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Missing Mass. Woman Ana Walshe’s Mom Speaks Out Amid Investigation, Husband’s Arrest
“Clearly, there must have been some problems," Ana Walshe’s mother, Milanka Ljubicic said of her daughter's relationship with Brian Walshe.
The mother of missing Massachusetts woman Ana Walshe has opened up regarding her daughter's disappearance and her son-in-law's arrest.
Cohasset Police say that Ana Walshe vanished on Jan. 1, after she was supposed to have left her home for Boston’s Logan Airport, where she’d been scheduled to fly to Washington, D.C. for a work-related emergency.
She was working in real estate, commuting to and living in Washington, D.C., per the Cohasset Anchor, while her husband, Brian Walshe, 46, stayed at home with their children.
Police initially said Walshe told them he was at home sleeping at the time his wife went missing. He was later arrested for misleading investigators related to his wife’s disappearance, prosecutors said.
Now, Ana Walshe's mother, Milanka Ljubicic, said her daughter and son-in-law had been experiencing domestic “problems” shortly before Ana vanished.
The 69-year-old Ljubicic, who lives in Belgrade, Serbia, said that her daughter had begged her on Christmas Day to come visit D.C. on Dec. 26.
"She just said, ‘Please, mama. Come tomorrow,’" Ljubicic, 69, told Fox News on Monday during an interview at her Belgrade home "Which means that, clearly, there must have been some problems."
"She texted in the evening, urging me to come the next day to Washington,” Ljubicic said. "I can’t get myself together in one day. I am 69 years old, I have to get my medications and a thousand other things."
The worried parent said she’s now ridden with guilt for not doing more.
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"And now I can’t forgive myself for not just letting things fall where they may, and just go, and whatever happens to me, happens," Ljubicic explained.
According to Ljubicic, Ana Walshe later downplayed the possible seriousness of her sudden request, suggesting that she and Brian Walshe would visit her in February instead. Her daughter last tried calling her at about midnight on New Year’s Eve, however, Ljubicic missed that and a subsequent 1:00 a.m. call.
"She called her elder sister who was also asleep," Ljubicic said. "Then she tried to call her maid-of-honor, who didn’t hear the phone because of the loud music. And now, I regret not getting the phone, because she’s disappeared."
In the early morning hours of New Years Day, authorities say Brian Walshe told investigators that Ana Walshe took a rideshare to the airport around 4:00 a.m., but investigators found that she never took a ride, nor did she appear on flight records, ABC affiliate WCVB reported.
Other records showed that Ana Walshe had booked a flight from Boston to D.C. on Jan. 3 but never caught that flight either.
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Blood and a knife were found in the basement of the Walshe property on Sunday, per CBS affiliate WBZ. Investigators were captured by Boston NBC affiliate WBTS searching trash a waste transfer facility in Peabody on Monday, after hauling dumpsters there from an apartment complex in nearby Swampscott where Brian Walshe's mother lives.
"Search activity conducted north of Boston yesterday resulted in a number of items being collected which will now be subject to processing and testing to determine if they are of evidentiary value to this investigation,” Norfolk County District Attorney spokesman David Traub told Oxygen.com in an emailed statement. “
Sources told WBTS that the items recovered on Monday included "a hacksaw, bloody materials including towels, and materials consistent with some of the items Brian Walshe allegedly purchased at Home Depot."
Court records already allege that Walshe was captured by CCTV cameras "wearing a black surgical mask, blue surgical gloves and making a cash purchase" of cleaning supplies, “including tape, mops and drop cloths” from Home Depot around the time of Ana Walshe’s disappearance.
Police began searching the Southeastern Massachusetts Resource Recovery Facility, a trash incinerator, in West Wareham in the case on Tuesday.
Brian Walshe, a convicted art fraudster, had been living on house arrest awaiting sentencing prior to his wife’s disappearance. He pleaded guilty in April 2021 to wire fraud, interstate transportation for a scheme to defraud, possession of converted goods and unlawful monetary transaction, after a 2018 arrest for selling fraudulent Warhol paintings on eBay that he'd passed off as legitimate. He used real legitimacy documents after unsuccessfully trying to sell the original paintings he'd obtained from their owner, who he ghosted after taking possession of the art.
He is also involved in a probate case related to his father's estate, according to WBTS: Friend and other family contend that Brian Walshe's father cut him out of his will over money which had gone missing, and named his cousin the executor of that estate. Brian Walshe's father's will went missing after his death.
Brian Walshe’s legal counsel, Tracey Miner, has insisted her client had been “incredibly cooperative” with investigators thus far. Oxygen.com has reached out to Miner for further comment.
Walshe remains incarcerated in $500,000 cash bail.
