Bloody knife found in missing mother’s basement

() — Investigators found a bloody knife in the basement of the home Ana Walshe shared with her husband in Massachusetts. The Norfolk district attorney’s office accused her husband of misleading the police.

The alleged discovery of the knife was revealed during a Quincy District Court hearing for the woman’s husband, Brian Walshe. Ana Walshe, a mother of three, has not been seen since New Year’s Day.

Her husband said he last saw her early Jan. 1, when she took an Uber or Lyft to the airport to fly to Washington for work, according to prosecutor Lynn Beland. Her workplace reported her missing on Jan. 4 after she failed to show up for work, Beland said.

However, a police investigation found that he had not ordered an Uber or Lyft that day, that he did not make it to his flight or Washington and that his cell phone showed activity at his home later that day, Beland said.

The investigation also cast doubt on Walshe’s statements to police about his actions and movements in the first days of the new year. For example, Beland said she took her son out for ice cream on Jan. 2, but surveillance video shows she spent $450 on cleaning supplies at Home Depot that day, including mops, a bucket and tarps, according to the court. fiscal.

Police obtained a search warrant and found blood and a damaged and bloody knife in the basement of his home, Beland said.

“These various statements caused a delay in the investigation to the point that during the period in which he did not report [la desaparición de] his wife and gave various statements, that gave him time to clean up the evidence, get rid of the evidence, causing a delay,” prosecutor Lynn Beland said.

husband’s defense

A defense attorney for Brian Walshe said his wife’s employer reported her missing because he called them first to ask about her whereabouts. The lawyer also pointed out that he has given multiple interviews to the police and consented to the search of his properties.

“It’s been incredibly cooperative,” he said.

The judge set bail at $500,000 cash and set the next hearing for February 9.

On Saturday, Cohasset police and Massachusetts State Police said in a joint statement that investigators had “concluded” the ground search for Ana Walshe. The decision to suspend search efforts in the wooded area surrounding her home came after two days of searching with “negative results,” according to the statement.

The ground search will not resume unless warranted by new information, he added, although detectives “continue to carry out various investigative actions to determine the whereabouts of Ms. Walshe.”

The two-day search around Walshe’s home in Cohasset — a Massachusetts Bay town 20 miles southeast of Boston — involved 20 state troopers from a specialized search and rescue unit, three teams K-9, the State Police Air Wing and police divers, authorities said.

— Kiely Westhoff and Isa Kaufman-Geballe contributed reporting.