Missing Woman’s Boyfriend, Family To Stay In ‘Background’: Lawyer

EAST ISLIP, NY — The boyfriend of Gabrielle Petito, who went missing on a road trip, "will remain in the background" with his family while investigators conduct their search, an attorney says, but Petito's family is still demanding answers.

Attorney Steven Bertolino of East Islip, who represents Brian Laundrie, called it “an extremely difficult time for both the Petito family and the Laundrie family,” in a statement released Tuesday afternoon.

“I understand that a search has been organized for Miss Petito in or near Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming,” the statement read. “On behalf of the Laundrie family, it is our hope that the search for Miss Petito is successful and that Miss Petito is reunited with her family.”

“On the advice of counsel, the Laundrie family is remaining in the background at this juncture and will have no further comment,” he added.

Bertolino did not respond to a reporter’s question as to why his client will not speak with police investigators.

Police in North Port, Florida investigating the circumstances under which the Blue Point Long Island native disappeared on the cross-country road trip tried to speak to Laundrie but his parents referred them to their attorney instead, a spokesman said.

North Port police were called in to assist Suffolk County detectives with the investigation into Petito’s disappearance over the weekend and located the van she had been traveling with at the home she shared with Laundrie and his parents, police spokesman Josh Taylor said.

Laundrie, who returned home without Petito, has been seen at the house but his parents would not make him “available” to speak with police, Taylor said.

He also questioned why Laundrie, 22, had them handling his affairs.

“He would not come to the door,” he said.

Her mother, Nichole Schmidt, said she last spoke with her daughter on Aug. 25, and then reviewed a text from her a few days later indicating that she was headed to Yellowstone National Park.

When Schmidt did not hear from Petito after she responded, she became concerned and began calling the National Park Service to check to see if the couple had made reservations.

Schmidt, who last saw Petito in person in July for her son's graduation, said if there is one thing that she could say to her daughter, it would be that she just wants her to come home safe.

"We love you so much," Schmidt said, addressing Petito, adding, "We just need to see you again. We need to know you're OK."

Rick Stafford, an attorney with law offices in Bohemia, said that both the Schmidt and Petito family “are going through the worst moments of their lives.”

“Their beautiful twenty-two-year-old daughter is missing and the one person that can help find Gabby refuses to help,” said Stafford, a family friend, in a statement.

Laundrie was traveling with Petito in her 2012 Ford Transit van in the Grand Teton/Yellowstone area and that is where the family believes she was last seen, according to Stafford.

“Brian is refusing to tell Gabby’s family where he last saw her,” Stafford said. “Brian is also refusing to explain why he left Gabby all alone and drove her van to Florida. These are critical questions that require immediate answers.”

The families are begging “the Laundrie family to not ‘remain in the background’ but to help find who Brian referred to as the love of his life,” Stafford said, referencing Bertolino’s statement, then posed the question, “How does Brian stay in the background when he is the one person that knows where Gabby is located?”

“The Schmidt and Petito family implore Brian to come forward and at least tell us if we are looking in the right area,” Stafford said.

Petito had been traveling in a converted camper van with Laundrie on a tour of the national parks system since early July. She was reported missing to Suffolk police by her family on Saturday after they had not heard from her in over a week.

Taylor called Petito’s disappearance and Laundrie’s return without her “odd” and said, “anybody would think that.”

Petito had been “in constant communication” with her family on the road trip and then “all of a sudden stopped communicating completely” with “no contact for weeks, he said, adding, “Her vehicle shows back up here in North Port with the person she was traveling with who's providing no explanation.”

Investigators confiscated the camper van and have begun processing it for evidence, according to Taylor.

A police officer dropped off an envelope to the home on Tuesday morning, though Taylor denied it was a subpoena, but rather a property receipt for the confiscated van.

Where the investigation will go remains to be seen, as the department “technically” does not have a crime, but only a missing person, according to Taylor.

“We're trying to figure out where she's at,” Taylor said, adding that if investigators “determine that something bad has happened to her, we’ll begin the more criminal investigation, and we'll go from there.”

In the meantime, investigators are trying to “reverse engineer what these folks have been doing” for the last three weeks, Taylor said, adding that they will be using every resource they have between themselves, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, as well as other agencies.

Taylor told Newsday that Laundrie has answered some questions through his counsel, but that he did not believe that he provided anything very helpful to investigators.

“He has provided and his family has provided a phone number for legal representation to us to filter our questions through,” Taylor told the outlet. “I don’t know that we’ve gotten all of them answered, or certainly to our liking.”

He went on to say that it is “not just necessarily completely not cooperating.”

“But certainly, we would love to speak with him. I think it would be helpful for our investigation in finding his girlfriend,” he said.

Taylor said it is concerning that no one has heard from Petito.

“We don't have any evidence that she's been trying to attempt to contact anybody; that's very concerning,” he added.

Suffolk police said they are working with other law enforcement agencies, including North Port police, and the FBI, according to a statement.

“We are not commenting further at this time as it’s an active investigation,” read the statement.
Police are asking anyone with information to call Crime Stoppers at 1-800-220-TIPS.

Tiffany Razzano and Daniel Hampton contributed additional reporting to this story.