As noted, she was definitely alive when he flew back, but that statement still puzzles me. They had enough money to stay at a hotel in Salt Lake City. They had enough money to eat at a restaurant in Jackson Hole. They had enough money for a flight home and back to get “supplies.”
Yet when the police are asking if he can get a hotel room for a single night so Gabby doesn’t have to go to jail, the answer is “no.” I understand that a “no” answer to the question “Do you have enough money to do X?” does not always mean absolute poverty; it can mean that money wasn’t budgeted for the particular purpose. But just like you said how a person can be motivated to find money when an emergency strikes, I think “my fiancée will go to jail unless” qualifies as one of those situations.
I just wonder if he was hoping she would get arrested. If you rewatch, he really wasn’t arguing very much about them charging her.
So…they supposedly paid round-trip airfare to Florida–about $400–so he could clear out their storage unit, which probably saved them, what, maybe $75 a month? Am I missing something here, or is their attorney just that stupid?
He probably killed her on the 28th-29th. If he flew back home to Florida to get ‘supplies’, I’m guessing the prosecution will use that, among other things, to show premeditation (i.e., capital murder).
Well, the day of the restaurant argument - the 27th - would also seem a likely candidate, but 27th-30th would appear to be the window.
If Laundrie was hitchhiking alone on the 29th, that might suggest that Petito was dead by that date. Maybe her body was in the van and he decided against using it to drive into town in case of being stopped and the body discovered. That might also explain why he did not want to be dropped off further than the entrance to the campground, so he’d be able to see from a distance whether the van had been entered and body discovered. But that’s just speculation.
Just some random musings…if Laundrie wasn’t acting so flaky, he might have a reasonable story. After the 12th, they fought and decided they needed a break. Laundrie flies home. They start talking/chatting. She begs him to come back out there because she can’t drive the van home. He relents.
He flies back out there. By this time she has been alone for six days and has probably made new and the wrong kind of friends. Guys who are trying to take advantage of her but she is young and naive and thinks nothing of it.
They fight again. This time instead of him flying, she tells him to drive the van back and she will can a flight whenever in the hell she wants. He leaves her with her new friends. So he goes home.
Plausible story. No need to worry…until there is a need to worry.
I’m not saying that is what happened, but depending on other factors, that could have worked.
No; that story wouldn’t have held up for 5 seconds.
How many new friends? How old were they? What kind of vehicle did they have? Why did no one else see these new friends, nor have any of them come forward?
The details don’t matter. Three friends. Six. Two. They were young, in their 20s…or 30s, maybe one lady was 40, not sure…they were driving an SUV or a van or a sedan. Who saw what? I don’t know who saw or didn’t see anything. I was 2600 miles away. Plus, everyone in the country is remembering me, her, or me and her, not a group of three, six, or eleven, so it is no surprise that nobody has come forward mentioning that.
I don’t know. I would have thought he’d be the prime suspect in a potential murder investigation as soon as she went missing having been on a trip with him, and that’s without police video and witness evidence of them fighting, and him returning home alone with her van.
How sure are you that Petito didn’t drive the van? A few days ago, I saw a montage of film clips, some of which seemed to be from her vlog, and one showed Gabby driving the van. She was wearing sunglasses, and the video was shot from the passenger seat.
It’d make sense if she drove the van sometimes. Otherwise, how was she getting around in the week between when he left for Florida on 8/17 and when he returned?
I also don’t think the defense you laid out would convince anyone. This was not a young woman with a history of going off on the spur of the moment with people she’d just met. And given the saturation coverage this story has gotten on social media as well as the news networks, nobody’s going to buy that the reason nobody has come forward identifying her is because they didn’t expect to see her with other people. That story would have fooled no one.
The police should be able to get Brian and Gabby’s texts from the phone carrier. They could learn a lot about the relationship from their conversations while Brian was back in Florida.
They may have FaceTime too. But I’ve noticed my younger coworkers prefer texts over a voice call.
I’m curious, do most Americans actually still use text messaging provided by their phone carrier? Where I am, 99.9% of texting is by WhatsApp, iMessage or Facebook Messenger. And in the case of WhatsApp and iMessage at least, those are end-to-end encrypted so the company couldn’t hand them over to the police even if they wanted to.
If you’re outside, away from wi-fi and don’t want to pay data, how are you going to use WhatsApp or Facebook Messenger?
I missed an appointment with a friend because she wouldn’t pay her phone bill and I couldn’t get in touch with her by Facebook Messenger. I finally convinced her to pay for her phone.
I strongly suspect someone looking to become a social media influencer via van-living will have a comprehensive mobile data plan. Like gas in the gas tank.
As far as I can tell, yes. I hadn’t heard of facebook messenger until this thread (although I’m not surprised it has that feature). The only time I’ve used Whatsup is to talk to friends who are traveling in Europe. (still not sure why we just don’t text). Although I’m old, my kids are in their 20s and 30s, and at least with us, they text.