A man resembling Brian Laundrie found himself handcuffed by US Marshals after someone misidentified him as the fugitive.
He was hiking the Appalachian Trail and taking a day off at a resort when he was detained. The federal agents recommended he shave his beard to avoid further complications.
Meanwhile, North Port Police reported that they found no new evidence of Mr Laundrie’s location in the Carlton Reserve on Friday. Police and FBI have been searching the 25,000-acre nature preserve – where Mr Laundrie was reportedly hiking alone – for more than a month and have employed the use of a human remains-detecting dog in their efforts. On Monday it appeared the police and FBI were scaling back their search in the swamps.
Authorities have previously said there is believed to be a 50 per cent change that Mr Laundrie is still alive.
Earlier this week, Dave Aronberg, State Attorney for Palm Beach County, has suggested that “murder charges are imminent.”
Moments after the autopsy results were revealed on Tuesday. Mr Aronberg tweeted: “Gabby Petito’s death was previously ruled a homicide.
“Today we learned that the cause of death was strangulation. This most likely means that murder charges are imminent.”
Teton County coroner Dr Brent Blue revealed that Ms Petito was killed by manual strangulation. According to Dr Blue, Ms Petito died 3-4 weeks before her body was located on 19 September. The coroner said that, under Wyoming state law, he could only release the manner and cause of death. All other details concerning the autopsy are not yet open to the public.
On Thursday, Ms Petito’s body was released to her parents, who are currently in Wyoming, after the weeks-long autopsy. Her body was then sent to a local mortuary for cremation.
