TAMPA, Fla. — Gabby Petito’s tragic death last year shined a new light on domestic violence. Many believe she suffered in silence from verbal, emotional and physical abuse at the hands of her boyfriend, Brian Laundrie.
22-year-old Petito was on a cross-country trip with Laundrie, and the two documented their trip on a social media blog. But when she suddenly disappeared, news outlets around the world spent weeks covering the missing person’s case.
Then when video surfaced from the Moab Police Department pulling over the couple, questions were raised as to what officers did wrong and the signs they may have missed.
Someone called 911 after seeing a man hit a woman inside a white van while driving erratically.
“I know I shouldn't have pushed her, but I just pushed her and said let's just take a minute, step back and breathe,” Laundrie said during footage from the Moab Police body camera video.
“I'm always calm. I'm perfectly calm. I'm calm all the time. But he just stresses me out," Petito said in the same video.
One clear indication that she’s the victim of domestic violence is the level of distress she was in for the entirety of the body camera video. If you watch, it was about an hour and 17 minutes.
Another sign officers missed, according to many who help protect victims of domestic violence, is the way Petito described her fight with Laundrie.
“She put her hands up at one point like this, and how he put his hands around her face," The Spring of Tampa Bay CEO Mindy Murphy said. "You know, that I think was a missed opportunity too, because it would have been a natural segue for the officers to ask, 'Has he ever put his hands around your neck before? Has he ever put his hand over your mouth? Has he ever attempted to restrict your airflow?”
Murphy added that a victim is seven and a half times more likely to be murdered by an abusive partner if he's attempted to strangle or choke her.
At one point, Petito goes on to describe Laundrie's behavior to officers.
“I've been building my website, and I’ve been really stressed. and he doesn't believe that I can do any of it," Petito said. "And that's been like a downer. We'd just been fighting all morning, and he wouldn't let me in the car before. He told me I needed to calm down."
But Laundrie remained very calm and cool while communicating with officers.
“Hitting that curb was just her grabbing the wheel. She said, 'I can't believe we're getting pulled over,' and she grabbed the wheel,” Laundrie said.
After questioning the couple, Moab Police Officers believed Petito to be the aggressor and separated the two for the night. But just weeks later, Petito's body was found in Wyoming in the Teeton National Forest.
An autopsy revealed her cause of death to be strangulation. Laundrie returned to Florida and, soon after, also went missing while hiking in the Carlton Reserve.
Investigators eventually found his body and determined he died by suicide. He also claimed responsibility for Petito's death in a notebook found by his body.
But many question whether a different police response could have prevented her death.
“These officers were negligent, and their negligence contributed to the cause of Gabby's death,” the Petito family's attorney Brian Stewart said during a press conference.
The lawsuit filed by the Petito family against the Moab Police Department claims wrongful death and is seeking $50 million in damages.
“The officers failed to recognize the serious danger that she was in and failed to investigate fully and properly," Stewart said. "They did not have the training that they needed to recognize the clear signs that were evident that morning. That Gabby was the victim, and she was in serious need of immediate help."
Stewart also said the officers were not properly trained to investigate domestic violence situations and did not properly assess the circumstances.
Murphy believes we can learn from Petito's tragic death by educating and warning anyone who's in an abusive relationship to never find themselves isolated with that person since they have no way to ask for help.
“Abusers are very crafty and manipulative and intentional about putting their partner and themselves into an isolated situation, where it's just 'us against the world,'" Murphy said. "Because when it's just 'us against the world,' you have no one to turn to when you start to realize 'us' is not a safe place to be."
The Petito family also filed a lawsuit against Laundrie's parents. They accused his family of knowing their son murdered Petito and of helping him leave the country.
The Moab Police Department and the Laundrie family did not respond to a request for comment.
If you or a loved one is a victim of domestic violence, call the national domestic violence hotline at 1-800-799-7233. Or the Florida domestic violence hotline at 1-800-500-1119.
