To end their marriage, Brian Walshe killed and dismembered his wife Ana Walshe, then dumped her body parts in dumpsters, according to a Norfolk district attorney’s office prosecutor, who testified on his behalf at his arraignment on Wednesday.
“Rather than divorce, it is believed that Brian Walshe dismembered Ana Walshe and discarded her body,” prosecutor Lynn Beland said.
Prosecutors said that Brian Walshe beat his wife to death and assaulted her in their criminal complaint.
In Quincy District Court, while Walshe, 47, was being arraigned on counts of murder and unlawfully disinterring a body, Beland read aloud the accusations and the alleged motive. Since his arrest on January 8 and subsequent charge of deceiving detectives looking for his wife, he has been detained.
The 39-year-old Massachusetts mother of three, Ana Walshe, who has been missing since the start of the year, was officially declared dead by the prosecution for the first time during the hearing. They did not specify whether they had discovered her remains.
Beland presented evidence to support the allegations in court, including finding Ana Walshe’s possessions and blood in the trash and Brian Walshe’s Google searches on body dismemberment and disposal.
The prosecutor claims that Brian Walshe was seen on security footage in Abington and Swampscott throwing large bags into the trash and that cell phone records revealed that he went to a dumpster near his mother’s house in Swampscott.
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By the time police found the bags in Abington, they had been incinerated, according to Beland. A hacksaw, a hatchet, boots, a Prada pocketbook, and the Covid-19 immunization card that Ana Walshe was carrying were all found in the Swampscott trash bags later found at a collection location in Peabody, according to the prosecutor.
According to Beland, the state crime lab examined some bloodied objects in the bags and discovered DNA belonging to Ana and Brian Walshe.
Additionally, the prosecutor claims that Brian Walshe conducted a string of infamous Google searches in the days following her disappearance, including on his son’s iPad: “Ten ways to dispose of a dead body if you need to,” “dismemberment and the best ways to dispose of a body,” “can you be charged with murder without a body,” and “can you identify a body with broken teeth.”
Also, on December 27, he Googled, “What’s the best state for a man to divorce?“
In response to the horrifying accusations, Brian Walshe only shrugged his shoulders once at the arraignment. He accepted the charges during his testimony in court, and a not-guilty plea was filed on his behalf. Additionally, he has entered a not-guilty plea to the amount of deceiving investigators.
He was ordered held without bond by the judge. He will go to court again on February 9.
Tracy Miner, Brian Walshe’s defense lawyer, said in a statement that she would not comment on the case and that the evidence was not compelling.
“I will not comment on the evidence first because I will try this case in the court and not in the media. Second, I haven’t been provided with any evidence by the prosecution. In my experience, where, as here, the prosecution leaks so-called evidence to the press before they provide it to me, their case isn’t that strong,” she said.
“When they have a strong case, they give me everything as soon as possible. We shall see what they have and what evidence is admissible in court, where the case will ultimately be decided.”
How We Got Here
The arraignment follows an extensive search for Ana Walshe after her workplace reported her missing on January 4.
Since then, investigators have combed through the couple’s Cohasset house, conducted a thorough search of the neighborhood, and dug through trash bins to see what happened to her.
According to the prosecution, police discovered blood stains and a broken knife in the couple’s basement.
In addition, investigators claim Brian Walshe lied about several of his acts in the days that followed his wife’s disappearance and purposefully delayed them to hide evidence.
According to a police affidavit, he told officers that he last saw his wife the morning of January 1 when she went for a business trip to Washington, DC. The spouse said he spent January 2 with his children after the rest of the day doing errands for his mother.
Prosecutors assert that there is no proof Ana Walshe took a taxi or her normal ridesharing to the airport, boarded a flight, or arrived in Washington. In the vicinity of the couple’s house, her phone also rang overnight on January 1 into January 2.
Additionally, according to investigators, Brian Walshe failed to complete his mother’s chores on New Year’s Day. On January 2, he went to Home Depot without disclosing it, where, according to prosecutors, he spent around $450 on cleaning goods such as mops, buckets, and tarps.
According to detectives, Tishman Speyer, a real estate firm, reported Ana Walshe missing to the police on January 4. The company has contacted the husband, according to a Cohasset police log. He hasn’t said anything to the police.
According to defense lawyer Miner, Brian Walshe called his wife’s employer before they reported her missing to let them know he hadn’t heard from her.
Husband Has A Turbulent Legal History
The latest in a succession of legal issues for the husband, Brian Walshe, is accused of his wife’s disappearance.
He entered a guilty plea to three federal fraud counts in 2021 associated with a plot to market phony Andy Warhol artwork online. As he waits for sentencing, he is placed under house arrest and has to request permission to leave his home for particular reasons at specific times.
A police document claims that Walshe allegedly broke the terms of his house imprisonment by taking many unapproved travels the week after his wife vanished.
Additionally, according to a police report CNN has seen, Ana Walshe said in 2014 that someone had threatened to “murder (her) and her friend.” According to a Washington DC Metropolitan Police Department spokeswoman, Brian Walshe was the report’s subject.
The victim’s refusal to assist the prosecution led to the case’s closure, according to the police.
During a legal dispute over his father’s estate in 2019, relatives and close family acquaintances allegedly characterized Walshe as a violent and dishonest individual. According to affidavits in the lawsuit, two acquaintances of Brian Walshe’s father charged Walshe with financial wrongdoing and described him as “a sociopath.”
Pamela Bardhi, a friend and former coworker of Ana Walshe, told CNN that when she learned that police believed Ana was killed, she was simultaneously angry and relieved.
“I just had this horrible gut feeling, and I prayed I was wrong,” she said Tuesday. “I prayed that it wasn’t the case. And here we are now, finding out a few hours ago there’s a murder charge … That’s a heavy, heavy thing,”
Bardhi expressed her hope that the truth will come to light despite her fear of learning the case’s specifics.
“I think that the truth is a real double-edged sword. It’s painful to know, but it’s necessary,” she said. “I think those kids deserve to know what happened to their mother, no matter what, and her family and friends.”
According to a spokeswoman, the Massachusetts Department of Children and Families is in charge of the couple’s three kids, who range in age from 2 to 6 years old.
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