'What if this happened to Cassie': Brian Laundrie's dad destroys sign on front lawn
NORTH PORT, FLORIDA: Brian Laundrie’s father reportedly stepped out of his home on Saturday, October 16, to remove a sign that protesters left on his lawn next to a large photo of 22-year-old Gabrielle ‘Gabby’ Petito, his son’s now-dead fiance. Local and federal investigators have been searching for Laundrie for about a month now. Petito's cause of death was determined to be strangulation. Her body was found almost a month ago in the Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming.
As per the New York Post, Chris Laundrie, 62, was seen ripping down a yellow sign reading “What if this happened to Cassie?” a reference to his daughter and Laundrie's sister. Cassie is the only Laundrie family member who has spoken about her brother and Petito’s death openly with the media.
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Cassie has said she does not know if her parents are involved in the disappearance of Laundrie. “I would tell my brother to just come forward and get us out of this horrible mess,” she said on ‘Good Morning America’. Cassie saw her 23-year-old brother on September 1 and again on September 6 when she joined the family at the Fort De Soto Park campsite in Pinellas County, Laundrie family attorney Steve Bertolino confirmed.
“I would tell my brother to just come forward and get us out of this horrible mess,” she said during the aforementioned interview, adding that if she did know where he was, she would turn him in. Later, speaking with protestors outside her house, she said that her children had been crying for three days and that there was not much she could do to find her brother. “I’m in the boat where I’m getting ignored by my family and thrown under the bus by my family’s attorney,” she said. “We are just as upset, frustrated, and heartbroken as everybody else,” Cassie told the protesters. “I am losing my parents and my brother and my children’s aunt and future sister-in-law on top of this.”
Laundrie’s father, the daily reported, declined to answer questions from a reporter on Wednesday as he mowed the lawn around a makeshift memorial set up for the 22-year-old. Chris and his wife, Roberta, Brian’s mom, have largely been holed up in the home.
Brian Laundrie hasn’t been accused of being involved in Petito’s death, but remains the sole person of interest and faces an arrest warrant. While authorities continue their search for Laundrie at the Carlton Reserve, the FBI announced the US District Court of Wyoming issued a federal arrest warrant for him. Laundrie is suspected of using a debit card and PIN for accounts that do not belong to him for charges of more than $1,000 sometime between August 30 and September 1, according to the indictment.
"While this warrant allows law enforcement to arrest Mr. Laundrie, the FBI and our partners across the country continue to investigate the facts and circumstances of Ms. Petito's homicide," Special Agent in Charge Michael Schneider says in a statement. "We urge individuals with knowledge of Mr. Laundrie's role in this matter or his current whereabouts to contact the FBI."