missing Gabby Petito from Wyoming, traveled in van with bf

This.

As someone whose father died of suicide, it’s pretty disappointing to hear it described as “the pussy way out,” among other things.

I apologize. I described his death as the coward’s way out. By that I meant he avoided justice by ending his life instead of facing the music. I don’t believe he suffered mental illness. I believe he didn’t want to face a trial and imprisonment so he ended his life. I suppose you could think he was so consumed with guilt that he did it out of despair, but I think that unlikely in his case.

I do not believe that all, or even most people who die by suicide are cowards or taking a cowardly way out. In his case I think it was a calculated, risk mitigating decision. But I’m sorry if my words hurt anyone whose life has been touched by suicide.

I know there’s the thought that someone who could do those things to another person must be mentally ill. From the way he manipulated law enforcement, I think he was just a monster.

I'll just say this...

If you need to put a bunch of disclaimers about which deaths by suicide are spineless and which are sad, maybe just don't say what you were going to say.

Good question.

Also I thought, originally, the coroner couldn’t find a cause of death. Because of that the remains were sent to an anthropologist (I think that’s the name). I would have thought a gun shot would be obvious. Do we know who declared gun shot as the cause?

How a person could be diagnosed, or not, as mentally ill by strangers who aren’t psychiatrists reading articles on the internet — I used to represent people in his position, and I couldn’t do that sort of thing with my own clients with whom I spent time in person.

I don't think anyone here is intending any sort of actual diagnosis or not. No one here is a clinician and this is all just speculation.

I think what's actually occurring is a discussion of how people look at the world. I think it's a very real thing to grapple with the question of if there are monsters among us, who are neurotypical, healthy, and do these horrendous things on purpose and with full awareness and intention, or if these things can only exist where there is some diversion or disruption or variation from neurotypical orthodoxy, and if so, what is the societal response, the perpetrator's culpability, and the appropriate penalty? 

I don't have that answer. Do you?

I'm surprised he confessed in the notebook but not shocked. It was talked about while they were searching for him. What I find interesting is this, "Laundrie's father, who was searching with authorities when his son's remains were found, discovered the notebook near Laundrie's body." I've always suspected that the parents knew exactly where he was but led police on a different path. I also think they knew that their son murdered Gabby. Now if the FBI can somehow prove those things and then charge them, then I'd be shocked. Because so far the police have messed up this case from the beginning.

Why would the cops cover for him?