Small comfort for Gabby’s family, I think. We can only hope that there was more written, not made public, that helps them in some way.
Holy crap! Check out this quote.
The National Centre for Domestic Violence (NCDV) says it expects to see a surge in domestic violence reports following England’s Euro 2020 final defeat against Italy.
Figures from the NCDV show that when the national team plays, domestic violence in England increases by 26 per cent. If the team loses, the figure is even higher as crimes surge by 38 per cent.
That’s fucking insane, if true. I wonder if that is the same kind of reporting that used to crop up about violence and the Super Bowl that was debunked many years ago.
I will say that when I first saw the short version of the Moab police encounter, I thought they handled it pretty well. It was only after the full version was released and experts commented on it that I was made aware that they didn’t properly read the situation and didn’t follow the protocols they were supposed to follow. The difference of behavior of Petito and Laundrie is stark.
I’m not sure what the answer is here or even if there is just one answer. It would be ideal if you could have mental health people ride around in every patrol car to reply to calls, but I’m not sure that’s financially doable in most places.
I don’t really think one day’s training police to look for signs of abuse will pay off in the long run. I would think a lot more training would be required, not to mention refresher courses. I think if this is part of the solution, you need to go all in with ongoing training.
I’ll go ahead and be a sexist pig and wonder if a push for hiring more female officers may be of help. They may not be any better than males for noticing signs, but maybe the abused would be more likely to talk to them. Men and women both. Or maybe I’m a dumbass.
It seems very spurious, especially how women get beat after the local soccer team loses. As noted, it sounds like the debunked Super Bowl myth that hung around forever.
But as I said earlier, even if first responders are trained to spot “coercive” behavior, there isn’t anything that can be done. It is not illegal to verbally or emotionally abuse anyone. It is not illegal to insist that the price of your “love” is that she wear a GPS tracking device or never speak to her friends and family. The only things that are illegal are physical force and threats of physical force.
And if you don’t have that because the woman is just too damn scared to make any allegations to the police, the police can try to get her to say that an act of violence occurred, but if she doesn’t, they have to leave as there is nothing to be done.
Oxygen aired a two-hour documentary called “The Murder of Gabby Petito: Truth, Lies and Social Media” five days ago and has shown it again at least once since.
I found this worth watching; it has a lot more extensive interviews with Gabby’s family than I’d seen before, even if there is a lot of material about on-line reaction to the case that seems less compelling. There is also a lengthy treatment of the Moab stop.
One interesting point: Gabby’s mother and stepfather are asked about their reaction to the news that Gabby and Brian had become engaged, and say something along the lines of ‘we saw how happy she was and that was good.’ But when Gabby’s father and stepmother are asked the same question, they immediately get hard looks on their faces and say ‘we are not going to talk about that.’
I couldn’t help wondering if that attitude could be connected to some potential lawsuit that the father might be planning to bring.
People don’t criminally prosecute each other, counselor….the state prosecutes criminals.
I get what you’re saying, though….And it used to be true - the police couldn’t make a warrantless arrest unless they had witnessed the assault, so all they could do was make a citizen’s arrest on behalf of the victim. And if the victim didn’t want to cooperate, there wasn’t much the cop could do unless the assault resulted in serious injury. In that case, I assume they would wake up a judge and get a warrant.
But those laws are changing, although it still varies by jurisdiction. But many jurisdictions now go so far as to mandate an arrest if certain conditions are met, whether the victim likes it or not. I’m generally fine with those laws, because arrests aren’t the final judgement and charges can always be dismissed if you can convince the prosecutor.
I don’t think anyone was claiming that coercive control in the absence of physical abuse is, or should be, a crime. But if a crime has been committed, it’s a factor that can and should be considered when police and prosecutors decide how to handle the case.
I’m very familiar with how the system works in New York City. Unless the assault was serious, most cases end up in family court and the charges are leveraged to get the offenders into anger management courses, substance abuse programs and counseling.
I knew a guy that once told the judge he wanted to go to the same anger management course as his girlfriend so he could make sure she didn’t hang out with other guys. It didn’t go over well.
They do lots of victim counseling in NYC, and they make robust efforts to try to get the victims of chronic abusers to leave. It’s kind of a patchwork system involving police, prosecutors, judges and outside organizations like Safe Horizons, but they work at it. When my friend was in a abusive relationship, one of the cops ( a female one ) asked to meet with me to give me advice on how to convince her to leave the relationship.
I’m all in favor of a robust social services response to domestic violence but I don’t think it’s appropriate as a first response.
Domestic violence situations are very dangerous for first responders. They require tactical training. The perp might be armed, or might have a weapon hidden. There may be children thrown into the mix. One or both parties might be intoxicated. Sometimes the victim will turn on the cops.
In about half the cases where a domestic violence call results in an attack on the responding officers, that attack occurs during the initial approach, before the officer makes contact. I think it would be irresponsible to bring in civilians.
I think most police officers are better trained to deescalate violence than a social worker, if not, they should be. Because deescalating violent conflicts is not what social workers do, unless they work in emergency medicine. Mediation has its place, but you can’t mediate an abusive relationship and you can’t mediate with someone that’s intoxicated, which covers most domestic abuse situations.
I think cops can be trained to be better first responders, and I think social workers are more effective the next day.
And I agree that the Super Bowl / wife-beating connection is weak, and I don’t like it for other reasons. I think it minimizes domestic abuse by implying that it’s something normal non-violent guys sometimes do when their team loses.
They should be, but all the video in the last decade shows that they often are not. How many times have we seen multiple police officers pointing guns at someone and all shouting different commands at the top of their lungs? I think once that happens, de-escalation is harder because everyone has a shot of adrenaline running thru them. It rarely works out well for the guy with all the guns pointed at him, even if all he has is a cell phone.
I suspect she got thrown into the creek during a violent altercation. Hospitals report suspicious injuries and Laundrie didn’t want to leave behind a witness.
I said this in another thread, but when someone attempts a mercy killing, it’s not by strangulation. I believe his “injery” line was intended to explain injuries he’d inflicted. If she was in a lot of pain from an injury, he could have carried her to the van and taken her to the hospital.
Note that all the “mistakes” he mentioned are those that made him look guilty, not those that hurt or killed Petito.
ETA: It looks like I’m arguing with Lancia, but I’m not. She quoted Laundry’s confession, and I’m responding to that.
When Laundrie returned without Petito he immediately hired a lawer and wouldnt say anything to anyone else – a big reason this story turned into such a circus. He reeked of guilt. One big question has always been “how much did his lawyer know?” Now that both of them are dead I wonder if the lawyer can disclose any of the conversations that the two of them may have had regarding Petito’s “injerys” or if that confidentiality pact remains in force.
In California, the duty of confidentiality (which is slightly different from the attorney- client privilege), is absolute and survives the death of the client. This article indicates that’s also the case in Florida:
I expect the case against the Laundries to continue.
There’s a civil trial and on going Federal Investigation.
This letter could prove the parents had prior knowledge of Gabby’s death. It’ll be interesting to see how the FBI case develops. Imho A lot of time and public money was wasted after Brian disappeared from his parent’s home. There’s strong suspicion that the parents repeatedly mislead police.
I don’t think there’s any doubt that initially he hoped to survive and remain free after Gabby’s death. The hitchhiking excursions* as well as what he said to those who picked him up, indicate that he was trying to create an alibi for himself.
The most horrifying thing to me about this whole horrifying story is the speed with which people started defending Brian after his death. There’s a whole ‘well, he paid, so that means that he was an okay guy’ theme out there that I find both disgusting and disturbing.
*Basically:
Aug. 29 - Wisconsin TikToker Miranda Baker claimed that she and her boyfriend were approached by Laundrie at Grand Teton National Park and asked them for a ride at 5.30pm [“5:44pm”]; he asked to be let out at 6:09pm at Jackson Dam … Aug 29 – ~6:40pm: Norma Jean Jalovec picked up BL, drove him BACK close to site of van (near where body later found)
Yeah, I mean even assuming you believe she had some sort of accident (and I don’t), when’s the last time someone you loved had a horrifying accident and you immediately thought is “gee, she must be in terrible pain - I know, I’ll strangle her to death to ease her suffering!” I mean screw trying to get someone to the hospital, am I right?
The only thing more unbelievable than his ridiculous self-serving fairy tale is that somewhere, somehow, you’re going to be able to find a handful of nimrods that decide to believe it.
There’s a strong strain of ‘a man has a right to do what he wants to his woman, so long as he’s willing to pay the price [in this case suicide]’ in our culture.
But, yeah: no one thinking straight is going to buy the idea that strangling someone in pain is the best way to help them.
(With the possible exception of Joseph Heller, whose 1974 novel “Something Happened” included a scene along those lines. The novel did NOT do well, by the way.)
