NEW YORK (1010 WINS) – Gabby Petito’s parents sat down with Dr. Phil in a new interview, saying they believe “coward” Brian Laundrie is alive, three weeks after he was last seen on Sept. 14. As the manhunt for Laundrie continues, his sister Cassie said she doesn't know where her 23-year-old brother is and that their parents should “come clean” if they were involved in his disappearance.
Here’s the latest:
8:15 a.m., Oct. 5: BRIAN LAUNDRIE'S SISTER URGES HIM TO 'COME FORWARD' AND THEIR PARENTS TO 'COME CLEAN'
“I do not know where Brian is,” Cassie Laundrie told ABC’s “Good Morning America” in her first sit-down interview since Gabby Petito’s remains were found in Wyoming last month.
“I really wish he had come to me first that day with the van, because I don’t think we’d be here,” she said, referring to the white Ford Transit van that Laundrie returned to Florida in without Petito back on Sept. 1.
“I worry about him. I hope he’s okay. And then I’m angry and I don’t know what to think,” his sister said. “I would tell my brother to just come forward and get us out of this horrible mess.”
Cassie also revealed the last time she saw her brother.
“The last time I physically saw and the last time I physically spoke to my brother was on (Sept. 6),” she said. “I’ve tried to get in touch with him—phone went to voicemail.”
Cassie also shared a photo of Laundrie and his 5-year-old nephew at Florida’s Fort De Soto Park, where their family camped five days before Petito was reported missing in Suffolk County on Sept. 11.
“We just went for a couple of hours, and we ate dinner and had s'mores around the campfire and left,” Cassie said of her visit to the campsite. “There was nothing peculiar about it, there was no feeling of grand goodbye, there was no nothing.”
“I’m frustrated that in hindsight I didn’t pick up on anything,” she added. “It was just a regular visit.”
Cassie said the camping trip was “not hidden from law enforcement” and that she has been “cooperating with police since day one.”
She said she doesn’t know if her parents are involved in her brother’s disappearance. (Chris and Roberta Laundrie have not been accused of a crime.)
“I think if they are, then they should come clean,” she said.
While Brian has spent days in the wilderness before, it’s unusual for him to be gone this long, Cassie said.
“I’d say Brian’s a mediocre survivalist. It wouldn’t surprise me if he could last out there a very long time, but also I don’t think anything would surprise me at this point,” she said. “If the FBI finds him in Timbuktu, I’d be like, ‘All right, well that’s where he was.’ I’ve got—I’ve got nothing.”
She said she hopes her brother is alive “because I want answers just as much as everybody else.”
Cassie also said it’s hard for her to watch the police bodycam video from Moab, Utah, that shows officers responding to a domestic incident between Petito and her brother on Aug. 12.
“It was pretty typical of them to argue and try to take space from each other, but people saying that they saw public domestic violence, I’ve never seen anything like that from either of them,” she said.
8 a.m., Oct. 5: GABBY PETITO’S FAMILY SPEAKS WITH DR. PHIL
Gabby Petito’s family spoke with Dr. Phil, saying they believe Brian Laundrie is still alive and that he may be using his outdoor experience to survive and evade capture.
All four of Petito’s parents—mom Nichole Schmidt, stepdad Jim Schmidt, dad Joseph Petito and stepmom Tara Petito—sat down with Dr. Phil for the new interview set to air on Tuesday.
Asked if they believe Laundrie is hiding somewhere, all four said they believe he is.
“I do,” Joseph Petito responded, adding that he thinks Laundrie is “a coward.”
“Flat out—I’d use some other words, but I can’t use them on your show,” Petito said. “He’s a coward.”
“Anyone that lived in that house is a coward, and they don’t know how to stand up for their actions,” Petito added, referring to the home of Laundrie’s parents, Chris and Roberta.
“Where do you think he is likely at?” Dr. Phil asked. “Is he living off the land somewhere?”
“Possibly,” Nichole Schmidt said.
“Does he have that skill set—I mean is he an environmentalist, survivalist type?” Phil asked.
“I believe he bragged about that, like that he was good at that stuff,” Schmidt said.
10:00 p.m., Oct. 4: BRIAN LAUNDRIE’S SISTER SPEAKS OUT: DOESN’T KNOW WHERE BRIAN IS, PARENTS WON’T SPEAK TO HER
Brian Laundrie’s sister, Cassie, spoke to protesters outside of her Florida home Monday, telling them she has no idea where her brother is and that their parents have stopped talking to her.
She also couldn’t definitively say whether her parents had aided Brian’s disappearance — though no evidence has so far suggested they have.
“We have been cooperative with the police since Sept. 11 when they called,” Cassie Laundrie said in the video, published by TMZ.
Laundrie also said she never knew that her brother had driven the van he and Gabby Petito used for their cross-counter trip back to Florida.
“We are just as upset, frustrated and heartbroken as everybody else,” she went on
On her parents, Cassie added: “They’re not talking to us, either.”
A videographer then asked why they had stopped communicating.
“If I knew, I would say. I don’t know,” Cassie added.
The videographer then asks if Cassie believed her parents were “involved” in Brian’s disappearance.
“I don’t know,” Cassie repeats.
8:45 p.m., Oct. 5: DOG THE BOUNTY HUNTER TELLS DR. OZ HE BELIEVES BRIAN LAUNDRIE IS STILL ALIVE
Reality star Duane Chapman, AKA Dog the Bounty Hunter, told Dr. Oz he believes Brian Laundrie is still alive and equipped with “some form” of communication in a pre-taped interview scheduled to air on The Dr. Oz Show Tuesday.
“I believe he has some form of communication, and I do not believe that Brian is deceased or dead. I believe that Brian is not well because this is some tough area out there,” Chapman said. “Let’s get him alive and let him go to trial in Wyoming and let’s get this over with. Cause if not, they might be attending another funeral.”
Chapman, who is reportedly pitching a new reality show as he searches for Laundrie, also said he found a “primitive makeshift camp” while searching for Laundrie in Florida and turned over items to authorities who are also searching for the lone person of interest in Gabby Petito’s death.
“So the investigation over the weekend, we found a primitive makeshift camp. So we collected some items around the camp and have turned them over as of yesterday to the FBI,” Chapman said.
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