The husband of a missing Massachusetts woman, Ana Walshe, has been charged with murder and improper transport of a body after prosecutors said in court on Wednesday that he conducted internet searches on ways to dismember and dispose of a body in the hours and days after she disappeared. Brian Walshe, 47, who has already been charged with misleading investigators in the search for his wife, was arraigned in court on Wednesday.
Ana Walshe, 39, was last seen on New Year’s Day and has not been found. According to reports, her employer reported her missing a few days later. Prosecutors alleged that Brian Walshe dumped bags containing his wife’s body and other evidence in several dumpsters, including in Abington where he was captured on surveillance.
During his murder arraignment, Norfolk Assistant District Attorney Lynn Beland outlined a series of grisly Google searches allegedly conducted by Brian Walshe on his son’s iPad and on his own cellphone in the days after Ana Walshe’s disappearance. These searches included queries about disposing of a body, dismembering a body, body decomposition, how to mask the smell of a decomposing body and how to clean up blood.
“It is believed that Brian Walshe dismembered Ana Walshe and discarded her body,” Beland said in court. Prosecutors also alleged that Brian Walshe dumped bags containing his wife’s body and other evidence in several dumpsters, including in Abington where he was captured on surveillance. “He walks to the dumpster carrying garbage bag. He’s leaning. It appears to be heavy as he appears to heft it into the dumpster,” Beland said in court.
Beland added that it is believed that Ana Walshe’s remains ended up at multiple transfer stations across eastern Massachusetts, and some were destroyed or incinerated before investigators searched those sites. However, multiple plastic bags containing DNA and other evidence were located in a dumpster from Swampscott and searched at a Peabody transfer station, Beland said. “However, investigators did secure and search the dumpsters from defendant’s mother’s complex. And once again, it was searched at a transfer station in Peabody. Investigators recovered 10 trash bags,” Beland said. “Many of these items contain stains consistent with blood. In fact, a lot among the items secured were towels, rags, slippers, tape, pillows, cleaning agents, carpets, rugs.”
Beland said that Ana Walshe’s DNA was also found on a Tyvek suit that Brian Walshe was seen purchasing at a local Home Depot after her disappearance. Ana Walshe’s COVID-19 vaccination card, the clothes she was last seen wearing, a necklace she was known to wear, a hacksaw and a hatchet were also located at the site.
“On Dec. 27, the defendant Googled, ‘What’s the best state to divorce for a man.’ Rather than divorce, it is believed Brian Walshe dismembered Ana Walshe and discard her body,” Beland said.
The defense said the case will be tried and decided in court, not in the media or court of public opinion. “I am not going to comment on the evidence. First, because I am going to try this case in the court and not in the media. Second, because 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.”
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