SALT LAKE CITY (AP) – Family members of a 22-year-old woman whose boyfriend admitted killing her last year have filed a wrongful-death lawsuit against the Moab Police Department, alleging their negligence led to her death weeks later.
The lawsuit filed Thursday is the latest development in the high-profile case surrounding the death of Gabby Petito. What began as a missing person’s case last summer has ridden a wave of true-crime obsession to become a social media sensation, attracting amateur online sleuths and the kind of global attention that can help authorities track down the missing.
Petito and her boyfriend, 23-year-old Brian Laundrie, were stopped by police in Moab, Utah, last summer but ultimately not cited for domestic violence amid signs of distress and their own accounts of a physical altercation. Petito’s body was later found on the edge of Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming after being strangled. Laundrie was the only person ever identified by law enforcement as a person of interest and was found dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound after returning alone to his parents’ home in Florida.
The contrast between the cheerful facade displayed on Petito’s widely followed Instagram account – where she chronicled her journey in a truck to tens of thousands of followers – and the darker reality of the domestic violence she was experiencing before her death captivated millions and sparked an unprecedented national conversation about dating violence. She also criticized authorities and the media for focusing attention on missing white women like Petito rather than missing and murdered indigenous and women of color.
Petito’s mother, father and other family members have tried to keep her name out of the news, hoping to honor her legacy and help ensure signs of abuse are recognized by authorities in a position to intervene, they said.
“There are laws to protect victims. And these laws were not followed. And we don’t want this to happen to anyone else,” said Nicole Schmidt, Petito’s mother, her voice shaking.
Schmidt, other family members and their team of lawyers stood in front of a photo of Petito smiling in a slot canyon at a news conference Thursday in Salt Lake City.
The wrongful-death lawsuit seeks $50 million in damages from the police department in Moab, a rural Utah town known as a gateway to national parks full of red rock canyons and mesas.
Petito’s death is blamed on city police officers who did not issue a domestic violence report after a passerby was called to report the altercation between Petito and Lundry. In doing so, the lawsuit alleges, the officers ignored signs of violence they should have been trained to observe.
The suit also alleges that the officers “directed Gabby into giving answers that the officers used to justify their decision not to enforce Utah law,” which requires steps to be taken to address incidents of domestic violence.
Moab Police Officer Eric Pratt “was fundamentally biased in his approach to the investigation, choosing to believe Gabby’s assailant, ignoring evidence that Gabby was the victim, and deliberately seeking loopholes to circumvent the requirements of Utah law and his duty to protect Gabby.”
The complaint is based on the bias of an unnamed woman referred to as “Witness 1,” who claims Pratt threatened to kill her after their relationship ended while he served as police chief in Salina, Utah, another rural town.
After the lawsuit was filed, the city of Moab said the death was tragic, but not the fault of its police department. Pratt did not return a phone call seeking comment, and the city of Moab said no city or police department officials would comment further at this time.
“Our officers acted with kindness, respect and empathy toward Ms. Petito,” city spokeswoman Lisa Adams said in a statement. “No one could have predicted the tragedy that would occur weeks later and hundreds of miles away, and the city of Moab will vigorously defend itself against this lawsuit.”
The lawsuit follows a notice of claim filed in August notifying Moab that Petito’s family intended to file for wrongful death damages. An independent investigation in January accused police of “several inadvertent errors,” including not issuing a domestic violence report after Petito told police she hit her boyfriend.
