Exactly! An abuser needs little/no provocation to escalate to murder. It's all about control with them. IIRC, witnesses said that Brian was pissed about the incident in the Merry Piglets restaurant where she went back in and apologized for his behavior. That could have been what set him off.
Sure, that could be what set BL off. Or it could be (based on some accounts from witnesses) he was upset GP ended up paying for what was intended to be a "dine and dash" meal at what was a relatively pricey restaurant for them. Or it might not have had anything to do with their excursion to the Merry Piglets & apparent arguments there. Just because A happens before B doesn't mean A caused B. And from all accounts, the couple argued ALOT. So there were plenty of arguments that didn't lead to death.
An earlier poster made the claim that research has demonstrated DV ALWAYS leads to the victim's death. I don't think that's true at all and would still like to see some documentation for that bold claim. But when it IS true, there is still some sort of immediate trigger for the homicidal act. It may not be a rational trigger and we may knew find it, but it was still there. We don't know what the trigger was in this case except that the death happened weeks after the Moab stop. Maybe it did have to do with the Merry Piglets but we'll never know for sure.
As I posted earlier, I do not think LE or the City of Moab is responsible for Gabby's death. To me, there's no obvious connection between Gabby's death weeks later and not arresting one of them for the night and instead separating them, treating the event as a mental health crisis. Gabby did tell the officers she had a mental disorder (OCD) after all.
Personally I think the couple had a "toxic" relationship. By that I mean they tended to bring out the worst in each other. But I'm not sure
all the DV labels that have been bandied about here fit. The couple fought a lot according to a number of people who knew them-- high school friends, co-workers in FL & NC, BL's sister, GP's friend, Rose. Except for Rose, no one mentioned physical fights. (And GP's family didn't even see or hear any verbal fights apparently. And nobody in her family saw any abuse.) Yet we now know BOTH G&B may have responded in physical ways when fighting with each other on a regular basis. Moab LE didn't know any of that.
In my opinion there was a snowball's chance in the Moab desert of GP immediately changing her mind about staying with BL because of anything Moab LE did or said. But maybe as time went on, the Moab experience might have had an effect... Maybe after spending 6 days alone in a nice, clean, Marriott-owned, air-conditioned hotel (no dirty feet!) and getting her hair dyed and cut GP was starting to change her mind about continuing a cramped, uncomfortable, and dirty van life with BL. We don't know what else she did by herself in SLC but it has been reported she spent a lot of time on the phone with her parents that week, particularly her dad. Maybe when BL returned from FL she started to hint at the possibility of either a breakup or at least an earlier-than-planned end to the trip. GP said in one of their first van life videos she wanted to live a van life so she wouldn't have to work a real job. Maybe the idea of doing manual labor on a pumpkin farm in Oregon wasn't so attractive to her after all.
There's little doubt an abused partner is often at much greater risk if/when she decides to leave the relationship. Maybe things GP said-- perhaps about leaving the trip-- are what set off BL. If so, I guess one could argue Moab LE (particularly the park ranger)
might have contributed to GP's death by encouraging her to question the trajectory of her life. But it would be pretty ironic to assign blame in that way.
MOO
