The strangled and beaten body of Gabby Petito was found in Grand Teton National Park on September 19, 2021.
After killing Gabby Petito, Brian Laundrie allegedly texted her parents using her phone to pretend to be her.
In an amended complaint filed Nov. 30, Petit’s parents, Joseph Petito and Nichole Schmidt, allege that after killing Petit, Laundrie sent text messages “back and forth between his cell phone and Gabrielle Petito’s cell phone in an attempt to conceal the fact that she was died.”
The young couple were on a trip documenting their adventures on YouTube, Instagram and TikTok when Petito, 22, disappeared without a trace.
Her body was found in Grand Teton National Park on September 19. She died of blunt force trauma to the head and neck by manual strangulation.
According to the complaint, Laundrie allegedly sent Schmidt a text message on Aug. 27, 2021 — the day her family believes she was killed — “in which he called Gabrielle Petito’s grandfather, Stan, by name. Gabrielle Petito never called her grandfather by his name.”
On Aug. 30, he allegedly sent Schmidt another text from Petito’s phone “stating that there was no service at Yosemite Park in an attempt to trick Nichole Schmidt into believing that Gabrielle Petito was still alive,” the complaint states.
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The emotional distress lawsuit, filed against Laundrie’s parents, Christopher and Roberta Laundrie, alleges that on Aug. 29, two days after Petit’s death, Laundrie told his parents “in a frantic phone call” that Petito was “‘gone.’
That same day, Laundrie’s parents spoke with their attorney, Steven Bertolin, “advising him that Gabrielle Petito was ‘gone,’ that Brian Laundrie needed an attorney and sent him a fee on September 2, 2021,” the complaint states.
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Bertolino, who is also a defendant in the suit, tells PEOPLE he has no comment and will “submit our responses shortly.”
PEOPLE has reached out to attorneys representing the Laundrie family, but has not yet heard back.
The Petito and Laundrie families came into the international spotlight last summer when Petito’s parents reported her missing after she stopped responding to texts while on a trip with Laundrie. It was soon revealed that Laundrie had quietly left the trip early and returned to his parents’ house in Florida – without Petit.
In October, after Petit’s body was found, Laundrie was found dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound in the Florida wilderness.
After a months-long criminal investigation into Petit’s disappearance and — later — murder, the FBI determined in January that Laundrie was responsible for her death, saying he had written a confession in his notebook before taking his own life.
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Source: HIS Education