Retired FBI agent questions Pima County sheriff’s approach, says Trump’s criticism is ‘well taken’
James Gagliano, a retired FBI supervisory special agent, told Fox News’ “America’s Newsroom” on Friday that the way Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos is releasing information in the Nancy Guthrie investigation is not “the best way to conduct the messaging in a case this large.”
“I'm super careful in how I criticize from the armchair quarterback perspective, but the thing that I think has really hurt this investigation, number one, that the FBI has not been offered the lead and number two, the fact that the information that's been put out through fits and starts, and things have to be walked back,” Gagliano said.
“Things were said incorrectly, and what the sheriff is doing is not operating through a public information officer or a public affairs office where there's a weekly or bi-weekly press conference. He's doing these individual interviews and each one of them provides a little something different. I don't think this is the best way to conduct the messaging in a case this large,” Gagliano continued.
He also reacted to President Donald Trump’s criticism of investigators working the case. Trump on Thursday took issue with authorities telling the media they were flying a Pima County Sheriff’s Department helicopter equipped with an FBI Bluetooth "sniffer" to detect the missing woman's pacemaker.
"I didn't like when they talked about going after the pacemaker before they even started going after it," Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One on his way to Georgia.
“The question becomes, how much is too much? What should we let the public know that we are looking for or we need help in, and what are things we should keep close to the vest?” Gagliano said. “And obviously searching for the pacemaker, it’s a technology that's been around for a while, it operates off of Bluetooth, and there are things open source online about it, but the president's point was well taken, that sometimes we might give the bad guys too much information.”
Posted by Greg Norman-Diamond