The final text messages sent from ‘van-life’ girl Gabby Petito’s phone to her mother have been revealed.
Forensic experts have been checking the 22-year-old’s computer hard drive for more important clues after Florida police got a court warrant to search the device, which was with Petito’s fiancé Brian Laundrie when he returned home without her on September 1.
According to reports, a cryptic last text message sent from Petito’s phone to her mother immediately set off alarm bells.
The warrant states that Petito’s mother received an ‘odd text’ from her daughter. It read: “Can you help Stan, I just keep getting his voicemails and missed calls.”
The warrant continues: “The reference to “Stan” was referring to Gabby’s grandfather. But according to her mother, Gabby never calls him “Stan”. The mother was concerned that something was wrong with her daughter.”
The document also said that this was the “last communication anyone has with the subject.
“Her cell phone was no longer operational, and she stopped posting anything on social media about their trip. Per her family, this was not normal behavior for the subject and they became more worried about her.”
Petito’s mother, Nicole Schmidt, said she received another message from her phone on August 30. It read: “No service in Yosemite.”
She immediately knew that her daughter did not send that last text and believes it was Laundrie who sent the message using Gabby’s phone to mislead them and investigators as to her whereabouts.
Petito’s computer was in her white van that was taken away by police around 10 days after Laundrie had returned to Florida.
The computer warrant application explains that Laundrie and Petito “left from New York state sometime in mid-June 2021 for a vacation in Utah, traveling a variety of National Parks along the way. While they were on their trip, they documented some of the events on a YouTube video, ‘VAN LIFE: Beginning Our Van Life Journey.’
It continued: “During the trip the subject sent multiple text messages and had many talks with her mother Nichole Schmidt … during these conversations there appeared to be more and more tension between her and Laundrie.”
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