New Questions in the Gabby Petito Case: Fiancé Was Suspected of the Crime, Now His Remains Have Been Found

Brian Laundrie went missing a month ago.

In a nature reserve in Florida, the remains were found of Brian Laundrie, the fiancé of blogger Gabby Petito, who went missing a month ago and whose body was found in September in a national park in Wyoming. Here are the latest news on this high-profile murder case. 

Reaction in the US to Petito's death

In July, 22-year-old Gabby Petito and 23-year-old Brian Laundrie set off on a road trip across the US, which the young woman documented on Instagram. In late August she disappeared, while her fiancé returned home to Florida alone. 

Laundrie did not contact the police or his fiancée's family. It later emerged that the couple had had at least one serious argument during the trip. Ten days after Brian's return, Petito's family officially reported her missing. 

Not only the FBI and police but also social media users searched for the young woman. Thousands of people put forward various theories about what could have happened to her. On social networks, videos with the hashtag #gabbypetito gained millions of views, and 1.3 million people followed the missing woman on Instagram. 

Laundrie's family and Brian himself did not help search for Gabby and did not comment on the situation at all. On September 15, police named Brian a “person of interest” in the case. His parents then said he had set off for Carlton Reserve in Florida several days earlier and had gone missing. Police began searching for Brian. 

A source told CNN that the young man had left home without his phone or wallet and that his parents feared he might harm himself. On September 19, shortly after Laundrie disappeared, Petito's body was found in the Bridger-Teton National Forest in Wyoming. An autopsy showed the young woman had been strangled. 

Brian was not charged with murder. Law enforcement put him on a wanted list and said he had used someone else's bank card after Gabby's death. It was not specified whose card it was. 

Discovery of Laundrie's remains

For more than a month, the missing fiancé of Gabby Petito could not be found. The search was complicated by the fact that Carlton Reserve and the surrounding area are marshy, with most of it covered by water. Search participants even checked places where the water reached their chests and where there were many snakes and alligators. 

Lee County Sheriff Carmine Marceno said: “Very, very difficult conditions for searching.” On October 20, skeletal remains of a person, a phone, a notebook and some other items were found in the area of the reserve. An examination showed the remains belonged to Brian Laundrie. 

Laundrie's family lawyer said the parents had not taken part in the search earlier because they had told the FBI and police everything they knew about their son's presumed whereabouts, and Carlton Reserve had been closed to the public because of the search operation. As soon as the reserve reopened, the couple warned the search team of their wish to join and arrived on the morning of October 20. 

According to the lawyer, at the reserve, Brian's mother Roberta and father Chris explored the trail their son liked to walk. The woman walked along the trail, while Chris left it and moved in zigzags. At one point he saw a white waterproof bag. Soon police officers and FBI agents showed him a photo of a backpack that had been found nearby. 

“At that moment, the Laundries were told that remains had been found near the backpack and were asked to leave the reserve,” said lawyer Steven Bertolino. 

New questions 

The fact that Laundrie's remains were discovered on the day his parents joined the search seemed suspicious to some. Especially given that they had not helped search for Petito and had not reported their own son missing right away. They were suspected of helping him escape. 

Now there are suggestions that Chris Laundrie could have planted the bag he found himself. The lawyer called this “nonsense.” He said the place where the young man's remains and belongings were found had previously been underwater, which the FBI had confirmed. Bertolino noted that the Laundrie parents are overcome with grief and will not comment. 

Former federal prosecutor Nina Rahmani said that initially Brian's parents did not behave like people concerned about the wellbeing of their missing future daughter-in-law. However, after their son's body was found, the family can hardly be accused of wanting to shield Gabby's fiancé from punishment for murder. 

Former assistant prosecutor in Miami and dean of the law school at the local St. Thomas University, Alfredo Garcia, believes that such a charge also had little chance of standing up in court earlier, when the Laundrie family was not cooperating with the investigation. 

Former New York police officer Joseph Giacalone argues that any parents would have behaved the same way as the Laundries: “I'm sure they suspected something was wrong when he came back without her.” 

According to him, if police do not name other suspects in the Gabby Petito murder case, the case will have to be closed, and the girl's parents will never learn all the circumstances of her death.