Netflix’s American Murder: Why Did Brian Laundrie Kill Gabby Petito? His Chilling Claims After Killing Girlfriend
- It's been over three years since Gabby Petito went on a four-month long trip with fiancé Brian Laundrie and never returned.
- Two months after Petito's disappearance, Laundrie killed himself confessing his crimes in a letter.
- Now, Netflix has come up with a docuseries based on Petito's mysterious disappearance, her murder, and more.
Gabby Petito and her 23-year-old fiancé, Brian Laundrie, had a beautiful and love-filled life. Well, it seemed so on the internet and in front of the camera but there were many things that their viewers couldn’t see, which was happening behind-the-scenes. In 2021, the couple went on a four-month-long cross-country road trip while documenting their journey on social media. After a few days in August 2021, when Laundrie returned home with his fiancé’s vehicle without Petito, her parents doubted her mysterious disappearance.
In September, Petito’s dead body was found, and things started to get more chaotic. Now, Netflix has developed a docuseries based on her story, what happened between them, and what’s known. The streaming platform is expanding its documentary series American Murder with another season that will feature real text messages, excerpts from their journals, interview clips, and more. Two months after Petito’s disappearance, Laundrie had killed himself but left a letter, confessing his crimes.
What made Brian Laundrie kill his fiancé Gabby Petito?
Two months after Petito’s disappearance, in September 2021, she was found dead in a remote area in a national park in Wyoming. The cause of death was stated as strangulation. Later that month, Brian Laundrie also went missing. However, soon enough his dead body was found in Myakkahatchee Creek Environmental Park near his home.
Laundrie had shot and killed himself. But, before doing that, he had written a confession letter in his notebook discovered near his body. In that letter, he had claimed that Petito’s death was a result of mercy killing after she had injured herself in a fall. As per WWSB reports, he realized she was in deep pain and killing her was ‘merciful’. In his letter, he further mentioned,
Please do not make life harder for my family. They lost a son and a daughter. The most wonderful girl in the world. Gabby I’m sorry.
A civil lawsuit was filed against the Laundries claiming that they knew what their son had done, helped him to conceal the truth, and conspired with him to flee. Later, Laundrie’s family attorney Steven Bertolino released Brian’s eight-page confession letter to media portals. However, the Petito family’s attorney, Patrick Reilly, was shocked to see how the letter was released to the public within half an hour of meeting at the FBI office.
When and where to watch American Murder: Gabby Petito?
This whole Gabby Petito and Brian Laundrie incident had stirred up the internet. Netflix took up the story for their third documentary following 2020’s American Murder: The Family Next Door and 2024’s American Murder: Laci Peterson. Julia Willoughby Nason and Michael Gasparro directed and produced Petito’s docuseries. As per Netflix, “the series captures the reality of a young woman enmeshed in an abusive relationship behind closed doors — even as she put on a happy, “Insta-perfect” face for social media.”
American Murder: Gabby Petito will highlight the events from her life up until the time she disappeared and then further dive into her true murder story and how her fiancé killed her. It will feature eyewitness accounts and social media archives. The series will explain how Petito was a victim of domestic violence. The trailer has been dropped on Netflix.
The docuseries has been scheduled to release on February 17, 2025, on Netflix.
