A newspaper outlet reported that if Dog The Bounty Hunter were to find fugitive Brian Laundrie, he wouldn’t be able to arrest or detain him or he’d run the prospect of being charged with kidnapping.
That’s because Dog, whose real name is Duane Chapman, isn’t actually licenced as a bounty hunter or private investigator in Florida, or anywhere else that a newspaper outlet has found, making his hunt for Brian Laundrie potentially dicey as he’s legally banned from arresting or holding anyone against their will.
According to professional Florida bounty hunters, there’s no legal distinction between Dog or any citizen who decides to join the hunt for Brian Laundrie, whose girlfriend Gabby Petito was discovered murdered on September 19 in a secluded part of Teton County, Wyoming, and making a citizen’s arrest is verboten unless you catch the offender in the act of committing a crime.
Florida bounty hunters, whose job it is to locate and apprehend suspects who fail to show up in court, are amused that Dog, who rocketed to fame with his long-running reality show about his quest for suspects in Hawaii, joined the search.
Duane Chapman recently surrendered to the FBI what he considered evidence, including a can of Monster caffeine soda located in the state park.
He also set up his own tip line and claims to have got more than 2,000 calls from as far north as Tennessee. However, that could all be for nothing if Duane Chapman can’t even so much as touch Brian Laundrie.
Mike Harrison, vice president of the Florida Bail Bondsmen Association, said Duane Chapman could end up charged criminally himself if he were to make the mistake of grabbing Brian Laundrie.
Tallahassee area bail bondsman Mike Harrison said that would be kidnapping or false imprisonment, and Harrison said that Dog’s lack of licencing is well known in the business and originates from an old murder conviction.
In 1976, Daune Chapman was arrested for participating in a drug deal that went wrong in Texas when his accomplice shot and killed 69-year-old Jerry Oliver, and while Chapman was in the getaway vehicle and didn’t participate in the shooting, he was found guilty of first-degree murder and was sentenced to five years in state prison.
Daune Chapman said that he’s still trying to clear his name and wipe the conviction from his record, but that he’s been unable to get the proper permissions to bear arms, write bail bonds, investigate cases or even travel to countries like the United Kingdom – no surprise then that everyone makes fun of him, but I guess at this point it doesn’t matter who finds Brian Laundrie, so long as he’s found.
However, there doesn’t appear to be much evidence that Brian Laundrie killed Gabby Petito, hence the lack of warrant for homicide, but of course, trial by the media is particularly titillating, but often off the mark.
Of course, he looks guilty for running, although he could have a reason, other than killing her, or it could be possible that it was manslaughter and not murder, but of course, everyone wants to be Inspector Gadget at the moment, including the media.
And even if Brian Laundrie was found they would need either evidence or a confession, and he would be lawyered up instantly because he seems to be a particularly smart cookie, and at the moment it appears to be harder to find Brian Laundrie than it was to find Osama bin Laden.
