Bardstown High School principal Chris Pickett also answered questions about claims he offered to sell some of the bourbon to the liquor store.
STORY: Rare Kentucky bourbon stolen in apparent inside job
"He did not" try to sell the sought-after bourbon, Pickett's attorney Doug Hubbard said in a phone interview. Instead, Hubbard said Pickett is a liquor collector who asked whether any Pappy was available.
Sheriff Pat Melton said the man who appeared in the store's surveillance video to be wearing a Bardstown High School pullover and drove a late model Ford F-150 that appeared to be green with tan trim. He estimated the man is between 50 and 60. When he released the video, Melton had labeled the man in the video as a "person of interest."
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Asked whether Pickett was cleared of any suspicion after meeting with investigators, Franklin County Sheriff Pat Melton said, "We've got to verify information."
Melton said Pickett "cooperated fully with detectives and we're moving forward with the case. ... I think right now everybody involved is obviously a person of interest."
Melton said other leads in the case also are being pursued.
Video surveillance at the Elizabethtown liquor store captured Pickett entering and leaving on Oct. 20, days after the theft was reported.
Pickett was in Elizabethtown for a Bardstown High athletic event and had been at a nearby restaurant when he decided to inquire about Pappy at the liquor store, Hubbard said.
Hubbard said the whole episode was "about 90 seconds (from) in to out." Pickett did not return messages left at his office Monday.
For the last two weeks, th! e sheriff's department has been investigating the heist — initially called an apparent inside job — from the Buffalo Trace Distillery in Frankfort, where the bourbon is made.
Sixty-five cases of the 20-year bourbon are missing. Nine cases of 13-year-old Van Winkle Family Reserve rye — about $675 worth — also were stolen.
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