“...What’s so special about her..?”
Blame the media. First of all, the media has ALWAYS pushed stories about Missing White Girls and/or Tragically Dead Little White Girls. JonBenét Ramsay for the most florid example in recent history. Compare the way that the Mainstream Media covers stories about missing and murdered little girls of any other race than white. I like to think I’m a fairly conservative person in most of my viewpoints, but that doesn’t mean that I think the left are always WRONG. Sometimes they’re right, even if for the wrong reasons, such as all the papers that have been written about the whole missing white girl bias, and the systemic racism in western media. Yes, they are 100% correct about that, and I don’t dispute it. And its that far more vulgar variety of racism that exists on the political left. That rotten-fish-stinking variety that they seem to think enough virtue signalling will cover up like expensive cologne.
The second (and lesser) reason is because Laundrie and Petito were minor online celebrities, and this whole thing became an online meme that the MSM, always late to the online party as they are, knew they had to find a way to scoop as much story out of this as they could, before the bean-feast had ended, so... “Hey! She’s a Missing White Girl!” (reporters’ eyes go wide as saucers): Oooooh! If it bleeds, it leads. NOTHING bleeds better than a missing white girl!
/sarc
/at least SOME of my bitterness.
Usually, a case reaches an end quickly - either happily or tragically - and everyone stops following the story.
Some cases are never solved. With no new details to report, eventually those cases drop from the headlines.
(Example: When Dulce Maria Alavez vanished, many people followed that story closely, but then no new details were ever found.)
Then there are cases like this one. I'll admit I wasn't paying attention to this case at first. But, it stays in the news because new information is released almost every day. The story is convoluted with twists and turns. This couple was traveling the country, so the case is not limited to one area. A double-murder happened around the time and place this couple might've been staying. The suspect refused to talk to police for a long time, and now he's disappeared. That's why so many people are following this case.