Gabby Petito: Police note found on Brian Laundrie’s car after disappearance

Family of fiancé and person of interest in YouTuber’s disappearance say they removed vehicle after he failed to return home from ‘hike’

The family of Brian Laundrie, who has allegedly been missing for a number of days amid the search for his girlfriend Gabby Petito, have said they found a note on his vehicle from police asking it to be removed.

The 23-year-old, who police in North Port, Florida, last week named as person of interest in the disappearance of Ms Petito, 22, was said to have gone missing last Tuesday or Wednesday.

An attorney for the Laundrie family reportedly told ABC7 that he told them he was going on a hike in the nearby Carlton Reserve, and failed to return to his parents’ home, which he and Ms Petito had shared together.

When they went looking for him on Wednesday, his family found only his vehicle parked by the reserve, which spans more than 24,000 acres and is located just north of his parents’ home.

Steven Bertolino, the Laundrie attorney, said police had put a note on the vehicle asking for it to be removed, and the family were said to have left it until Thursday, in case he returned to it.

It comes after investigators found a body “consistent” with that of Ms Petito – eight days after she was reported missing on 11 September, and a long police search.

Her fiancé, Mr Laundrie, returned alone from an almost two-months long road trip with Ms Petito at the end of August. He has been accused of refusing to work with police and investigators, before going missing himself.

Authorities said on Sunday that the location where the body was found was not far from where a van belonging to Ms Petito and Mr Laundrie was filmed by two passers-by, along a dirt road near Spread Creek, Wyoming, on 27 August.

Ms Petito last posted on social media two days before, on 25 August, when she is also believed to have last contacted her family.

Police in Moab, Utah, last week released body camera footage from 12 August showing officers talking to Ms Petito and Mr Laundrie after they were called to reports of a domestic incident between the two.

In the video, Ms Petito told officers she had increasingly argued with her fiancé and that she sometimes became physical with him. No charges were filed and the two spent the following night apart, before continuing on to Wyoming.

Additional reporting by Reuters.