Two Arizona men swept up during the Nancy Guthrie investigation in February have taken the first formal step toward suing the Pima County Sheriff’s Department, arguing they were detained without cause and left publicly branded as suspects in a case they had nothing to do with.

A notice of claim, the procedural precursor to a lawsuit under Arizona law, was filed this week naming Sheriff Chris Nanos and a detective. It alleges wrongful arrest and property damage.

Who Filed and What They Want

Three people are represented in the filing. Carlos Palazuelos and Daniel Maddox were both detained on 10 February. Josefina Maddox, Daniel’s mother, owns the residence that was searched and is named over damage to the property.

The settlement figures proposed in the notice are substantial:

2.5 million dollars for claims relating to Palazuelos
500,000 dollars for Daniel Maddox
250,000 dollars for Josefina Maddox

Beyond Nanos and the detective, the notice identifies the county and the sheriff’s department as parties potentially subject to future claims.

The Account of What Happened

According to the notice, obtained by NBC affiliate KVOA in Tucson, deputies took Palazuelos into custody at gunpoint and held him for roughly seven to eight hours without probable cause. The arrest was carried out publicly.

The document states that Palazuelos is innocent and that his home was ransacked, alleging physical, emotional and reputational harm.

Daniel Maddox described a different but equally jarring encounter. He left his room to investigate a loud noise and was met by men in military gear pointing weapons at him, who ordered him to lie down in the hallway. He was subsequently held under guard beside a van for several hours.

The notice characterises that detention as wrongful and says it caused him significant physical, mental and emotional suffering.

The Social Media Element

A central grievance concerns what was said publicly rather than what happened at the property.

The notice points to a post by Nanos stating that a person had been arrested and was being questioned in connection with the Nancy Guthrie investigation. Combined with other statements from the sheriff’s office, the filing argues, that post presented Palazuelos to a global audience as a suspect.

The lawyers say they asked the sheriff and the department to retract those statements or clarify that Palazuelos had no involvement, and that both requests were refused.

That refusal is arguably the most consequential detail in the claim. In a case receiving international coverage, an unretracted association with a kidnapping investigation follows a person indefinitely.

The Sheriff’s Position

The department declined to comment on pending litigation but pushed back on the underlying premise.

In a statement, the office noted that the sheriff has said in multiple interviews that nobody has been cleared, describing the matter as an ongoing and active investigation.

Speaking Friday on NBC News’ Stay Tuned Now, Nanos defended the operation on procedural grounds. He explained that investigative work involving evidence and tips led his team to believe something of interest existed at that residence or with those individuals, that they presented this to a judge, and that the judge agreed sufficient probable cause existed to issue a search warrant.

They then served the warrant, spoke with the people involved and continued the investigation, he said.

The distinction he is drawing matters legally. A judicially authorised search warrant provides significant protection against claims of wrongful entry, though it does not automatically justify how individuals were treated during its execution or what was said afterward.

Palazuelos Spoke Out at the Time

The events took place at a home in Rio Rico, roughly sixty miles south of Tucson. Shortly afterward, a man identifying himself as Palazuelos, a delivery driver, spoke to Telemundo outside the property and stated plainly that he had no involvement.

He was released without charges.

The Case That Prompted It All

Nancy Guthrie, 84, disappeared from her home near Tucson in the early hours of 1 February. The FBI is treating the disappearance as a kidnapping for ransom.

Nanos said this week that the case remains active and that investigators are working it as hard as they can. In a statement Thursday, the sheriff’s office described six months of ongoing analysis of DNA and digital evidence, calling the work complex and time-intensive while stating that every credible lead continues to be pursued.

A Daughter’s Continued Appeal

Savannah Guthrie, co-anchor of TODAY and Nancy Guthrie’s daughter, released a video on Monday addressing whoever is responsible.

She said her family is in agony. Acknowledging that the world can be cruel and unforgiving, she suggested she believed the person had tried to do things properly before, and asked them to make the right choice now, to help find her mother and tell the family where to search.

Two Investigations, One Consequence

What this claim exposes is a tension that surfaces in nearly every high-profile disappearance. Pressure to produce results pushes investigators to act on leads aggressively, and the people caught in that process have limited recourse when a lead turns out to be nothing.

Six months on, the Nancy Guthrie investigation has produced no arrest and no recovery. It has now produced litigation.