Holly MatkinNorth Port, FL – A homeowner living in the neighborhood where Brian Laundrie and Gabby Petito resided with Laundrie’s family for the past two years was arrested after a heated argument with protesters on Wednesday evening (video below).
Two protesters have spent the better part of the past several days using megaphones to taunt and yell at the Laundrie family in the wake of Petito’s death and Laundrie’s disappearance, according to FOX News.
News reporters and demonstrators have been focused on the home for weeks.
The protesters have been showing up in the mornings and causing a ruckus until the evening hours, according to FOX News.
But at approximately 6 p.m. on Sept. 29, tensions boiled over for one neighbor.
Video footage showed the homeowner stormed over to the male protester and pushed him away from his property, FOX News reported.
The protesters immediately threatened to call police.
“You can sit here all you want with your megaphone. I don’t care,” the homeowner warned. “But you come on my property again, I’m going to f—king beat you’re a–!”
“You’re going to prison,” the protester told him at one point.
“Good!” the angry homeowner yelled. “Don’t come on my s—t no more!
The protester warned him that the “whole world is watching.”
“You’re going to jail!” the protester declared. “You just assaulted me on camera!”
The two demonstrators followed behind the neighbor, yelling at him as he stormed off, the video showed.
“I’m pressing charges!” the protester assured him.
“I don’t give a f—k,” the homeowner retorted.
The North Port Police Department (NPPD) later responded to the scene and arrested the homeowner on a battery charge, FOX News reported.
Laundrie, 23, has been named as a person of interest in the death of Petito, his 22-year-old fiancé.
The couple set off in Petito’s converted camper van in early July to tour U.S. national parks.
Petito’s mother, Nichole Schmidt, said she last spoke with her daughter on Aug. 25.
Laundrie returned to his family’s North Port, Florida home in Petito’s van on Sept. 1, but she was not with him.
He refused to speak with police or Petito’s family about where he last saw her before he supposedly vanished while hiking in a Florida nature reserve on Sept. 14.
Petito’s body was discovered in the Bridger-Teton National Forest in Wyoming on Sept. 19.
Her death has been ruled a homicide, but her exact cause of death has not been released.
Police named Laundrie as a person of interest in Petito’s homicide, but investigators have stopped short of labeling him as a suspect.
The U.S. District Court of Wyoming issued a federal warrant for Laundrie’s arrest on Sept. 22 for use of unauthorized devices, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Denver office announced in a press release.
He has been accused of using a Capital One bank card and someone else’s personal identification number to make unauthorized charges or withdrawals exceeding $1,000, according to the Associated Press.
According to the indictment, the unauthorized use of the card occurred from approximately Aug. 30 until Sept. 1.
The name of the card owner was not listed in the indictment, the Associated Press reported.
Multiple law enforcement agencies have been searching for Laundrie in the swampy 25,000-acre Carlton Reserve for nearly two weeks.
Police have also begun searching the area around a campground where Laundrie and his parents stayed from Sept. 6 until Sept. 8, FOX News reported.
Watch the incident unfold in the video below. Warning – Obscene Language:
A fight broke out in front of the Laundries’ North Port home this evening when a neighbor accused a protester of going on his property.#GabbyPetito #BrianLaundrie
WARNING: Profanity laced clip below pic.twitter.com/3jg8ZkRkE5
— Paul Best (@KincaidBest) September 30, 2021
