Cop Involved In Gabby Petito Case Allegedly Arrested Man In 2019 Whose Wife He Had Affair With

A police officer who was investigated for his involvement in a traffic stop between Gabby Petito and Brian Laundrie before Petito’s death reportedly had a man whose wife he was sleeping with arrested due to a domestic incident.

Eric Pratt, a police officer from Moab, Utah, reportedly met a woman on Tinder and dated her for a few days–to the point where she was able to go on a ride-along with Pratt, before breaking things off once he learned that she was still married, according to Fox News.

The woman had denied to Pratt that they were married, but the man had told him that they had “been married during a commitment ceremony”. The couple has since been able to be legally separated, WFIN reported.

On Feb. 9, 2019, however, Pratt, who was “off-duty and out of town,” was called by the woman during an “emotionally charged altercation.” He reported the call to Grand County dispatchers, where the man was arrested for domestic violence charges. “I responded to a call of a welfare check due to a phone call received by MCPD Officer Pratt,” Landon Leavitt, the responding deputy, said. “While I attempted to perform the welfare check, I was advised the parties in question were at the emergency room of Moab Regional Hospital.”

The woman claimed that the man had punched her in the stomach and face, and that he had struck her in the face with an object that she wasn’t able to identify. She arrived in the hospital with a red-and-white “lump” on her right eye and “bumps” on her cheek and forehead. Despite this, she admitted that “there is more than enough reasonable doubt” regarding her account of the incident due to the fact that she did not remember it well, and the charges were dropped and ultimately expunged.

Pratt and fellow officer Daniel Robbins were found to have made “unintentional” mistakes during a traffic stop on Aug. 12, 2021 that involved Petito and Laundrie, deciding that a domestic violence incident between the two required only a “mental health break,” instead of the arrest or citation required by law.