Isabel Celis: Tucson girl's murder that took 10 years to solve
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Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos compared Nancy Guthrie's potential abduction to the Isabel Celis case, saying the Guthrie case is 'unlike anything we've seen in years in Tucson.' Isabel Celis was six years old when she was taken from her bedroom in 2012. A man named Christopher Clements received a natural life sentence in April 2024 for the murder of Celis in Tucson more than a decade ago.
Clements took Isabel from her bedroom in the early morning hours of April 21, 2012. Her father, Sergio Celis, found her missing when he went to wake her up at around 8 am. The missing child's oldest brother found her window open and the screen bent and propped against the side of the house, according to Tucson.com.
Despite an investigation, the case remained unsolved for years. FBI agents received a tip in 2017 that Clements had information about Isabel's location. At the time, he was in the Pima County jail on unrelated charges, and agreed to lead investigators to Isabel's body in exchange for the charges being dropped, and his car being released from impound.
Clements directed authorities to a desert area near Avra Valley and Trico roads, and pointed to a tree surrounded by dense brush. Investigators initially found a few cranial bones there. However, a wider search of the area revealed several other bones, which were later identified as Isabel's. Forensic specialists with the Pima County Medical Examiner's Office testified that one of the child's vertebrae was fractured, possibly due to blunt force trauma.
