked in its own internal power struggle, however, between the sons of “El Chapo” and the faction loyal to Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada, who is in U.S. custody.

Vigil said Mexico should seize the moment to launch “an effective frontal assault based on intelligence.”

“This is a big opportunity for Mexico and the United States if they work together,” he said.

Security analyst David Saucedo said that if relatives of Oseguera Cervantes take control of the cartel, the violence seen Sunday could continue. If others take power, they could be more willing to turn the page and continue operations.

The greatest fear would be that the cartel turns to indiscriminate violence. They could decide to “launch narcoterrorism attacks … and generate a scenario similar to what Colombia lived in the 1990s,” a full on attack against the government “car bombs, assassinations and attacks on aircraft.”