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COHASSET, MASS. (WHDH) - Neighbors of a missing Cohasset woman are eager for answers as the investigation into her disappearance continues.
Ana Walshe, 39, was last seen early New Years Day. Her husband, 46-year-old Brian Walshe, was arraigned Monday on a charge of misleading a police investigation and ordered held on $500,000 bail after prosecutors described bloody evidence being found at the family’s home.
“It’s just been crazy,” said neighbor Shannon Silvia. “We woke up one day and there was just police outside the house.”
Silvia said police searched her yard with canines., They also searched a stream and cars parked nearby.
Police say Brian told them that he went to his mother’s house in Swampscott on New Year’s Day, but that it took him longer than it should have because he got lost.
Brian also said he went to Whole Foods and CVS, but officials stated he was not seen on surveillance video at either store and that there were no receipts for the items he claimed to purchase.
According to prosecutors, Brian misled police by telling them Ana had left for the airport in an Uber or Lyft on Jan. 1 to fly to Washington D.C., where she works for a real estate agency. However, officials said there was no evidence she left the house and that her phone pinged at her home location on Jan. 2.
Additionally, prosecutors said Brian claimed the only time he left his home on Jan. 2 was to take his son for a smoothie. However, he was seen on surveillance video around 4 p.m. at a Home Depot in Rockland, where he purchased $450 worth of cleaning supplies, including mops, a bucket, and tarps.
Police later obtained a search warrant and searched the house they were renting, where they found blood in the basement and a knife with blood on it.
Walshe’s attorney told the court her client has been nothing but cooperative with authorities during the investigation over the past several days, emphasizing that Walshe has not been charged with murder.
The case is not Brian’s first run-in with the law, according to the U.S. District Attorney’s Office. In 2018, he pleaded guilty in a wire fraud case after selling two fake Andy Warhol paintings on eBay and has been on house arrest since 2021 while awaiting sentencing in federal court.
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