Gabby Petito’s mother claims that Brian Laundrie’s room was “completely gutted and renovated” soon after he disappeared in 2021.
“None of his things were there anymore,” Nichole Schmidt claimed on The Squeeze, the podcast hosted by Taylor Lautner and his wife, Tay. “All his things were gone.”
“That very same week Gabby was missing, and cops were going to their house to try to get a scent from their dogs to look for Brian. All his things were gone. His room was completely empty, just gone.”
Schmidt said the van Gabby and Laundrie drove cross-country was “completely cleaned out.”
“The mattress was never recovered,” she said. “Gabby’s stuff was packed away in a closet. I don’t understand. Yeah. I don’t, I don’t get it. Just strange behavior.”
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Gabby went missing in the summer of 2021 after documenting her travels with Laundrie on the couple’s YouTube channel. In early September of that year, Laundrie returned to his parent’s home in Florida and the missing person search for Gabby began.
Gabby’s family addressed Laundrie’s parents via a letter to the media, pleading for their help in the search of their daughter.
“We believe you know the location where Brian left Gabby,” the letter read. “We beg you to tell us. As a parent, how could you let us go through this pain and not help us? As a parent, how could you put Gabby’s younger brothers and sisters through this.”
On Sept. 19, Gabby’s remains were discovered at Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming, and it was later discovered that Laundrie strangled her to death. Laundrie’s skeletal remains were found in Myakkahatchee Creek Environmental Park in North Port on Oct. 20, 2021. Laundrie died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
Soon after Gabby’s death, her parents created The Gabby Petito Foundation — a nonprofit focused on raising awareness about domestic violence while also lobbying for tougher laws and policies regarding how police respond to reports of intimate partner abuse and missing persons.
“We have to prevent this from happening to other people,” Nichole told PEOPLE in June 2024. “It keeps us strong. Gabby works through us. We can’t not do it. We have to move forward and change the world together.
If you are experiencing domestic violence, call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233, or go to thehotline.org. All calls are toll-free and confidential. The hotline is available 24/7 in more than 170 languages.
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