NZ Herald
  • Home
  • Latest news
  • Herald NOW
  • Video
  • New Zealand
  • Sport
  • World
  • Business
  • Entertainment
  • Podcasts
  • Quizzes
  • Opinion
  • Lifestyle
  • Travel
  • Viva
  • Weather

Subscriptions

  • Herald Premium
  • Viva Premium
  • The Listener
  • BusinessDesk

Sections

  • Latest news
  • New Zealand
    • All New Zealand
    • Crime
    • Politics
    • Education
    • Open Justice
    • Scam Update
  • Herald NOW
  • On The Up
  • World
    • All World
    • Australia
    • Asia
    • UK
    • United States
    • Middle East
    • Europe
    • Pacific
  • Business
    • All Business
    • MarketsSharesCurrencyCommoditiesStock TakesCrypto
    • Markets with Madison
    • Media Insider
    • Business analysis
    • Personal financeKiwiSaverInterest ratesTaxInvestment
    • EconomyInflationGDPOfficial cash rateEmployment
    • Small business
    • Business reportsMood of the BoardroomProject AucklandSustainable business and financeCapital markets reportAgribusiness reportInfrastructure reportDynamic business
    • Deloitte Top 200 Awards
    • CompaniesAged CareAgribusinessAirlinesBanking and financeConstructionEnergyFreight and logisticsHealthcareManufacturingMedia and MarketingRetailTelecommunicationsTourism
  • Opinion
    • All Opinion
    • Analysis
    • Editorials
    • Business analysis
    • Premium opinion
    • Letters to the editor
  • Politics
  • Sport
    • All Sport
    • OlympicsParalympics
    • RugbySuper RugbyNPCAll BlacksBlack FernsRugby sevensSchool rugby
    • CricketBlack CapsWhite Ferns
    • Racing
    • NetballSilver Ferns
    • LeagueWarriorsNRL
    • FootballWellington PhoenixAuckland FCAll WhitesFootball FernsEnglish Premier League
    • GolfNZ Open
    • MotorsportFormula 1
    • Boxing
    • UFC
    • BasketballNBABreakersTall BlacksTall Ferns
    • Tennis
    • Cycling
    • Athletics
    • SailingAmerica's CupSailGP
    • Rowing
  • Lifestyle
    • All Lifestyle
    • Viva - Food, fashion & beauty
    • Society Insider
    • Royals
    • Sex & relationships
    • Food & drinkRecipesRecipe collectionsRestaurant reviewsRestaurant bookings
    • Health & wellbeing
    • Fashion & beauty
    • Pets & animals
    • The Selection - Shop the trendsShop fashionShop beautyShop entertainmentShop giftsShop home & living
    • Milford's Investing Place
  • Entertainment
    • All Entertainment
    • TV
    • MoviesMovie reviews
    • MusicMusic reviews
    • BooksBook reviews
    • Culture
    • ReviewsBook reviewsMovie reviewsMusic reviewsRestaurant reviews
  • Travel
    • All Travel
    • News
    • New ZealandNorthlandAucklandWellingtonCanterburyOtago / QueenstownNelson-TasmanBest NZ beaches
    • International travelAustraliaPacific IslandsEuropeUKUSAAfricaAsia
    • Rail holidays
    • Cruise holidays
    • Ski holidays
    • Luxury travel
    • Adventure travel
  • Kāhu Māori news
  • Environment
    • All Environment
    • Our Green Future
  • Talanoa Pacific news
  • Property
    • All Property
    • Property Insider
    • Interest rates tracker
    • Residential property listings
    • Commercial property listings
  • Health
  • Technology
    • All Technology
    • AI
    • Social media
  • Rural
    • All Rural
    • Dairy farming
    • Sheep & beef farming
    • Horticulture
    • Animal health
    • Rural business
    • Rural life
    • Rural technology
    • Opinion
    • Audio & podcasts
  • Weather forecasts
    • All Weather forecasts
    • Kaitaia
    • Whangārei
    • Dargaville
    • Auckland
    • Thames
    • Tauranga
    • Hamilton
    • Whakatāne
    • Rotorua
    • Tokoroa
    • Te Kuiti
    • Taumaranui
    • Taupō
    • Gisborne
    • New Plymouth
    • Napier
    • Hastings
    • Dannevirke
    • Whanganui
    • Palmerston North
    • Levin
    • Paraparaumu
    • Masterton
    • Wellington
    • Motueka
    • Nelson
    • Blenheim
    • Westport
    • Reefton
    • Kaikōura
    • Greymouth
    • Hokitika
    • Christchurch
    • Ashburton
    • Timaru
    • Wānaka
    • Oamaru
    • Queenstown
    • Dunedin
    • Gore
    • Invercargill
  • Meet the journalists
  • Promotions & competitions
  • OneRoof property listings
  • Driven car news

Puzzles & Quizzes

  • Puzzles
    • All Puzzles
    • Sudoku
    • Code Cracker
    • Crosswords
    • Cryptic crossword
    • Wordsearch
  • Quizzes
    • All Quizzes
    • Morning quiz
    • Afternoon quiz
    • Sports quiz

Regions

  • Northland
    • All Northland
    • Far North
    • Kaitaia
    • Kerikeri
    • Kaikohe
    • Bay of Islands
    • Whangarei
    • Dargaville
    • Kaipara
    • Mangawhai
  • Auckland
  • Waikato
    • All Waikato
    • Hamilton
    • Coromandel & Hauraki
    • Matamata & Piako
    • Cambridge
    • Te Awamutu
    • Tokoroa & South Waikato
    • Taupō & Tūrangi
  • Bay of Plenty
    • All Bay of Plenty
    • Katikati
    • Tauranga
    • Mount Maunganui
    • Pāpāmoa
    • Te Puke
    • Whakatāne
  • Rotorua
  • Hawke's Bay
    • All Hawke's Bay
    • Napier
    • Hastings
    • Havelock North
    • Central Hawke's Bay
    • Wairoa
  • Taranaki
    • All Taranaki
    • Stratford
    • New Plymouth
    • Hāwera
  • Manawatū - Whanganui
    • All Manawatū - Whanganui
    • Whanganui
    • Palmerston North
    • Manawatū
    • Tararua
    • Horowhenua
  • Wellington
    • All Wellington
    • Kapiti
    • Wairarapa
    • Upper Hutt
    • Lower Hutt
  • Nelson & Tasman
    • All Nelson & Tasman
    • Motueka
    • Nelson
    • Tasman
  • Marlborough
  • West Coast
  • Canterbury
    • All Canterbury
    • Kaikōura
    • Christchurch
    • Ashburton
    • Timaru
  • Otago
    • All Otago
    • Oamaru
    • Dunedin
    • Balclutha
    • Alexandra
    • Queenstown
    • Wanaka
  • Southland
    • All Southland
    • Invercargill
    • Gore
    • Stewart Island
  • Gisborne

Media

  • Video
    • All Video
    • NZ news video
    • Herald NOW
    • Business news video
    • Politics news video
    • Sport video
    • World news video
    • Lifestyle video
    • Entertainment video
    • Travel video
    • Markets with Madison
    • Kea Kids news
  • Podcasts
    • All Podcasts
    • The Front Page
    • On the Tiles
    • Ask me Anything
    • The Little Things
  • Cartoons
  • Photo galleries
  • Today's Paper - E-editions
  • Photo sales
  • Classifieds

NZME Network

  • Advertise with NZME
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • BusinessDesk
  • Newstalk ZB
  • Sunlive
  • ZM
  • The Hits
  • Coast
  • Radio Hauraki
  • The Alternative Commentary Collective
  • Gold
  • Flava
  • iHeart Radio
  • Hokonui
  • Radio Wanaka
  • iHeartCountry New Zealand
  • Restaurant Hub
  • NZME Events

SubscribeSign In
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Home / World

How the case of Gabrielle Petito galvanised the internet

By Katherine Rosman
New York Times·
22 Sep, 2021 05:00 AM8 mins to read

Subscribe to listen

Access to Herald Premium articles require a Premium subscription. Subscribe now to listen.
Already a subscriber?  Sign in here

Listening to articles is free for open-access content—explore other articles or learn more about text-to-speech.
‌
Save

    Share this article

    Reminder, this is a Premium article and requires a subscription to read.

Gabrielle Petito, 22, vanished while on a cross-country trip in a converted camper van with her fiancé. Photo / AP

Gabrielle Petito, 22, vanished while on a cross-country trip in a converted camper van with her fiancé. Photo / AP

The disappearance of a 22-year-old woman sparked international interest, in large part because of the online sleuthing of amateur detectives.

Hundreds of thousands of people are reported missing in the United States every year. But it's rare for a single case to capture the public's attention — and galvanise individuals to take action — as the disappearance of Gabrielle Petito has.

In July, Petito, 22, embarked from New York on a cross-country road trip with her fiance, Brian Laundrie, 23. As they made their way out West in a white Ford van, the couple posted photos and videos of their journey on Instagram and YouTube. Then, September 1, Laundrie returned from the trip alone. Ten days later, Petito's family reported her missing.

The case has become a national sensation, in large part because of the awareness generated by people who are watching it unfold on social media. Each new development has been followed by flurries of explainer posts and videos from would-be detectives on TikTok, Instagram and Twitter, who have seen their follower counts balloon. Theories have been debated and debunked. And an influencer couple helped locate Petito's remains.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Paris Campbell, a comedian and writer, took up the case on social media early last week, when interest in the case was nascent. She first read about Petito in the Daily Mail on September 13 but hadn't seen much about the story on social media.

As a new mother, Campbell, 28, was compelled to use her platform (around 150,000 followers on TikTok at the time) to try and reunite Petito's parents with their daughter.

Her first TikTok about Petito featured a "Missing" poster she'd seen in an article about the young woman's disappearance. "Screenshot it, share this," Campbell says in the video. "This girl is actively missing."

In the days that followed, Campbell posted about 40 videos, including news updates and analyses of Petito's and Laundrie's Instagram feeds. One commenter, who identified herself as Petito's cousin, wrote that the Petito family appreciated the attention she had paid the case and hoped she would continue.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

"'Oh man, her family has seen this,' " Campbell recalled thinking. " 'I want to make sure I'm putting out accurate information and being respectful.' "

Gabby Petito was reported missing on September 11. Photo / AP
Gabby Petito was reported missing on September 11. Photo / AP

Kyle and Jenn Bethune, who have been living in a bus with their three children and four dogs for two years, travelling the country and making videos for YouTube and Instagram, were also paying attention to the story of Petito and her disappearance.

Discover more

World

Body confirmed as missing woman Gabby Petito, ruled as homicide

21 Sep 09:29 PM
World

'Love Aunt Gabby': Gabby Petito's sweet texts to missing fiance's family

21 Sep 05:00 PM
World

Gabby Petito's family claim boyfriend is 'hiding' and not missing

18 Sep 08:10 AM
World

Bodycam shows woman argued with boyfriend before she vanished

16 Sep 06:18 PM

On Saturday just before midnight, a friend contacted Jenn Bethune with the information that Petito and Laundrie may have been in Bridger-Teton National Forest at the same time as the Bethune family.

Jenn Bethune "jumped out of bed," Kyle Bethune said in an interview, and she began reviewing the video she had taken during their time in Wyoming.

The couple recalled seeing a white van and combed through their footage to see if it appeared. "Lo and behold, we saw it, clear as day," Kyle Bethune said.

Jenn Bethune called the FBI to alert them to their discovery. The person she spoke to directed her to a website to share tips about Petito. They uploaded the video there and also added it to the beginning of a video they had planned to release that morning.

"We know the power of social media," Kyle Bethune said.

The video went viral, and Jenn Bethune received a request to speak on the phone with Petito's mother, Nichole Schmidt. The two women bonded over shared loss: The day the couple found the video footage showing the van would have been the 17th birthday of Ethan Roeder, Jenn Bethune's son and Kyle Bethune's stepson who had died in a car accident on a family road trip.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

"They had a huge heart-to-heart and mama-to-mama talk," Kyle Bethune said, "and a good cry."

On Sunday, after a search that involved investigators from the National Park Service, local authorities and the FBI, human remains that matched Petito's profile were found near the van's location in the video.

Petito's father, Joseph Petito, spoke on the phone with Jenn Bethune after that. "All of this happening on Ethan's birthday, it was a very emotional night for Jenn," Kyle Bethune said. "But I know she is glad to be able to be there for them in their time of need."

Mark Lewis, writer and director of the Netflix documentary series Don't F**k With Cats, which depicted two amateur detectives who used Facebook and other sites in the 2010s to try to solve a mystery, said that "this idea of internet sleuthing and internet vigilantism" isn't new.

"From the safety of your living room, you can do amazing things in terms of detection," he said. "And many, many people are."

Haley Toumaian, a 24-year-old data analyst who lives outside of Los Angeles, is one of them. During the pandemic, she started recording a true-crime podcast called Inhuman with one of her friends.

She was drawn to Petito because of their similarities — young women, active on social media, engaged to be married — and started posting about her case on TikTok.

With virtually each new development, she has updated her followers. When she was in a car on the way to a friend's wedding this past weekend, police in Florida published a tweet that included information that debunked a rumour she had mentioned in a TikTok she posted earlier in the day.

Toumaian felt she needed to correct the record by posting a new video immediately. "It's not aesthetically pleasing," she said of the video from the car, "but I wanted to get it out there before the wedding because I wasn't going to be on the phone during the ceremony."

In addition to the social media posts, the case has been covered avidly by many national news outlets. Petito's name was mentioned dozens of times on CNN on Sunday, the day that the human remains were discovered in the Bridger-Teton National Forest in Wyoming. The New York Times published a breaking news story and a live briefing. Fox News issued multiple news alerts in recent days.

Martin G. Reynolds, an executive director of the Maynard Institute for Journalism Education, said he was struck by news outlets' disproportionate attention on missing white women, a focus that he said is compounded by competitive coverage. (At a journalism conference in 2004, PBS news anchor Gwen Ifill described this phenomenon as "the missing white woman syndrome.")

The demographics of the industry are a big factor, Reynolds said.

"Our newsrooms don't reflect the diversity of the country, and folks in editing roles are even less diverse," said Reynolds, whose organisation works with journalists of colour. "Until journalism corrects this, we are going to continue to be more and more irrelevant to the audiences that reflect the future."

Online interest in Petito's case also pushed news editors to closely track her story.

"Journalism in general tends to be reactionary, and if we see something blowing up on one of these platforms, we're going to jump all over it," Reynolds said.

Alvin Williams, a host of Affirmative Murder, a podcast that focuses on true crimes with Black and brown victims, echoed Reynolds' analysis.

"I'm incredibly glad she is getting the resources needed to help find her," Williams, 29, said, in an interview Sunday before law enforcement officials announced they had recovered a body likely to be Petito, "but there is an obvious disproportionate focus on her story," he said.

"We can play the game of, 'Oh it's because she was a vlogger' and all those things, but we can also see that she is a Gen Z, blonde, petite girl, and that is what gets the clicks," Williams added.

Reporters outside the family home of Brian Laundrie on Monday. Photo / AP
Reporters outside the family home of Brian Laundrie on Monday. Photo / AP

He noted that in Wyoming, the same state where Petito was found, 710 Indigenous people went missing between 2011 and 2020, according to a report conducted by the University of Wyoming.

"People are selective with the humanity they see in others," Williams said.

Though she agrees that true-crime storytelling has largely focused on white women, Toumaian sees something different in Petito's case. "I think people are so into it because it is happening in real time and because you can follow many of the clues yourself that Gabby and Brian left on social media," she said.

One true-crime podcast, Crime Junkie, rushed to release a special episode Sunday about the Petito case. "This isn't a regularly scheduled episode," the host, Ashley Flowers, told listeners, explaining that the show was focused for "the first time ever" on "a breaking story."

"In almost four years of doing this show I have never, I mean never, seen you guys in a frenzy like you are in now," she said. "Our emails are flooded. Our DMs are flooded."

On Monday, the episode was the fifth most popular on Spotify's podcast charts and No. 1 on Apple Podcasts.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.


Written by: Katherine Rosman
© 2021 THE NEW YORK TIMES

Save

    Share this article

    Reminder, this is a Premium article and requires a subscription to read.

Latest from World

World

'Trauma no doubt': Survivor's incredible tale after missing 12 days

12 Jul 05:11 AM
World

38 killed in deadliest day of anti-Government protests in Kenya

12 Jul 04:31 AM
World

How El Chapo's son co-operated for a reduced sentence

12 Jul 04:24 AM

From early mornings to easy living

sponsored
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Latest from World

'Trauma no doubt': Survivor's incredible tale after missing 12 days

'Trauma no doubt': Survivor's incredible tale after missing 12 days

12 Jul 05:11 AM

Her van broke down 35km off-track in dense bushland near Karroun Hill.

38 killed in deadliest day of anti-Government protests in Kenya

38 killed in deadliest day of anti-Government protests in Kenya

12 Jul 04:31 AM
How El Chapo's son co-operated for a reduced sentence

How El Chapo's son co-operated for a reduced sentence

12 Jul 04:24 AM
Trump visits Texas as flood response faces scrutiny and criticism

Trump visits Texas as flood response faces scrutiny and criticism

11 Jul 11:03 PM
Solar bat monitors uncover secrets of Auckland’s night sky
sponsored

Solar bat monitors uncover secrets of Auckland’s night sky

NZ Herald
  • About NZ Herald
  • Meet the journalists
  • Newsletters
  • Classifieds
  • Help & support
  • Contact us
  • House rules
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of use
  • Competition terms & conditions
  • Our use of AI
Subscriber Services
  • NZ Herald e-editions
  • Daily puzzles & quizzes
  • Manage your digital subscription
  • Manage your print subscription
  • Subscribe to the NZ Herald newspaper
  • Subscribe to Herald Premium
  • Gift a subscription
  • Subscriber FAQs
  • Subscription terms & conditions
  • Promotions and subscriber benefits
NZME Network
  • The New Zealand Herald
  • The Northland Age
  • The Northern Advocate
  • Waikato Herald
  • Bay of Plenty Times
  • Rotorua Daily Post
  • Hawke's Bay Today
  • Whanganui Chronicle
  • Viva
  • NZ Listener
  • Newstalk ZB
  • BusinessDesk
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • iHeart Radio
  • Restaurant Hub
NZME
  • About NZME
  • NZME careers
  • Advertise with NZME
  • Digital self-service advertising
  • Book your classified ad
  • Photo sales
  • NZME Events
  • © Copyright 2025 NZME Publishing Limited
TOP