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American Murder: Netflix documentary explores Gabby Petito’s tragic journey
The three-part series delves into Gabby Petito's disappearance, the police encounters with the couple, and Laundrie's eventual suicide
American Murder: Gabby Petito, a new Netflix documentary series explores the case of how two individuals took a journey and a single one came back. The real narrative has many twists and turns, some of which are explored in the documentary.
The three-part documentary, directed by Julia Willoughby Nason and Michael Gasparro, follows Petito, 22, and her fiancé, Brian Laundrie, 23 as they set out to record their cross-country van journeys for YouTube.
Petito's abduction caught the nation's attention after her family reported her missing in September 2021, and the case quickly became one of the most talked-about true crime cases in recent history.
What happened to Gabby and Brian?
Gabrielle “Gabby” Petito was born in 1999 and raised in Blue Point, New York, as the eldest of six siblings and half-siblings. She started dating Brian Laundrie, a former classmate from high school, in 2019. Later, she relocated to North Port, Florida, to live with Laundrie and his parents.
Laundrie worked in the grocery shop and Petito was a pharmacy technician at a nearby Publix. In an attempt to launch a travel blog and YouTube channel, the pair decided to take a cross-country trip together when the COVID-19 epidemic erupted in early 2020.
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The two uploaded a video to YouTube on August 19, 2021, with the title "Beginning Our Van Life Journey." Their beach days, lunches, and camping arrangements are highlighted in the video, which follows them on different parts of their journey.
Less than a month after that, she was reported missing. The pair was stopped by authorities on August 12, 2021, in Moab, Utah, after they were allegedly seen fighting in the community. The caller who reported the altercation claimed to have witnessed a guy striking a lady.
Despite Laundrie's facial injuries, Petito acknowledged striking him first during the traffic stop. Moab cops believed Petito was the aggressor and left her with the van as they checked Laundrie into a motel for the night.
After weeks of not hearing from Petito, her family formally filed a missing person's report on September 11. It quickly came to light that Laundrie had discreetly gone back home without Petito on September 1. His parents instructed investigators to forward any enquiries to their attorney since he would not talk to the police.
Eight days after being reported missing, Petito was discovered dead on September 19 in Wyoming's Grand Teton National Park. The FBI reported that her bones were found at the dispersed camping area at Spread Creek.
Two days later, authorities ruled her death a murder. Petito died from strangulation, according to an autopsy conducted after almost three weeks, and her body was left outside for three or four weeks.
Laundire and his parents refused to talk to investigators after the North Port Police labelled him a person of interest on September 15. Josh Taylor, a spokesman for North Port Police, disclosed that Laundrie had also vanished on September 17.
According to Laundrie's parents, they last saw him on 13 September when he left for a walk to the Carlton Reserve, which is close by. The US District Court of Wyoming issued a federal warrant for Laundrie's arrest on September 23, four days after Petito's body was found, on the grounds that he had used her debit card while she was missing.
Human bones that were eventually identified as belonging to Laundrie were discovered by officials at Myakkahatchee Creek Environmental Park on October 21. Laundrie's parents said that the last time they saw him, he was heading out on a walk at Carlton Reserve, which is connected to the park.
The family's attorney disclosed the following month that Laundrie had shot himself in the head and died as a result. There was no funeral once it was determined that he died by suicide.
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FBI agents declared Laundrie guilty of her murder in January 2022 after discovering a written confession in a notebook discovered next to his body. The contents of the notebook were made public by the Laundrie family's lawyer five months later. Petito's parents sued Christopher and Roberta Laundrie in civil court in March 2022, alleging that they assisted their son in hiding the murder and were preparing to assist him in leaving the country. In February 2024, a settlement was made between the families.
