Duane “Dog the Bounty Hunter” Chapman has left Florida for Colorado, amid the ongoing search for Brian Laundrie. TMZ reports that Chapman is headed home for a short time and plans to meet with his doctor about an ankle injury he sustained while on the hunt for the missing Florida man. Chapman is not quitting, however, as TMZ states that sources have said Chapman plans to return to the search very soon.
While he rests and seeks medical treatment for his ankle and other reported small injuries, Chapman will still be hard at work on the Laundrie search. Sources say that Chapman’s tip line has received somewhere around 4,000 tips about alleged Laundrie sightings. The famed bounty hunter will be sifting through those and determining if any of the tips are genuine leads.
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Laundrie was reported missing by his parents on Sept. 17, just days before the body of his fiancée, Gabby Petito, was found in Wyoming. He’d reportedly been uncooperative with authorities in her missing person case prior to going missing himself. A short time later, Chapman got involved in the search for Laundrie and has been posting social media videos of his search.
He previously shared a clip that detailed his “active and specific search in a key area,” which was “based on the intelligence we are receiving and researching.” Chapman added, “Boat crews and ground teams have been called in and we have search and rescue dogs deployed.” On Sept. 29, Chapman posted on Instagram that he and his team “discovered a campsite and fresh Monster [energy drink] can deep in the woods while searching Shell Island off the coast of Florida for” Laundrie. It was also noted that “the Monster can showed no rust or faded colors,” possibly indicating that whoever built the abandoned campsite had not been gone for long.
Speaking to The Sun, Chapman recently offered some thoughts on Laundrie, saying, “I’m thinking more and more about him being maybe a serial killer — not just a killer of Gabby.” Chapman then cited some of the “unbelievable” books that Laundrie reportedly read as being supposed evidence for Laundrie’s “demonic past” and “dark side.” Chapman explained, “A couple of the books that he’s been reading are 10 times worse than Dungeons and Dragons. This kid, Brian, has taken those books obviously to heart. And this is what happens when your kid is looking at those kinds of things.” At this time, Laundrie’s whereabouts are still unknown, but in the past few weeks there have been unconfirmed sightings reported in North Carolina.
