The tragic case of Gabby Petito

0:01 Hello everybody and welcome back to Unthinkable, a True Crime Podcast. Thank you for joining me. My name is Lisa. I hope you're all well. I am from the UK and I'm recording this on August 2026, and we are currently experiencing an extreme heat wave, which has lasted so far for about five weeks, I think. It's very hot and we don't normally get this sort of weather. It's quite unusual for us to be sort of 35 degrees. So I'm sat upstairs in my husband's office recording this, and it's absolutely sweltering up here.

0:39 So I've put I've got a fan on that I hopefully you can't hear it. I've put a little sound barrier on, so hopefully you can't hear it. But if you can, that's that's what that noise is. Um I record up here because it's the quietest like room in the house, but it's in the like it's in a loft conversion, so it's extremely hot. Um yes. Hopefully, we're coming to the end of it now. It looks like it's going to start cooling down the next couple of days. Very much looking forward to autumn. And winter, actually.

1:14 Anyway, so today's case. So this is one that starts with what looks like a free-spirited couple heading off on an adventure across America. The young couple are documenting their journey, making memories along the way. Their videos and photos show a smiley, happy couple simply enjoying life. However, this case does not have a happy ending. It ends with murder. This is the case of Gabby Petito. So this is a very well-known case. Um, it's huge. I think I find it so intriguing because it's all documented, you're seeing Gabby unknowingly living out her final days.

1:58 So it's quite, I don't know, it's very sort of thought-provoking, and I don't know, it's a weird fascination. I don't know. So let's get started. So Gabby Petito, she was born on the 19th of March 1999 in Long Island, New York State. Now Gabby was part of a big family. She had six younger siblings and half siblings. Her parents are Nicole Schmidt and Joe Petito. Her parents separated when Gabby was young, but they remained close. Both parents remarried, so Nicole married a man called Jim, and uh Jo married a lady called Tara, and they all raised the children together.

2:43 It wasn't a volatile environment at all. So Gabby she attended Bayport Blue Point High School, and this is where she meets Brian Laundry. Now, Brian was born on the 18th of November 1997 to parents Christopher and Roberta Laundry. Now, after graduating, Brian and Gabby began dating in March 2019, and quite soon after, Gabby actually moves from New York to Florida to live with Brian and his parents. They were described as childhood sweethearts, but for Gabby, she found it difficult living with Brian's parents.

3:21 She was quite uncomfortable, especially around um his mother. Like she was quite interfering in their relationship and in their business, and Gabby found her quite overbearing at times. Now, in July 2020, Gabby and Brian got engaged, and soon after, Gabby bought herself a white Ford Transit, and together the pair kicked out the van to make it livable. Now, Gabby and Brian they worked various jobs to save up for a four-month cross-country adventure across America where they had planned to explore different national parks.

4:00 Gabby planned to document their trip and share it with the world. She wanted to be a Van Life blogger and she set up a YouTube channel as well as posting daily on social media. A year after they got engaged on July 2nd, 2021, the couple and their van were ready. So they set off from New York. Their first documented major stop was in Kansas. They filmed themselves driving and they took pictures of themselves on the Monument Rocks in Scott City, Kansas. They look happy and the photos, they're really good.

4:36 The couple then traveled to Colorado and they take lots more photos. There are quite arty photos with Gabby stood in front of buildings with flowers and other paintings on them. They stay two nights at the Great Sand Dunes National Park, again, all documented. After leaving Colorado, they travel to Utah and spend three nights at Zion National Park. And this is beautiful. They take pictures of them hiking on the mountains, it's very scenic, it's lovely. They set up a lovely campsite, and it really looks like they're having the time of their lives.

5:13 So now they go to Bryan Canyon National Park, Utah. Then Gabby posts pictures from Mystic Hot Springs. There's a picture of the couple kissing under a waterfall, and Gabby's smiling and she's splashing around in the springs. And then the couple they then hike through Canyonlands National Park. And after posting pictures of their hike, something strange happens. So the couple have been posting daily, like very regularly, and then all of a sudden, 12 days go by with no posts, nothing at all. But then on Thursday, the 12th of August, Gabby reappears on social media.

5:57 She's posting pictures of Archers National Park in Utah, and everything seems fine. They're posting very scenic pictures again, um, the places they've travelled through, the places they've walked through, and they they really are good pictures. Now, on the 25th of August, Gabby posts her last post on her Instagram account. She's at Monarch's Art Venue in Ogden, Utah, and she's standing in front of this butterfly mural, and she's holding a pumpkin, and she looks so happy, and it's one of her usual very creative pictures, like the butterfly wings look like they're attached to her, like it's very it's very lovely.

6:40 But this is Gabby's last post. So she has contact with her mum on the same day, the the 25th of August, and now she keeps in regular contact with her mum, sending text messages at least once a day, and they also video call and have phone calls as well. Um, so but this is the last time her mum hears from her. So the last known sighting of Brian and Gabby together was on the 27th of August. Now a witness said she saw them both together in Mary Piglet's, which is a Tex-Mex restaurant in Jackson, Jackson Hole, Wyoming.

7:17 She said Brian appeared aggressive, he was angry, he was shouting, and that Gabby was in tears. She was apologizing to the restaurant staff, and Gabby actually ran outside, and then well, she was out there for a couple of minutes, and then she ran back in and she seemed very emotionally distressed. And restaurant staff later confirmed this. CCTV catches the van driving away. Now, later that day, a text from Gabby's phone is sent to her mother. It says, Can you help Stan? I just keep getting his voicemail and missed calls.

7:55 And now this message does raise concern with Gabby's mother because Stan was Gabby's grandfather and she never called in by his first name. Gabby's mother and family members tried to contact Gabby over the next few days. They're reaching out to her on social media after phone calls and messages went unanswered. Um, they are trying not to panic, and they're saying like they could be somewhere with no signal, like they are out in the mountains, but her mum, her mum, she's sure that something's wrong.

8:26 There were no more posts from Gabby. Now, Nicole, Gabby's mum, she tried to contact Roberta, Brian's mum, but these phone calls went unanswered as well. Nicole is now very concerned that something terrible has happened to her daughter, and on the 11th of September 2021, she files a missing persons report with Suffolk County New York Police Department. Now this leads to a shocking discovery. When the police start investigating, they quickly find out that Brian Laundrie wasn't in Wyoming with Gabby, he was at home at his parents' house in Florida, and he'd been there for two weeks.

9:12 And not only that, he had Gabby's van, but where was Gabby? Brian and his parents by this time already had a lawyer, and they absolutely refused to speak to police or anyone else. They refused to speak to Gabby's mother, they completely refused to help with the police investigation. Now I looked into this, and the United States individuals are legally protected by the Fifth Amendment from self-incrimination, and they are not required to answer any police questions or cooperate with active investigations, even as a person of interest.

9:54 It's unbelievable, isn't it? The only person who knows what happened to Gabby is there in Florida, but he's refusing to speak. Now, as you can imagine, the story is gathering a lot of attention, helped by Gabby's social media, and people start turning up at the laundry's home and they're demanding answers. And there's a video of Christopher Brian's uh father and he's mowing the lawn and there's members of the public harassing him, and he just carries on mowing like there's no one there, it's so annoying.

10:27 Now, the police investigation led police to Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming. This is where Gabby's phone was last used. The national park is 310,000 acres, so it's huge, it's a lot of ground to cover, and police are appealing to members of the public, and social media goes into overdrive. Everyone has come together to try and help find Gabby. People are posting, make sure you look out for this girl. If you see her, let someone know. So it's really kind of ramping up. Now, on Friday, September the 17th, 2021, police in Utah they released body cam footage of officers with Gabby and Brian on the side of the road.

11:16 Now, this footage was taken on August 12th. A witness had called 911 to report a couple arguing in front of the Moonflower Community Cooperative, and that the man had slapped the woman in the face and she was kind of punching him in the arm. Now the police they quickly locate the van, which is speeding, and it seems to be sort of jerking to one side, and all of a sudden it hits the curb. So the police pull them over, and when they approach the van, Gabby is crying. They ask Gabby to step out of the van, and Brian seems calm.

11:53 Gabby is very, very upset. She tells officers that they've been fighting all morning, that she's got really bad OCD and she's stressing about her blog. She's talking quickly in between like sobs and she's breathing quite heavily. It's really quite like she's really upset and it's quite upsetting to watch. She tells them that Brian wouldn't let her back in the van earlier because he wanted her to calm down. Now the officer he goes and sits Gabby in the back of the van and he tells her to take a breath and he wants to get her out of the heat, so he puts her in the car where there's air conditioning, and then he goes to speak to Brian.

12:27 Brian gets out the van and he's completely different to Gabby. He's calm, he's relaxed. They ask Brian about the marks on his face and a cut on his hand, and he said that Gabby can get really worked up sometimes, and he was trying to walk away from her, like to take a breather, but he had the van keys and she wanted to get back in the van. So he said when she tried to grab the keys off him, she caught him in the face with her phone. They asked Gabby if Brian had hit or slapped her in her face. And first of all, she says no.

13:02 But the more they talk to her, she does admit that he'd grabbed her face, like quite roughly. They talk to Gabby and Brian separately on the side of the road for over an hour, and they conclude that Gabby is the aggressor, not Brian. But they chose not to make an arrest because they viewed it as more of a mental health break, a domestic dispute rather than a violent crime. They talk about Gabby's mental health, and one of the officers starts talking about his own wife that suffers with OCD and anxiety.

13:32 Um and they're actually caught on body cam kind of laughing and joking with Brian. So the police decide to separate the couple for the night. They book Brian into a hotel room and they drive him to it. And then what so Gabby will be left with the van. Now, when Gabby realizes that they're going to be um separated for the night, she's really, really upset and she wants to know where he's going. But the police say no, you two shouldn't have any contact with each other until tomorrow morning, and that will give you time to calm down, get your thoughts together, and then you can, you know, meet up again in the morning.

14:07 And he says to Gabby, there's a good campsite where she can go and take a shower and de-stress and reset for the next day. Then they leave with Brian. The next day the pair are reunited and their trip continues. Now, the body cam footage, this point paints a very different picture to what's being portrayed on social media. And Gabby's in a terrible state in this footage, and we've seen her upset like this before in the restaurant when she's arguing with Brian. Now, back at the laundries, they are still refusing to speak to anyone, and now huge crowds have gathered outside, and they're holding signs and shouting, where is Gabby?

14:47 Where is Gabby? And people are angry. The press are there. Gabby's parents actually write a letter to Christopher and Roberta, begging them to tell them what happened to Gabby or where is Gabby, but they don't respond at all. It's heartless and it's frustrating. And Brian's parents are friends with Gabby's parents. Their daughter lived with them for two years. And the only people that know what happened to Gabby are in that house and they're continuously refusing to speak. Now, police have actually placed hidden surveillance cameras around Brian Laundrie's home to monitor his movements.

15:27 They've set them up in neighbours' gardens and in rubbish bins, and they do a live stream that videos feeds to track Brian. So when he left the house, where he goes, when he returns, etc. Now the search for Gabby continues in Wyoming when another Van Life blogger, Carl and Jen Biffoon, they are also documenting a road trip on an adventure across America. And when they are looking back at their footage on the dash cam, they realise that they've passed a white van with a Florida licence plate. And on closer inspection, this van looks very much like Gabby Petito's.

16:07 They quickly notify the police and they say that they have footage of what they think is Gabby's van, and it's located in Spread Creek in Grand Teton. Sadly, on the 19th of September 2021, Gabby Petito's body is found in Wyoming's Bridger Teton National Forest. The county coroner stated that she had been exposed outdoors in the wilderness for approximately three to four weeks. Despite this, they were still able to perform a full autopsy and they determined that Gabby had died from blunt force trauma to the head along with manual strangulation.

16:49 So Gabby Bettito's family are, of course, absolutely devastated by the news. Her father, Joe Bettito, he posted a broken heart on social media with the caption saying she touched the world. Her younger brother, TJ, he wrote, I don't know what to say, my heart is shattered. And Gabby's stepfather, Jim, he had flown to Wyoming to help search for Gabby. He was the one that had to make the call to his wife, Gabby's mother Nicole, to give her the news. It's heartbreaking, isn't it? And of course, this story has been huge.

17:25 People all over the world are following and joining together on social media to do whatever they could to help find Gabby. And now they're hearing that the worst thing that could have happened has happened. Now the family are asking the media and the public for privacy as they mourn. Now, on the 20th of September, the day after Gabby was found, police get a search warrant for the Laundry's home and they need to take Brian in for question him. However, when they arrive, Roberta and Christopher Laundry tell the police that they want to report Brian missing.

18:01 They say that he went on a hike somewhere in the Miyakahatchie Creek Environmental Park a week ago and hasn't returned. Now police are confused. They have 24 surveillance on the property. How did Brian get out undetected? It was later found that the police mistakenly thought they'd seen Brian driving his Ford Mustang back to their home. So they'd seen him leave the home on the 13th of September 2021. He was wearing a baseball cap. And when the Mustang returns on the 15th of September, it's actually Brian's mum driving it, but she's wearing his baseball cap.

18:42 So the police think it's him. So now Brian is missing, and police start a new search. This time they are focusing on the Miyaka Hachi Creek and the Codson Reserve. This area is 24,000 acres. So the search for Brian goes on and on. And after four weeks, Christopher, Brian's dad, then joins the search on the 7th of October. So that's four weeks after his son goes missing. And then Brian's mother, Roberta, she decides to join the search on the 20th of October, which is five weeks after her son's gone missing.

19:23 And on the exact same day that Roberta joins the search, she finds Brian's skeletal remains. They were there with some personal belongings, a backpack, a notebook, and a gun. Brian had shot himself in the head. And the notebook. So in this notebook is Brian's suicide note. And in it he admits to killing Gabby, but he says it was merciful. He explains that Gabby and he had been rushing back to the van trying to cross the streams of Spread Creek before it got dark and cold. Gabby was behind him and suddenly he heard a scream and a splash.

20:01 And he says when he found Gabby, she was breathing heavily, she was soaking wet. He pulled her from the water, he said she had a bump on her head, her feet hurt, her wrist hurt, she was shaking uncontrollably, and she was begging for someone to end her pain. He then says that he ended her life. He thought it was merciful, that it was what she wanted, but now I see my mistakes. You can read the letter in full online if you're interested. It's very easy to find. So after Gabby Petito and Brian Laundrie died, extensive police investigations began and major legal battles unfolded between the families.

20:44 So Gabby's parents filed a civil wrongful death lawsuit against Brian Laundrie's estate and his parents. And they also pursued a civil claim, accusing the Brian's parents of knowing Gabby was dead and intentionally inflicting emotional distress by not coming forward. The lawsuits were settled out of court for three million dollars to avoid trial. Now there is a documentary about this tragic case. It's on YouTube. It's called American Tragedy, the Gabby Petito Story. It's good, it's well worth a watch, and it's got lots of her sort of photos and videos, what she was taking on her trip.

21:23 If you have Instagram, Gabby's account is still there. There are others, but hers is still there. And you can see how creative she was and her zest for life and adventure, and she looked so happy. It's such a shame she died this way. Her mum, Nicole, said about the place where Gabby died. She said Gabby was where she wanted to be, on an adventure with a beautiful view of the mountains. Now Brian's parents, Christopher and Roberta, they maintain that they did not know Gabby was dead. They said that they received a call from a frantic Brian on August 29th saying Gabby was gone and that he needed a lawyer.

22:06 Very telling that, isn't it? Anyway, well, there you have it. That is the tragic case of Gabby Petito. And I guess we'll never really know what happened on the night Gabby died. I mean, we know Brian killed her, but but we don't know why. Um, and you know, he's got his suicide note, but you know, people don't really believe it, what he's written in there. Like he says things like, I've killed myself because I didn't want Gabby's family to kill me and then go to prison for killing me. And then he says, I want my my body to be left out in the wild and hope it gets tear apart by wild animals because he thinks that will make Gabby's family happy, and like he only wants to make them happy, you know, things like this.

22:54 Um, and he says that he's killing himself because he just can't live without Gabby and he can't go on without having all the adventures that they were gonna have together, blah blah blah blah. Um, but have a look at the suicide note, it's online and it's it's still sort of written in his notebook, uh, but then you can read the transcript underneath. Um yeah, and it's I don't know. Anyway, so thank you everyone for joining me. Let me know what you think of this case. Um I have an Instagram account now, so it's at Unthinkable TrueCrime.

23:27 And I like to end as ever by saying in a world where you can be anything, be kind. Take care, guys.