Roberta Laundrie 'Burn After Reading' Letter Released To Gabby Petito's Family

VENICE, FL — Roberta Laundrie, the mother of Brian Laundrie, offered to provide him with a shovel and some garbage bags for the disposal of a body, according to the letter released to the family of Gabby Petito as part of a lawsuit in Florida.

In the handwritten letter, which is written on a card with a black stencil of a bird and features the words, "Remember," she tells her son to remember that they will always love each other and nothing would ever divide them, according to the letter.

"If you’re in jail, I will bake a cake with a file in it," she wrote. "If you need to dispose of a body, I will show up with a shovel and garbage bags. If you fly to the moon, I will be watching the skies for your re-entry. If you say you hate my guts, I’ll get new guts.”

“Remember that love is a verb, not a noun. It’s not a thing, it’s not words, it is actions. Watch people’s actions to know if they love you — not their words," she continues, including a religious passage from The Bible, adding, "‘Therefore I am certain that neither death nor life, nor angels nor the ruling spirits, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers from above nor powers from below, nothing in the entire created world can separate our love.’ Neither hostile powers nor messengers of heaven nor monarchs of earth. Nothing has the power to separate us…’”

She concludes the quote by saying that the passage is from the extended version of Romans before adding an exclamation point.

The undated letter was in an envelope with the words, “Brian Christopher Laundrie" and "burn after reading," written on the outside, according to the outlet. It was reportedly inside the backpack of Brian Laundrie when his remains were located in the swamp where he is believed to have shot himself in the head.

It does not mention Petito or provide any clues as to when it could have been written.

The 23-year-old Petito, a Blue Point native, and her fiancé, Laundrie, began traveling in her van across the country in the summer of 2021 when she lost contact with her family. Her mother, Nichole Schmidt, reported her missing Sept. 11, 2021.

Laundrie returned in her van to his parents' house in Florida, where they had been living. Multiple law enforcement agencies across the country undertook a massive investigation into her disappearance, while Laundrie refused to speak with them.

Laundrie later drove to a Florida swamp, where he shot himself. He left his confession in his notebook, claiming he strangled her out of mercy after she fell into a ravine.

Petito's remains were found Sept. 19, 2021.

The letter was released to the Petito family as part of the discovery process in the lawsuit they brought against the Laundries for the intentional infliction of emotional distress.

In a statement from Roberta Laundrie, she says that it was written to her son prior to his trip with Petito, and noted that she previously submitted an affidavit to the court swearing to that effect "for very limited purposes but that is not the whole story."

"Although I chose words that I thought would be impactful with Brian given our relationship, the letter was in no way related to Gabby. Please read the entire letter before you believe the hype put out by Pat Reilly," she concludes.

In a statement to Patch, Laundrie family attorney, Steven Bertolino, who is a defendant in the case, posed the question of whether there would be any truth to "Brian flying to the moon and Roberta waiting for his re-entry."

"Or would there be any truth to Roberta taking out her guts and getting new guts?" he said.

"If you do not believe those two sentiments to have any truth, why would you think the prior two sentiments would be any less facetious?" he added.

In a statement to Patch, Reilly said Roberta Laundrie "has issued a self-serving statement and released the “Burn After Reading” letter after Judge Danielle Brewer yesterday denied her Motion for a Protective Order to preclude a release of the letter to the Petito family."

Reilly says that the letter was not released to the press by his office.

"It is interesting that she would do this now, given that she has resisted providing it for the last five to six months, she asked for a protective order, asked for a confidentiality agreement in the afternoon of May 24, and then released it later that day," he said.

Reilly goes on to say that Bertolino also released Brian Laundrie’s confession on behalf of the family last summer within an hour after it was provided to him by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

"We appreciate Judge Brewer’s ruling in which she recognized the importance of the 'Burn After Reading' letter as a potential source of evidence to be used at trial against the Laundries," he said.

"The letter is undated, and while Roberta Laundrie has suggested it was written before Brian Laundrie and Gabby Petito left on their trip, a reasonable inference is that it was written after Gabby Petito was murdered, and is evidence that the Laundries and Bertolino were aware of Gabby's demise when the statement at issue was released on Sept. 14, 2021."

"We look forward to having a jury determine when the letter was written at the time of trial," he said.