← Clues with Morgan Absher and Kaelyn Moore
Clues with Morgan Absher and Kaelyn Moore
Ana Walshe Solved: The Home Depot Receipt That Exposed a Killer Husband
01:18:04
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A
Hi listeners. It's Carter Roy, host of True Crime Stories. I wanted to let you know that Crime House and Murder True Crime Stories are celebrating America's 250th by dropping a four part limited series on the crimes that built America. These are the crimes and cases that gave us Miranda rights, sparked criminal profiling and and a murder that built America's missing children movement. Follow Murder True Crime Stories for a new episode every Monday leading up to July 4th. Or you can binge all of them right now ad free with Crime House Plus. To join, go to crimehouseplus.com or if you're listening on Apple Podcasts, tap try free at the top of this show's page. This is Crime House.
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A girl from war torn Serbia dreams of a better life for herself and she makes it happen.
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She comes to America and works her way up, lives the American dream and rises from seemingly the bottom to the upper class. She has an Instagram perfect family and a luxurious jet setting lifestyle.
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And then on New Year's Day 2023, she vanishes and the fairy tale that was Anna Walsh's life completely unravels.
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Foreign. Hi, welcome back to Clues, where we sneak past the crime scene tape to explore the key evidence behind some of the most gripping true crime cases.
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B
As always, I'm Kaylin Moore and I'll be the one digging deeper into the timelines, the backstories and the court files released on these cases.
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C
And I'm your Internet sleuth, Morgan Abshur. I'm the one who's diving into the Reddit forums to talk about the lesser known details and pulling out the threads that just don't add up. Don't forget to share your thoughts on social want ad free listening and early access. Subscribe to Crime House plus on Apple Podcasts and make sure to go back and listen to our previous episodes wherever you get your podcasts. Now let's get into Anna Walsh's case and the clues that defined it.
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A
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Go to joinmochi.com One of this week's partners is Ello. When your day moves fast between getting everyone out the door, meal prepping, and trying to find a small moment for yourself, the products you use should make things easier, not harder. That's where Ello comes in.
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Ello makes thoughtfully designed water bottles, tumblers, and glass food storage containers that fit right into your routine.
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Their water bottles are easy to refill, easy to carry, and leak proof, so you can toss them in your bag without second guessing it. They're designed to keep up with your busy day and make staying hydrated feel a little more doable.
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And when it comes to leftovers or meal prepping, their glass food storage containers make it simple to save dinner for tomorrow or take meals on the go with secure lids that help keep everything where it should be and not in the bottom of your bag.
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Visit elloproducts.com and use code try Ello20 for 20% off your first purchase. That's e L L O P R O D U C T S.com, code TRYLO20.
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B
You want to know something interesting from last week?
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C
Yeah.
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B
We put up an Instagram poll that was like this or that and we asked you guys, the audience, do you prefer like the Reddit deep dives or the case file deep dives? And so many people said Reddit. I was actually really isn't that wild surprised. But I get it. I think like the the reason a lot of people gave was it's nice to know what other people are thinking too.
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C
Yeah.
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B
And I I've found especially in a case like this, it is interesting reading. Just kind of what everyone who's also like deep in the research with you, like what what they're saying and how they're putting pieces together and people's reactions in real time. So I just thought that was really interesting.
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C
Yeah. I love a good breakdown too. And they're so palatable and easy to follow.
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B
Yeah.
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C
Kind of. What we aim to do here is to try to make the cases easy to follow and lead you through it as the detectives are kind of going through it. It's kind of our, our mission, if you haven't caught on yet. But this case, I'm like, I need a seatbelt, like so I don't hop out of this chair because it is so insane to me.
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It's one to get very angry about. I'll say that I found doing the research, I was getting madder and madder and madder. And I want to try to keep a level head just to look at the facts. Cuz I know I feel like sometimes I do kind of get a little lost in the emotion of it because
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we get a little spicy, we get
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a little mad about stuff, which I think is fair. This stuff is infuriating to read about and how things, you know, play out. But this one especially, we're gonna get into it. We're gonna do a deep dive. I will say, when we did the episode of Mo Wilson on our botched board, we kept a couple different categories. And I wanna hear what you guys have to think about that. So we, we've been keeping botched. We also keep Sherlock, which is really fun too, to kind of give the investigators their laurels when they do really interesting things. But we also were tracking a little bit of loser behavior, which is something that's not. It's not a botch in an investigation because it's not a big mistake. But sometimes people do things where you're like, I'm just giving you a tally because that was a really stupid thing to do. And it's not illegal, but it's icky, icky, icky.
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C
Or just not morally right, but not illegal. Yeah, yeah. If there's any other categories you think that would be fun for us to track on an episode, drop it in the comments. It's interesting to keep track of some, yeah. Abnormal things from time to time.
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B
And I always like hearing what you guys are keeping on your tallies on your boards at home as you listen. And so let's get into it. Just a quick reminder, anyone who's watching this on YouTube, you'll see some pictures and videos that will help paint a picture of the case. And if you're listening, you can find all of those same assets on our socials that's Clues podcast on Instagram.
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And just a warning before we begin. This episode does contain graphic discussions of domestic violence, murder, dismemberment, financial crimes and child abuse. So please, please listen with care all
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B
right, so this case begins on January 4, 2023 in Washington D.C. where Hugh Dunleavy works as chief Security Officer for Tishman Speyer. It's a massive real estate conglomerate. They own Rockefeller center in Manhattan, the MetLife Building and other very iconic properties around the world. He was in charge of physical security, crisis management, executive protection, and also employee safety. He's getting a lot of questions about the safety of one employee in particular, and that is 39 year old Ana Walsh. She's one of the company's regional general managers working across the Washington D.C. area. And it's supposed to be her first day back in the office after the New year, but she hasn't shown up for work that day. By late morning, she's still not there. Nobody at the office has heard from her either. And Hugh knows Ana pretty well. The office is an open workspace and their desks are really close to each other. So he also knows that it's not normal for her to just skip work and not notify anyone. Which is why at 10:57am, Hugh sends Ana a text. He's just gonna check in on her. But she doesn't respond to that and the message also doesn't show as being delivered or read. Around the same time, a colleague working in HR misses a call from Ana's husband, 47 year old Brian Walsh. He's also asking about her. Brian and Ana have been juggling a part time long distance marriage ever since she took this job. They live together in Cohasset, Massachusetts, which is almost 500 miles from D.C. and they have three young sons together, age 2, 4 and 6. Ana splits time between the family home and a townhouse that she bought in D.C. so it does make sense that he would call her work if he couldn't get in touch with her. Sometime after 10:57am HR and Hugh call Brian back and he seems so upset that he's basically incoherent. Eventually he's able to explain that the last time he saw Ana was early on January 1st. That was three days ago. Brian says Ana left Cohasset early that morning to go to D.C. because she said she had a work emergency. But she didn't give him any details beyond that. And when Hugh hears Brian explain this, he knows that that's not the case. Ana hasn't been there all day and he hasn't heard of any emergencies at the properties that she manages. So Hugh tells Brian that he's going to call the police in Cohasset to report Ana missing. And Brian does the same Thing. That afternoon, officers head over to the Walsh's house to talk to Brian. He says that it's not unheard of for Ana to be out of touch with him for a few days at a time. But at this point it's been three days and that's starting to feel too long. So the police work with Verizon to ping Anna's phone and they find that the last tower it connected to was in Cohasset, less than a quarter mile from the Walsh's house. And that was on January 2nd at 3:14am, almost 24 hours after she supposedly left for Washington D.C. before we get further into this really twisty, bizarre case, let me introduce you to Ana and just go over how incredible her life was before she went missing. So Ana Yubachik was born on April 12, 1983 in Belgrade, Serbia. And she grew up with a lot of instability. Basically she was raised during the violent conflict when Bosnia and Herzegovina tried to separate. By the time that war ended in December 1995, over a hundred thousand people were dead and more than 2 million people had been displaced. It was the most violent conflict in Europe since World War II. And that was really the world that Ana grew up in. But Ana's mom taught her daughters to focus on the positive things in the world. To act with kindness and courage, even in the face of pure evil. And with these words of wisdom, Ana grew into a kind and courageous woman. She studied hard and she earned a Bachelor's degree in French and Literature from the University of Belgrade in 2005. That's when 22 year old Ana immigrated to the United States and got a job cleaning hotel's room in Virginia near Washington D.C. and within a year she moved up into a server position. By 2008 she was working as a reservations manager for a hotel in Massachusetts. And at some point in her early days in the United States, Ana married a hotel chef named Mark Knipp. They were still married in 2008 when 25 year old Ana fell for someone else. That was 33 year old Brian Walsh. Now, Brian was the son of a prominent neurosurgeon, but his own career path was a little bit less defined than that. He'd been an entrepreneur, an aspiring restaurateur, an art dealer, kind of a jack of all trades. And he always seemed to be making a good living doing those things. He loved treating Ana to fine dining, exotic vacations and very expensive wine. Ana said it was love at first sight, at least for her. But there was one problem, and that was that she was still married to her first husband, Mark. In 2010, she and Mark returned to the Washington, D.C. area for a hotel management job while Brian was still in Massachusetts. She and Brian kept in touch, though, and eventually started having an emotional long distance relationship. Although at the end of the day, it does seem like she chose Brian, because in 2014, Ana, who is then 31 years old, officially divorced Mark. And the next year she moved to Boston to make things official with Brian. She got a job as an office director at the Intercontinental Hotel there. And then Brian proposed and the two got married on December 21, 2015. And according to one wedding guest, there was something strange about the ceremony when they got married, and that's that not one member of the groom's family showed up. Even though his parents were alive and they lived locally. No one came.
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It's a bit odd.
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It's very strange. Afterwards, Ana moved in with Brian and his mom to her five story Boston brownstone, where they got their own place. It was a bit of a step down. It was a modest rental house in Cohasset, about 26 miles outside of Boston. But they had their own space and they could focus on their family. The Walshes welcomed their first son seven months after their wedding in July of 2016. And two more baby boys followed in 2018 and 2020. And motherhood seemed to inspire Ana to aim even higher in her career. Her goal was to run a Fortune 500 company one day. That's no small feat. She transitioned from hotel management into real estate, initially working as director of operations at the Mutlu Group in Boston. Her boss was this guy named Jem Mutlu, who Brian had met in a leadership training program. He had become a close friend and one of Ana's biggest supporters in her career. So it didn't affect their friendship. When Ana left Jem's company in February 2022 for a better job as a regional general manager at Tishman Spire. They had made her an offer that she could not refuse. It was a base salary of $220,000 a year, plus performance bonuses. I mean, I read reports of like $300,000 total a year.
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Oh, yeah. And you know, she's gonna hit the performance bonuses. I mean, look at her. She's so career driven.
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Crushing it at work. Only catch, though, was that she had to work out of the DC offices, which meant a lot of time away from her kids.
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Yeah, and that's the tough part too. And everyone that talks about Anna says she was the best mom.
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Yeah.
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So to take that sacrifice and make that choice had to have been tough for her. But like she knew she was so driven and had such big goals, she was going to do whatever it took.
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Yeah, she's doing what was best for her family. She hoped that Brian and their three boys would actually be able to move to D.C. soon to join her, especially because at the time Brian was unemployed. But she was still dealing with a nearly 500 mile commute on January 1, 2023 when all of a sudden she vanished out of nowhere. And it didn't take long for the investigation to start revealing that there was a dark side to Ana's American dream come true.
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Foreign.
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Yes, over 1 million people have found care with Alma. Get started now at helloalma.com clues that's helloalma.com clue s
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A
hi listeners. It's Carter Roy, host of Murder True Crime Stories. I wanted to let you know that Crime House plus and Murder True Crime Stories are celebrating America's 250th by dropping a four part limited series on the crimes that bill America. These are the crimes and cases that gave us Miranda rights, sparked criminal profiling and a murder that built America's missing children movement. Follow Murder True Crime Stories for a new episode every Monday leading up to July 4th. Or you can binge all of them right now ad free with Crime House Plus. To join, go to crimehouseplus.com or if you're listening on Apple Podcasts tap, try free at the top of this show's page.
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B
This episode is brought to you by Zazzle. We have a lot of holidays coming up. I feel like we just had mother's Day. Father's Day is coming up and it can be really hard to find a gift that feels personal for your loved ones. Not a gift card, not something off of a shelf, something that says you actually thought about the person. And that's why I'm excited to talk to you about Zazzle today. Zazzle is a custom marketplace where you can take basically any product like a mug, a tote bag, a card, or a phone case, and you can make it mean something. You're not buying a gift, you're making one. You can browse millions of designs, or you can start from scratch and build something that's completely your own, something that really is meaningful to the person you're giving the gift to. Either way, you're the designer. This has been a great thing that I've been using recently because I just had a baby. So my dad is now a grandpa, my mom's a grandma, my husband is a dad. I get to make all these fun gifts for people that I wasn't giving them a year ago. They also have onesies and bibs and other cute little things that I can make for my baby, which I love right now. Save 25% on your first order at Zazzle. Com. That's 25% savings on your first order@zazzle.com. go make something zamazing zazzle.com now. On January 4, 2023, 39 year old Anna Walsh was reported missing three days after she was last seen alive. Ana's Instagram account made it seem like she and her 47 year old husband Brian were living the dream. They looked madly in love, obsessed with their sons. They were always taking these tropical vacations and dining out at Michelin star restaurants. But when the police arrived to speak with Brian about his wife's disappearance, they knew that that wasn't really the whole story. It was not all that it seemed on Instagram. Because what we haven't told you yet is that Brian was actually on house arrest when Ana disappeared.
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C
Yeah, there's a reason he was unemployed.
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B
See, at the time he was awaiting sentencing on federal charges for an art scam that he was running.
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C
And this is where it gets so wild for me about how he manipulated this and this whole breakdown of this scam.
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Basically a quick breakdown on what Brian was doing because it's kind of important to the story and it's also just weird and interesting. But Brian had visited a college friend who was living in Korea in 2011, and his family had this extensive art collection that they wanted to sell. It's a little unclear, but Brian basically tells him when he sees his art collection, hey, you should let me take some of these pieces back to the United States and I'm gonna auction them for you and we're gonna make a lot of money.
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C
Oh yeah. He had to badger. I did not want to get rid of these paintings at all. He's like, no, I like them. But he basically showed up there just to get two paintings and then started taking other stuff.
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So Brian gets back to the United States and decides that he's going to bring these to auction and try to sell them. But it's pretty unsuccessful because when he starts doing this, basically there's high end galleries out there that had doubts about their authenticity.
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C
Yeah. And he's trying to sell Andy Warhol paintings, which the Andy Warhol foundation authenticates all of these and provides a stamp.
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B
So he was just provenance.
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C
Yeah, he wasn't going about this in the right way and was giving sus vibes to all of these dealers.
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B
So it starts getting pretty sus. So Brian decides he's gonna try something new in order to sell these paintings. He's gonna try to sell them on ebay, not at auction. But in a confusing twist of events, he actually hires a forger to make copies of the Warhol paintings. And that's what he, he, he makes a listing on ebay with the, the actual authentic Warhol paintings.
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Yeah. Cause he had access to them.
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But what he's actually planning on selling is the forgeries.
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C
Yeah. When you guys see the side by side of the real Warhol and the fake that he was trying to pass off, it is insane. And this art dealer that he was trying to pull this over on, he's this American buyer and he has the largest gallery owned Warhol collection in the world. So this guy literally said he was genius. He almost got me.
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Yeah.
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C
Because what he did, he was sending all those ebay pictures, all of the proof of authenticity.
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B
Yeah.
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And then the guy was like, okay, cool, I'm gonna bring a cashier's check. I'll meet you in a hotel lobby. Sending my assistant though, because I don't have the time. And Brian had covered the back where the stamp would have been located. And the guy was like, I've seen everything. It's probably real. We're good. We'll check tomorrow because we've got a little return policy in our contract.
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Yeah.
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So we'll have no issue. And assistant gives him the check, checks the paintings the next day. It's a fake. They're fake. And of course, what does Brian start do? He starts ghosting the guy.
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B
Yes.
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Not getting that money back.
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B
And he also ghosted his friend in Korea too. Right. He didn't give the paintings back to the actual family.
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C
He took them from a bunch of mutuals from college. Had to reach out to Brian to be like, hey, what are you doing to the other friend? Like, where are these paintings?
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B
Do we market on loser behavior?
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C
Absolutely.
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B
Now, the FBI was pretty sure that Brian had defrauded at least four victims. That was his old friend, two online buyers, and also his family dentist who bought a different forged painting from him. Now, Brian used the money that he made during the scam to fund his own lifestyle. That included paying off credit card debt that he'd run up through his lavish spending. Prosecutors also alleged that Anna received $115,000 of Brian's art fraud proceeds. But they didn't accuse Anna of knowingly benefiting from his crimes. There wasn't a lot of evidence that Anna knew exactly what was going on. They placed the blame on Brian for transferring money to his wife in a way that was supposed to hide the gains. Of course, she did find out by April 2021, when Brian pleaded guilty to wire fraud, interstate transportation for a scheme to defraud, possession of converted goods, and unlawful monetary transaction. When Ana took her job in D.C. she expected Brian to be sentenced within a few months. It seemed like his guilty plea would actually allow him to avoid jail time. The Walshes asked the judge for leniency due to Brian's status as the primary caregiver to their three children. And with Anna working out of state, they thought that the judge would be sympathetic. Yeah, Brian hoped to either be sentenced to probation and restitution or that he would remain under home confinement with permission to leave the house for things like picking up the kids from school, like he was doing currently. Once he was sentenced, the family could try and get permission from the court for him to move to D.C. with the kids. But in June of 2022, four months into Ana's new work arrangement, the sentencing process hit a major snag. Prosecutors accused Brian of hiding hundreds of thousands of dollars from the government while he still owed his victims. The government asked the judge to consider this a violation of the terms of Brian's pre sentencing release, which would mean putting him behind bars. But that legal process was still playing out as of January 4, 2023, when police first interviewed Brian about his missing wife.
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C
That was super important because it gave the police some leverage that they wouldn't normally have this early on in an investigation, detectives usually have to tread pretty lightly in those initial interviews because if they don't have enough evidence for a warrant, the person they're interviewing can just choose to stop talking. I mean, we talked about this in the Mo Wilson case of Caitlyn and just asking for a lawyer right away. Yeah, those are your rights. Know your rights. By the way, everyone. But in Brian's case, they could push him pretty hard on one specific topic. Any of his movements outside of the house since he was under that house arrest. And his response is our first clue. As we said, Brian was supposed to be staying at home unless he'd received prior approval for any travel. He was actually even wearing a location monitoring device. Any deviation from his approved schedule could get him sent back to jail. But here is what Brian told police on Saturday, December 31, 2022. He and Ana spent the evening at their home with her old boss and her close friend Jem Mutlu. That part of the story was super easy to confirm. Jem's story did match Brian's. Jem said that they were all together from 8:30pm until about 1:30am on Sunday, January 1, 2023. And Jem didn't notice anything unusual about Anna or Brian that night. No domestic issues, no strife. However, the next morning, Brian told police that Anna suddenly left the house around 6 or 7am while he was still in bed, saying that she needed to return to D.C. for some sort of work emergency. According to Brian, after Ana left, he got up, made the kids breakfast, and stayed home until about 3pm From 3 to 9, Brian had received permission to drive his mother home to Swamscott, Massachusetts, which is about 40 miles away. Apparently, she'd been staying at Brian and Ana's place while recovering from cataract surgery. But here's where things start to get a little fishy. Brian said that his mom had actually recovered sooner than expected, so she left a few days before that on her own. Instead, he used that permitted time that he had already asked for and gotten approved from 3 to 9pm to run errands for her instead. Detectives wanted to confirm that by checking his cell phone location history. But there was a problem with this. Brian said that he didn't bring his phone with him that day. He said one of the kids must have taken it, he couldn't find it and so he left home without it. And because then Brian had to drive to his mom's condo without his phone, he ended up taking a lot longer because he got lost.
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B
Interesting.
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C
I know my husband was listening to that part, as we were researching, he's like, he couldn't find his way to his mom's house.
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B
Yeah.
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C
Really?
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B
I saw someone actually in our comments was like, because we've covered so many cases where criminals will bring phones with them and you can just track their. So they're like, I'm waiting for a time where someone doesn't bring their phone with them. And like, you got it.
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C
Brian did not.
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B
Brian did not have his phone.
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C
Once he finally got unlost and arrived at his mom's place around 5:30pm, Brian said he left to go get groceries at Whole Foods and cleaning supplies at cvs. Then he spent some time with his mom at her place before returning home around 8pm Also, side note, you have three young kids at home and you're leaving home without your phone.
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B
What are they, like two, four and six babies? Oh, my gosh. Babies. A six year old cannot watch a two year old.
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C
No, there was a nanny. But how's the nanny supposed to call you if something goes wrong?
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B
I know. If you don't have your phone. I can't even like take the dog out to go to the bathroom without having my phone just because I'm so paranoid something will happen in my house. Yeah. So I can't imagine leaving the house without a phone.
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C
No.
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B
3 young kids at home.
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C
And Brian didn't really seem super worried about it. He actually said he couldn't find his phone until Monday, January 2, by which point Ana had been out of touch with her family for a full day. Basically, detectives are hearing a lot of stuff that's just really odd and they're not liking it. I mean, how do you just happen to lose your phone the day of your wife's disappearance, which happened to be the same day. He used his leave for a purpose other than what it was actually approved for. And it somehow took him two and a half hours to drive only 40 miles. Even with getting lost.
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B
Either you have early onset dementia because these are all symptoms of that, or something is really fishy.
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C
It's all starting to look a little too coincidental to investigators. One of which is actually Detective Proctor, which, if you watched our episode on John o' Keefe and the Karen Reed trial, he was a very important player in that. But don't worry, we're going to get into it very soon.
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B
So Brian was definitely a person of interest. But in the meantime, police are still trying to find Ana. That's at the center of this is Ana is still missing.
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C
Where is she?
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B
The day after receiving the missing persons report, January 5th. Police announced her disappearance and asked the public for tips. With Brian's permission, they searched the area around their home, including the surrounding woods. A police dog named Einstein sniffed the exterior of the house and the surrounding area for about 25 minutes, but he didn't find a scent trail. With this being a voluntary search, officers couldn't look as extensively as they could if they had a warrant. Ultimately, the searches turned up no new evidence, which is why the Cohasset police got in touch with DC's Metropolitan Police Department, the MPD. And it turns out they had some pretty troubling news to share.
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C
The MPD checked their records for any information about Ana, and they actually found an old report. Which leads us to our second clue. Red flags in Ana and Brian's marriage. Seven and a half years earlier. On August 2, 2014, Ana called the MPD to say that her boyfriend, who lived in Boston, had threatened to kill her and a friend of hers. Ana was divorcing her first husband, Mark, at the time and was dating Brian long distance. He lived in Boston. The report had to have been about him.
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B
Yeah, I mean, that's something like. The report doesn't name who it was, but boyfriend lives in Boston. We can assume.
- [30:02]
C
There's no other mentions of her dating anyone else. Yeah, so two plus two. But the MPD later dropped their investigation when Ana refused to cooperate, which we see time and time again in domestic violence cases and things like this. Like, I mean, it takes, on average, seven attempts to leave. It's hard. Ana's best friend in Washington, D.C. elisa Kirby, also had something to say. She told police that she last spoke to Anna on December 29, three days before she went missing. At that time, Elisa said Ana seemed mentally and physically exhausted, that she was kind of at a breaking point in her marriage. Actually, according to her, Ana was tired of living in limbo while waiting for her husband to be sentenced for this art fraud. Ana wanted Brian to get his legal problems resolved as soon as possible, even if it meant going to jail. Like, she was just tired of this storm cloud hanging over their head. Jem, her friend and former boss, also said he got a call from Anna on December 29th complaining about her marriage, although Jem got the impression that she still loved Brian and they would work things out. But it's kind of becoming clear to investigators there were serious problems in this relationship, and their differences were likely coming to a head right before Ana disappeared. And that wasn't the only news the Massachusetts police received from dc. Shortly after Anna was reported missing, Brian gave The DC Police permission to actually break into her townhouse there, which they did with Hugh, which, again, was that chief security officer from her work, kind of a friend. Meanwhile, some of Ana's other co workers called around to the local hospitals looking for her and went to the properties. She managed to ask if anyone had seen her. None of them found Ana, but they did find our third clue. Evidence that Ana was not in D.C. for starters, Ana had a flight booked to D.C. for January 3, two days after she was last seen. She never got on that flight. Plus, there were other signs when investigators checked her townhouse that she hadn't been there in a while. There was a wet package on the porch, even though it hadn't rained since days before she disappeared. So, like, if she would have gone there, she would have taken it inside?
- [32:22]
B
Likely, yeah.
- [32:23]
C
On top of that, Ana had left her car at one of the buildings she managed. She parked it back there on December 30th before flying to Massachusetts to celebrate New Year's Eve with her family, and it hadn't moved since. That meant that Ana couldn't have driven back from Cohasset to D.C. and police weren't finding any evidence of an earlier flight or anything on rideshare apps. Because the other question was, how did Anna get to the airport if Brian was upstairs sleeping?
- [32:50]
B
Right?
- [32:51]
C
Well, she would have taken an Uber or a lift, he said. There was nothing on either of those apps that said she left the house via them. Her employer was also able to confirm that Ana hadn't used her work email or her corporate credit card since she had left D.C. on December 30th. There's no activity on her personal credit cards or any of her five bank accounts. this point, it seemed extremely unlikely that Ana had left the house on her
- [33:20]
B
own Accord on January 6, 2023. That's five days after Ana was last seen. Police searched the area around her house more thoroughly. The Cohasset police worked with the Massachusetts State Police to launch a massive search effort involving members of a specialized search and Rescue Unit, three K9 teams, multiple aircraft, and rescue divers who searched bodies of water near Anna's Massachusetts home. And the following day, January 7, the police called it off. After working around the clock for the past two days. There was absolutely no sign of her either alive or deceased. And I see you marking something.
- [33:58]
C
I'm getting ready for my Sherlock section.
- [34:01]
B
They also announced that a new search wouldn't resume unless there was new evidence that emerged. Behind the scenes, though, police did have theories as to what happened to Anna. So the same day they called off the search. On January 7, investigators drove up to Swampscott near Brian's mother's condo to confirm his movements from January 1st. Remember, Brian said that he went two places for his mom that day. Whole Foods and CVS. But after hours and hours of watching surveillance footage, they didn't see Brian at either store.
- [34:34]
C
Nope.
- [34:34]
B
That by itself was enough to arrest him. Not because of Ana, but for obstructing the investigation and also violating the conditions of his house arrest.
- [34:44]
C
Yeah, he's lying to investigators, going against his conditions.
- [34:48]
B
Yeah, and you're. You're on house arrest, dude. Like, you're. You still shouldn't be doing that. Technically, no.
- [34:54]
C
So one Sherlock for verifying the footage, because we don't, you know, sometimes for doing the verification, slip through the cracks.
- [35:03]
B
That is true.
- [35:04]
C
But before they could get a warrant, one of the Cohasset detectives got something totally unexpected. A bizarre email, which is our fourth clue. It came from the address Richard Walker, 9984 mail.com and it read, quote, we have the so named Anna Walsh with us here. We had a deal worth 127,000. She messed up. We have her here with us, and if she doesn't pay the money, then she'll never be back. And we know that the police and the FBI are involved. Good luck finding us. End quote. The note was immediately flagged as suspicious because it was missing two things. Any real ransom note would have had a due date and a way to pay.
- [35:50]
B
And that's something that comes up in a couple cases we've covered. And I know on hard to responding too, it's come up where if someone is writing you a note kind of suggesting they want money, they will put a way for you to pay them and the amount that they want. And if they don't include that, it's usually a bad sign.
- [36:07]
C
My blood just ran cold.
- [36:09]
B
I know, because it's like if they're not. I mean, it's kind of the thing with like, Nancy Guthrie, unfortunately. It's like if they're not trying to get money so that they can do the handoff with you, then it's not really looking good for the victim being alive.
- [36:23]
C
And increased contact just ups their risk. So it's like, yeah, it's usually send it in the note one and done.
- [36:30]
B
100%. Exactly.
- [36:32]
C
So at this point, detectives decided not to take it very seriously. But police were still narrowly focused on one person of interest, Brian Walsh, and they were about to get more evidence against him. Police had actually spoken to Brian and his lawyer about expanding their digital search. So Brian voluntarily handed over his cell phone and two iPads, mostly used by the kids. The police downloaded the data from those devices, which is our fifth clue. Police didn't find anything too suspicious on Brian's phone, but when they got to the data dump from his son's iPad mini, they hit the jackpot. It seems that Brian didn't realize that his iPhone was syncing to his son's iPad and other devices he may have had because he was using the same Apple id. So through all of this data dump, detectives were able to retrieve a history of every time Brian's cell phone was unlocked with a password. Back on January 1st, when Brian said his phone was missing after one of the kids maybe lost it in the house, his password was entered to unlock his phone four times that day between 12:39am and 11:24am they could also see that the phone was plugged into the charger that morning. So not missing at all right where you left it. And that wasn't the worst part of the data dump. Brian's Google search history had also synced to the iPad. And the things in this search history are absolutely horrifying. This next section, you guys, is a bit heavy, so if you need to skip, please do so now. Here are just a few searches from January 1, the day Ana went missing at 4:55am how long before a body starts to smell? 4:58am how to stop a body from decomposing. 5:20am how to embalm a body. 5:47am 10 ways to dispose of a dead body if you really needed to.
- [38:34]
B
That one always gets me because it's like, were you hoping there was a buzzfeed article on it? What? What kind of listicle exists on the Internet? 10 Ways to Dispose of a dead body.
- [38:42]
C
I talked about this with Justin and we were like, if you start entering these specific horrible things one after another, your computer should ping to the FBI somewhere. Yeah, like, this is insane. And it just keeps getting worse because at 6:25am how long for someone to be missing to inheritance? 9:59am can identification be made on partial human remains? 10:29am I am a user on my wife's credit card and she is missing. Can I use it? 11:34am Dismemberment and the best ways to dispose of a body. 12:48pm how to use hydrogen peroxide on blood stains. 1:21pm Is it better to throw away crime scene clothes or wash them? Investigators are able to narrow down that he had never searched for information about disposing of a body before 4:37am on January 1, 2023.
- [39:50]
B
So with this kind of search history, it was very easy for the police to get a search warrant for the Walsh's Cohasset home, which they executed on January 8th. They ended up taking 21 items into evidence, including a lot of hydrogen peroxide, which is in those Google searches pertaining to cleaning blood. And, you know, it was clear that he was trying to clean up the blood using that hydrogen peroxide. But he appeared to not have done the best job because police found, photographed, and swabbed blood stains in the couple's basement. They also took a roll of clear plastic, two chef's knives, one of which was partially broken and bloody, four shopping receipts, a utility knife, a trash bag, and a bunch of hand towels, amongst other things. After bagging and tagging, the police arrested Brian. They marched Brian out of the house in handcuffs in front of local news cameras. But they still weren't charging him with murder or any other crime against Anna, mainly because they didn't need to. Yet under Massachusetts law, misleading investigators by intentionally lying is a criminal offense. So that is the charge that they went with, at least for now. So the judge set Brian's bail at $500,000 in cash, or a $5 million bond, which Brian could not pay. So Brian would remain in custody while police continued gathering evidence against him as much as they could for murder.
- [41:09]
C
What detectives really were hoping to find was Ana's body to give her loved ones some closure, to help actually prove without any doubt that Brian was guilty of murder. Thankfully, one of Brian's iPhones helped them figure out where to look next. When a digital analyst with the Massachusetts state police got his hands on Brian's devices, he confirmed that Brian's phone didn't go anywhere on January 1st like he said. But his backup phone did. It was an iPhone SE, which was registered to Brian's mom and mostly used by his oldest son. It was at Brian's mom's condo at Swampscott at 5:07pm which mostly aligned with his story. But at 5:41pm iPhone SE showed up at a Lowe's in Danvers, Massachusetts, about 10 miles away from the condo. So this little shopping trip is our sixth clue. Investigators were able to find surveillance video of Brian shopping at Lowe's around that time, and they even had the receipt for it. It was one of the four that they actually seized while searching his house. Brian spent $463 in cash on cleaning supplies. Five gallon buckets, Terry cloth towels, a hacksaw, trash bags, and a full coverage suit similar to a Hazmat suit. Then at 6:24pm, the iPhone SE was in the parking lot of a CVS in the town of Danvers. This was a different CVS from the one he initially told police that he visited though. So police followed up with the Danvers CVS and they found more surveillance video, this time of Brian buying 13 bottles of hydrogen peroxide. Again, this is all in cash. At 6:53pm, the iPhone SE went to a stop and shop back in Swampscott. Surveillance video there has Brian using cash to buy three bottles of ammonia.
- [43:09]
B
I'm actually gonna mark this on Sherlock because just the speed in which they're like linking the iPhone to the locations, getting the footage, confirming link the iPhone to the location footage confirmed like that. It's all happening there pretty quickly, fast.
- [43:23]
C
And I've heard of cases where they miss a second backup phone, they miss the secret phone.
- [43:27]
B
Yeah, right.
- [43:28]
C
And this was in his mom's name. Like, this would have been so easy to miss. And for them to find all of this and then find the surveillance videos before it gets deleted or wiped over.
- [43:40]
B
Yeah, moving fast.
- [43:41]
C
Yeah, moving fast. We've got three marks on Sherlock so far. They're. They're on it. By 8:31pm, the iPhone was back in Cohasset at the Walsh's residence. The next day, January 2, the iPhone went with Brian to a TJ Maxx slash home goods store, where he bought three rugs and scented candles. Brian did have approved leave at this time, but only to take the kids to school. Except there was no school on Monday, January 2nd. Brian initially told detectives he used his leave that day to take his son for a smoothie, which they were able to confirm. But he didn't mention shopping for rugs at home Goods. After that, it appears Brian switched back to his own phone, which he claimed he found under his son's pillow that afternoon. Over the next three days, all before Anna was reported missing on January 4, Brian's cell phone history showed him visiting several more locations, again, all in violation of his house arrest. He went to Home Depot, where he's shown on surveillance buying another $450 worth of cleaning supplies, including a bunch of baking soda. This dovetailed with another Google search found on the iPad mini from January 3rd. He googled this quote, can baking soda mask or make a body smell good? He also visited a different stop and shop, Walgreens home goods. Again, another Lowe's where he bought Squeegees and a trash can. But the surveillance video from that second Lowe's visit is just blood curdling. When you guys see it, I want to know what you think in the comments, please. Because it looks like Brian looks directly in the camera of the self checkout and takes an opportunity to fix his hair while flashing the camera a big grin.
- [45:27]
B
I'm gonna mark that on loser behavior because I can't tell. It almost feels like he's making a little inside joke with himself. Like, oh, I'm on camera buying these cleaning supplies. I know what I've done and no one's gonna catch me. So he's like smiling or he's like, really not even. I can't tell if he's just so dumb he's not even thinking about the fact that he's being tracked right now.
- [45:49]
C
I have no words. All of my thoughts fell out of my head because I can't rationalize a reason to smile at the camera buying all these cleaning supplies.
- [46:00]
B
I know.
- [46:01]
C
It's like, again, you're wife is missing.
- [46:04]
B
Yeah. He's not even trying to make it look like he's concerned at all.
- [46:07]
C
No. And I mean, these shopping trips were damning enough on their own, but soon police would find even more video evidence and it would reveal the reason they hadn't been able to find Anna's body.
- [46:26]
B
This episode is brought to you by Zenni Optical. Maybe you're like me and you forget your glasses a lot of the time, so you like to keep a pair everywhere. I feel like I have a pair of glasses in my car. I have a pair of glasses in my bathroom, in my bedside table. I keep one in my bag all the time. I like to have them everywhere because I never want to be caught somewhere where I can't see. And that's why I'm excited to talk to you about Zenni today. Zenni is an online eyewear shop. Think prescription glasses, sunglasses, blue light lenses, if that's what you're looking for. And Zenni starts at under $30. You can go to zenni.com, pick a frame, upload your prescription, and they ship it right to your door. No appointment, no store, no upsell at the counter. I know how hard it can be to actually get to the doctor's office to order glasses and do the whole process. Zenni makes it so easy. And also they have over 150,000 five star reviews. And if you've never bought glasses online before, Zenni has a virtual try on so you can see exactly how the frame looks on your face before you ever commit. If your glasses are overdue for a refresh, now is the time. Go to zenni.com podcast and use code podcast15 for 15 off your first order. The styles sell out, so don't sit on it. That's Z-E-N-N-I.com podcast promo code podcast15.
- [47:43]
C
Another one of this week's partners is Solace. Navigating the healthcare system can be impossible. Impossible to do it on your own. What if your claims denied? What if you're not feeling heard by your care team? What if you're dealing with caregiver burnout? That is where solace comes in.
- [48:00]
B
Solace matches you with a dedicated advocate. Experts who take on the hardest parts of your health care. They find doctors, get insurance to cover your care, keep your doctors on the same page, and work with you one on one for as long as it takes to get the care you need.
- [48:14]
C
There's studies that show that 98% of patients feel more in control of their career after working with an advocate.
- [48:20]
B
And this is something that I'm seeing play out in real time right now. I have. You know, my grandmother has Alzheimer's. It's so hard to watch her go through the medical system without an advocate because she forgets everything her doctors tell her. Like, it's so amazing when you can have someone who's actually paying attention with you and helping you throughout this entire process.
- [48:38]
C
It's incredible. And some of Solace advocates are registered nurses or other healthcare professionals with an average of 16 years of experience.
- [48:47]
B
Go to Solishealth.com to see if you qualify. It takes about two minutes and it's covered by insurance. That's Solish. Health.com must be 18 or older. Advocates do not provide medical or legal advice.
- [48:58]
A
Hi, my name is Lloyd Lockridge and I'm the host of a new podcast from Odyssey called Family Lore. In this podcast, I'm going to have people on to tell unusual and sometimes far fetched stories about their family.
- [49:10]
C
I've heard my whole life that she invented the margarita.
- [49:12]
A
And then we're going to investigate those stories and find out how much of it is true. He gets a patent one month before the Wright brothers.
- [49:19]
C
Oh my God.
- [49:20]
A
Please follow and listen to Family Lore, an Odyssey podcast, available now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your shows.
- [49:29]
C
So on January 8, 2023, detectives arrest Brian Walsh for misleading investigators about the disappearance of his wife, Ana Walsh. They're able to gather all of this location data from his devices they were able to seize. And all of this location data led them to some big hints about what might have happened to Ana and her body. These trips become our seventh clue. Brian's dumpster visits and what police were able to recover from them. GPS data and surveillance video proved that between January 1 and January 5, Brian visited at least six different dumpsters. One was in the parking lot of a liquor store down the road from his mom's condo, 40 miles from home. One was at another apartment complex near his mom's condo, and three were at apartment complexes in other neighboring Massachusetts town. Based on Brian's Google searches about getting rid of body parts, detectives had a pretty good idea about why he went to so many dumpsters. They felt that Brian must have dismembered Ana's body and put her into multiple trash bags and disposed of them across different dumpsters in different towns. On January 9, the day after Brian's arrest, state troopers and local police raced against the clock to try to recover anything they could find from trash processing facilities. Unfortunately, a lot of trash in Massachusetts gets incinerated within 24 hours of being collected. It actually helps generate electricity for the local grid. So by this point, many of the trash bags Brian threw away were already incinerated. But officers did make it to a garbage transfer station in Peabody, about 46 miles from Cohasset. And they were there in time to recover trash bags from the Swampscott dumpster. And you guys will see the videos of this trash facility. I am blown away when I say this deserves five sherlock marks. I kid you not. They are sifting through mountains of trash with these dogs. Mountains.
- [51:38]
B
I remember reading about a case in orange County. They needed to look at, like, the dump facility for body parts, and it was something like six football fields of garbage got deposited there, like, a day. It's really, really wild how much trash gets generated and, like, put in dumps. But if a body ends up at the dump, it's nearly impossible to find them. So it's incredible that they were able to recover this.
- [52:00]
C
It's insane. And I will say something that really stood out to me that was kind of weird about this. I saw an interview with, like, one of the apartment managers where he used their dumpster, and he dumped late Tuesday, and trash there gets picked up on Wednesday. So it's like, did he do research to know that the pickup was the very next day?
- [52:20]
B
Yeah, right.
- [52:21]
C
It's insane to me. Luckily, officers, again, they're on it. They got a sherlock mark, and they were able to find items, including a hatchet a hacksaw, used cleaning supplies, blood stained towels, and the full bodysuit purchased at Lowe's, which was also blood stained. Not to mention, they found several of Ana's possessions, including her boots, her Prada purse, her COVID 19 vaccine card, which
- [52:49]
B
is going to have her name on it.
- [52:51]
C
It's yay big right in a mountain of trash.
- [52:56]
B
Yeah, that they were able to find that.
- [52:58]
C
I'm. Again, I'm blown away. All of these bloodstained items were sent to the state crime lab and came back positive for DNA, both from Anna and Brian. The crime lab was also able to confirm that the traces of blood found in the Walsh's basement did belong to Ana. However, they were never able to locate a single part of Ana's body.
- [53:21]
B
I mean, even without a body, though, the evidence becomes overwhelming. So on January 17th, Brian was officially charged with murder and improperly conveying a human body. About 10 weeks later, on March 30, a grand jury indicted him on those charges, as well as his original charge for interfering with the investigation. Brian pleaded not guilty, and he was held without bail. Sadly, the Walsh's three sons were taken into foster care at this time, which is really, really, really sad. Now, with the district attorney's office in charge, they had the task of unraveling one more mystery in this case.
- [53:59]
C
And that was the motive. Why? Why do this? The puzzle pieces really were starting to fit together when investigators Learned about our eighth clue. Anna's life insurance policies. Anna was insured for 2.7 million with Brian as the sole beneficiary. But Brian's defense attorney scoffed at the idea that Brian would have killed Anna simply for financial gain. She said Brian's mom was wealthy enough to provide anything he needed. Plus, he was an only child who stood to inherit his mother's fortune.
- [54:34]
B
Nothing about about him having a job and making money for the family. Interesting.
- [54:40]
C
If you have all this money, why commit art fraud? Yeah, yeah, come on.
- [54:46]
B
I know.
- [54:47]
C
And there's another thing that comes up. This wasn't the first time that Brian had taken a big risk for money. He had also been accused of stealing from his own father's estate. You see, Brian's famous neurosurgeon dad had actually disinherited him after a real estate dispute in the early 2000s. According to a family friend, Brian sold his dad on this joint fix and flip project, where his father would provide the funds to renovate the house and then receive back what he put in. After the house was sold, his dad agreed to the deal, even though it wouldn't earn him a profit because he believed that this would be good for his son. Brian allegedly spent $500,000 of his father's money fixing the house, but when it was time to return the investment, he ghosted without sending his dad a check. So in his new will, Brian's father gave his quote, best wishes, but nothing else.
- [55:44]
B
That's cold hearted. I mean, deserved, but cold hearted to read that in your parents will. Best wishes and nothing else.
- [55:52]
C
I know.
- [55:53]
B
Whoa.
- [55:54]
C
After that, they were estranged for more than a decade. Brian's dad passed away during a trip to India in 2018, almost five years before ANA disappeared. Court documents alleged that Brian had found the will, destroyed it, and emptied his father's bank accounts. By the time a family friend went to court with a photo of the will, Brian had sold off most of his dad's valuables, including family heirlooms and an original Salvador Dali painting. There's also a family friend at this time who, back in 2019, when all this is going down, filed an affidavit claiming Brian had been diagnosed as a sociopath and that he had tried to kill multiple security guards during a trip to China. Allegedly, Brian had tried to smuggle out some antiquities during this trip and was going to kill the security guards to get away with it.
- [56:48]
B
See, this is so scary to me because there's not a lot of evidence that Ana knew about any of this. This is all really dark stuff from his past that he didn't have to tell her, that he could cover up, that he maybe could explain away if it ever came up. And so she's operating on him being a completely different person than he actually is, which is like the idea of marrying someone and not really knowing who they are or what they're capable of is huge, huge fear.
- [57:13]
C
It's terrifying. It's terrifying. And so many people. You know, I see this in Reddit stories on two hot takes all the time. Like, once you have kids with someone, that's when they'll finally flip the switch. Because you're so locked in.
- [57:25]
B
Yeah, because you can't leave at that point. I mean, that's why they say too, that I guess a lot of domestic violence starts when you're pregnant. It's because you can't leave and so can escalate.
- [57:32]
C
Then that's a big time of escalation
- [57:34]
B
really got you trapped. It's so, so scary.
- [57:37]
C
Now, I will say there's no other documentation on this incident that occurred in China, but in court filings, Brian did deny ever seeing his Father's will. Still, if true, it did seem to point to, again, a pattern of line and a motive to do illegal, fraudulent things for money. Now, this estate court case didn't end well for the family. It ended really well for Brian because it was led by his cousin. And essentially efforts were abandoned because they didn't want to spend any more money on legal fees. And it was kind of because even if they did win, Brian had already displaced all of the assets. Yeah, everything's drained. Everything's already gone. Everything's gone. What are we even able to recover? But it seemed like Brian was kind of blowing through money really quickly. I mean, he liked the lavish things in life. He had a rich taste. He wanted people to view him as rich and well off and successful. But by the time Ana went missing, she was the primary breadwinner in their marriage. He was dealing with this art fraud. So, again, how do I get more money?
- [58:47]
B
She's had to move. It breaks my heart too, because she moved away from her three little boys to try to get the family back on track.
- [58:53]
C
Huge sacrifice. Huge sacrifice. Huge sacrifice. Maybe one she took to keep their heads above water. We don't know.
- [59:01]
B
Yeah, I know.
- [59:02]
C
Just insane. And so with this $2.7 million life insurance policy, Ana also had some properties she owned, and he was not listed as co owner on any of them. It was kind of looking to investigators like she might be worth more dead than alive. And so as long as they stayed married, Ana was, you know, the breadwinner. She had their lives covered. Why would he kill her? But if they were heading for divorce, that would be a pretty big motive for Brian, which, as we mentioned earlier, it did sound like kind of a possibility. There were mentions to friends that things were rocky and she was at her wit's end with their marriage. So prosecutors took another look at the Walsh's marriage and found our ninth and final clue. A man named William Fasto. Brian was actually the one who led them to William. Through his browser history. Around Christmas 2022, Brian repeatedly googled William's name and visited his Instagram page multiple times. So prosecutors, let's take a look. Who's William? Let's see why Brian was so interested in him. They learned that William was a real estate broker in Washington, dc. He had met Ana through Jem. Jem had introduced them after Ana accepted her new job in February 2022 and was looking for a townhouse close to work. But according to William, it wasn't long before the relationship became personal. William was separated from his wife at the Time. And he confided in Ana about his struggles with co parenting and their kids. Ana could relate to that. She told William how she missed her sons and wanted them to live with her in dc. But if that happened, she was worried Brian would be sentenced to prison instead of house arrest. In this art fraud case, his status as primary caregiver was kind of the only thing keeping him out of jail. Even with her concerns about Brian, William and Anna continued their relationship. And by July 2022, four months after they met, they were serious. She even told William that she was ready to reveal the affair and leave her marriage. She even bought children's furniture for her townhouse in anticipation of bringing her kids to dc. In fact, Ana and William had actually even made plans to meet on January 4, 2023, after her trip home to talk about their future. That's also when they were going to make a plan for her to break the news to Brian. Of course, that conversation never happened because January 4, 2023 was the day Ana was reported missing.
- [61:38]
B
Now, Ana's affair was the final piece prosecutors needed against Brian Walsh. Still, it took a long time to prepare for trial. By September 2025, now that's nearly two and a half years after Brian's indictment. Both sides were finally ready and a trial date was set for October. But then there was a little bit of a hiccup because 50 year old Brian was stabbed in jail by a fellow inmate. Brian was treated at a local hospital. He was released the same day. But during pre trial hearings a couple weeks later, Brian's lawyer became concerned about his mental health, citing, quote, the mental and physical effects of the violent assault that he had suffered in jail. The judge did pause proceedings and ordered Brian to be evaluated at Bridgewater State Hospital to ensure that he was mentally competent to stand trial. Brian stayed there for 40 days before they did declare him competent. Legal proceedings got back on track in November of 2025. But right before jury selection, Brian's legal team made a pretty big move and that's that he changed his plea to guilty for misleading the police and improperly moving Ana's body. That was a huge deal because now he's saying that he is guilty in part to some of the things that he's being charged for. Though he did continue to plead not guilty on the murder charge.
- [62:55]
C
Kind of seeming like they're lining their strategy up.
- [62:58]
B
Yeah, like, and I, I know too, as this was happening, everyone, like I was following the trial at this point, everyone is like, why would he do this? There's you Know, commentators speculating live on YouTube, there's researchers writing these op eds on what would cause him to plead guilty for improperly moving Ana's body, but not guilty for murder. And then the real speculation becomes, how is he going to explain himself in court?
- [63:22]
C
Like, what is panicked. I didn't know what to do.
- [63:24]
B
What is that defense going to look like?
- [63:27]
C
That's their angle that they're going from. Because, yeah, also improperly moving a body, you can only sentence up to three years. The sentence is nothing.
- [63:37]
B
Yeah.
- [63:38]
C
So it's like, well, of course he's gonna plead to the lesser and hope that that helps then. But what's his story?
- [63:44]
B
Yeah, what's the story gonna be?
- [63:46]
C
Well, here's where we have another bizarre twist in the case, because remember Michael Proctor?
- [63:51]
B
Oh, do I?
- [63:53]
C
Yes. Proctor again led the investigation with the Massachusetts state police in John O' Keefe's case in 2025. After a mistrial, she ended up being acquitted of everything except driving under the influence. Now, again, if you want all of the info on that case, go watch our episode on John o' Keefe and the Karen Reed trial. Because why Proctor got in trouble is because some of his text messages about Karen came out during her first trial in 2024, and they were awful. Again, go get into those over there. Essentially, there was enough doubt sown that there was a cover up. And because of that, Proctor ended up being fired over his mishandling of the case and the biases that he had shown in those text messages. But by that time, he had already worked as an investigator. In this case.
- [64:43]
B
Yeah, in this case. And he would eventually go on to be fired from his job for bias.
- [64:47]
C
So which from the defense standpoint, it's like, well, look at this investigator that was on this case. They just got fired over it. Also on this case. Who's to say they conducted everything by the book?
- [65:00]
B
Exactly.
- [65:00]
C
I mean, it's. It's insane. And I mean, Proctor did play a pretty key role. He did write an affidavit in support of Brian's arrest warrant. So naturally, Brian's defense team, they're digging in to see if Proctor meddled, tampered with evidence, maybe sent any offensive texts about Ana and Brian. In 2025, the defense filed motions for access to Proctor's notes, his cell phone records, his work icloud, internal affairs records about Proctor, and extensive records from the John o' Keefe case and Karen Reed trial. Brian's attorneys argued that if Proctor was so biased against Karen Reed that he ignored other suspects, he Might have been so biased against Brian that he also overlooked suspects in Ana's case. Ultimately, the judge granted the defense access to proctor's notes from the Anna Walsh investigation, But not his text messages. While going through those notes for anything that might help Brian, the defense submitted their final list of potential witnesses. Seven of the names on that list, including Michael Proctor, Were tied to John o' keefe's case and Karen reed's trial. Six police officers and one forensic scientist had worked on both cases. The defense never actually found any evidence of misconduct by proctor, at least in this case or any other potential witnesses. But the overlap with one of the most infamously botched cases in Massachusetts history Was Brian's best chance at stoking the fires of reasonable doubt.
- [66:36]
B
Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Now, Brian's murder trial began on December 1, 2025. The prosecution brought out a long list of witnesses and showed the jury 264 exhibits. You've heard about most of the key evidence here already. Things like Brian's suspicious google searches, his cell phone location history, his repeated lies to police, and the many suspicious items that were found in trash bags that he threw away. I mean, that is overwhelming in itself. Ana's affair partner, William, testified and provided his text messages with Ana as proof of their affair. They last texted each other around midnight on new year's. But on January 4, William said Brian called him to ask if he'd seen Anna. He even gave William Anna's garage passcode so he could check her townhouse for her. William called Brian back later to say that he'd gone over twice, and there was no sign of her. After Brian was arrested, William realized exactly how disturbing that interaction really was. I mean, william was just one of the prosecution's 50 witnesses, give or take, Including Anna's friends and loved ones, Members of law enforcement, Forensic ex experts, and her life insurance agent. Brian's lawyers cross examined them, Hammering away at reasonable doubt. But when it was the defense's turn to present their case, they made a move that shocked everyone. I mean, remember, everyone is waiting to hear what they're gonna say, Basically to prove that Brian was not the one that murdered Anna. And even the judge was shocked by what they said. Foreign this episode is brought to you by whatnot. I absolutely inherited my love of a good deal from my mom. She's the queen of the bargain hunt. I used to think that it was just her thing, but it turns out it's definitely my thing, too. And that's why I want to talk to you today about whatnot. Whatnot? Is the largest live shopping marketplace in the United States. It's a live shopping app where you can find deals on fashion, beauty, bags, jewelry and more. And you almost never pay full price on whatnot. There are over 10,000 fashion, beauty and handbag sellers on the app. Going live 24.7so you can shop live with sellers who welcome you in and communities that keep you coming back. You can hop on a stream and score a stunning Coach leather tote bag. Some people have found them for only $45 and they'll show you the interior lining. They'll also answer questions in real time on what you're looking for. It's a great place to shop brand names without the retail prices. Download whatnot today and get $20 off and free shipping on your first purchase. Search whatnot W h a t N o t in the App store, sign up and start finding the best deals on the products you love with $20 off and free shipping on your first purchase.
- [69:15]
C
Hey, before we jump back into the show, let's take a quick break. But not just any break. This is a refreshing break with Snapple. We all know about Snapple's iconic real facts, so let's take a minute to go over some of my favorites. Snapple Real fact 964 it is illegal in the United Kingdom to handle salmon in suspicious circumstances. Snapple Real fact 10:13 it is illegal to sing off key in North Carolina. Snapple Real Fact 2033Americans consume 150 million hot dogs on July 4th. Snapple RealFact 705 Every ton of recycled paper saves about 17 trees. So grab a Snapple, take a second and enjoy the moment. Because let's be honest, this might be the most refreshing part of your day. Snapple, make your break more interesting. All right, now let's get back to clues. On Wednesday, December 10, 2025, the prosecution in Brian Walsh's murder trial rested their case. Next up was the defense.
- [70:16]
B
One of the leading theories that I heard about as we were gearing up for trial was that Brian was going to say someone took the iPad and was making those searches. Like someone maybe came into the house, killed Ana and did all those searches on his iPhone or that was like hooked up to the iPad or something, but it wasn't actually him and they would have to prove that it was him using the devices or whatever. Like, okay, how are we going to get around this?
- [70:39]
C
It's insane to me that someone had to do this defense lawyer job because they also have him on video with the trash bags and swinging Them into the dumpster. Yeah, we are not gonna show that because it's just too.
- [70:52]
B
It's too upsetting.
- [70:53]
C
It's too upsetting. And it's like, okay, so the defense starts their story, and their narrative is this. Brian had found his wife dead early on the morning of January 1, after a festive wine and champagne fueled night that celebrated New Year's Eve. Brian panicked and disposed of Ana's body by dismembering it and placing her in several different dumpsters because he knew her sudden death would look bad for him and his current charges. But they insisted he did not kill her.
- [71:30]
B
They call it sudden unexplained death. Like, the whole opening statement is she died of this thing called sudden unexplained death. And now our whole case is going to be us proving that sudden explained death is a thing. Like, they talk in the opening statement about all the experts they're going to bring in to prove that this sud is even a thing. Which it just was, like, so shocking to hear. That was not really what anyone was anticipating them saying. And it also just felt like. I don't want to call it, like, a dumb.
- [72:03]
C
Dumb.
- [72:03]
B
Yeah, it's like, kind of dumb to be like, okay, well, if we prove that this is real, then surely the jury will agree that she died in some unexplainable way and that you.
- [72:13]
C
Reasonable doubt.
- [72:14]
B
Totally.
- [72:14]
C
Yeah.
- [72:15]
B
Off the hook.
- [72:16]
C
Yeah. I mean, I have never been a juror. I don't think I'll ever be asked to be one now, given clues.
- [72:24]
B
I know.
- [72:24]
C
I can't imagine sitting there and thinking, oh, yeah, okay, this guy's wife died and he panicked, and so he dismembered her rather than calling 911. Like, regardless, like, this is your wife, mother of your three children, and you don't attempt to call 911.
- [72:41]
B
Yeah, don't even attempt. Just sit there for seven hours and then Google on your phone.
- [72:47]
C
Yep. And then have those searches how to
- [72:50]
B
dismember 10 ways to dismember a body.
- [72:52]
C
Yeah.
- [72:53]
B
It was an interesting case to come forward with.
- [72:56]
C
The judge ends up calling both sides up for a sidebar and asked Brian's lawyers if he planned to testify in his own defense. The defense team indicated that he would,
- [73:07]
B
which also was shocking.
- [73:10]
C
Yeah. And they included that in their opening statements. But the next day, Thursday, December 11, they changed their minds. Brian told the judge that he did not want to testify, which was his fifth amendment right. But it's pretty unusual for a defendant to say that they're going to testify and then back out last minute.
- [73:30]
B
Yeah, because normally you go in with the strategy, like, you know exactly who's going to say what and what questions you're going to ask. Yeah.
- [73:35]
C
Brian's team knew this wasn't a good look. They actually filed a legal motion to stop the prosecution from saying anything about the last minute change up in their closing statements. But that wasn't the only change they made. When it came to actually presenting a defense, they didn't. They had initially submitted a list of eight witnesses, including Michael Proctor, Brian Walsh, and the other overlapping personnel from John o' Keefe's case, Karen Reed's trial. But they didn't end up calling on any of them. Instead, they rested their case and went straight to closing arguments. The prosecution clearly had the stronger case. I mean, mountains of evidence. The only real question was whether the jury would convict Brian of first or second degree murder. And this might have been kind of the weakest part for them and their attempt to prove premeditation. Brian hadn't searched for information about murder or disposing of a body until after Ana was most likely dead. And he didn't buy his cleanup supplies until after the murder either. The best evidence of premeditation was Jem Mutlu's testimony, in which he said Brian told him during their New Year's Eve party that he'd lost his phone. They kind of thought that if Brian said that he was already planning to leave his phone behind while dealing with all of the aftermath of Ana's murder the next day, it could indicate then that it was planned. Like he didn't just wake up and lose his phone. Kid didn't hide it. He's already telling people his phone is missing.
- [75:04]
B
Right.
- [75:05]
C
Meanwhile, Brian's lawyer begged the jury not to find Brian guilty of murder just because he admitted to dismembering his wife's body, which even his defense attorney described as, quote, upsetting and terrifying to, and at times disgusting. But with closing arguments over, it was entirely up to the jury.
- [75:25]
B
So the jury deliberated on the afternoon of December 12th. Then they took a break for the weekend, and By Monday the 15th, they came back with their verdict.
- [75:33]
C
Which, can I say, they deliberated for over five hours, I believe.
- [75:37]
B
Yeah.
- [75:38]
C
Feels a little long.
- [75:39]
B
Well, I mean, what do they say? It's normally a day for every week of the trial. So typically, I mean, it takes a while to go through all the evidence and stuff. I mean, I'm biased.
- [75:49]
C
I'm sitting here in a chair. I'm not up there.
- [75:51]
B
I. I know it's like, as a. Like you as a jury member, like, hearing those Google searches. How do you not say, like, I've made up my mind, like, we actually can wrap this up? Because I'd like to vote enough here. I've seen enough what I needed to see. So the fact that they did five hours pretty quick in the grand scheme of things. But I. It does make me wonder if they had to convince someone in there, if someone was, like, holding out for five hours, being like, I don't know.
- [76:15]
C
I want to know. We did just have our producer Kristen chime in over here. And based on her jury experience, it took seven hours for a DUI case against one person.
- [76:25]
B
Wow.
- [76:25]
C
So, okay, I take back what I said.
- [76:27]
B
Yes. I mean, and this is murder. This is maybe someone going to jail for the rest of the lives.
- [76:31]
C
There's a lot on the line here.
- [76:32]
B
Who has three young children. By the 15th, they did come back with a verdict, and they said Brian was guilty of murder in the first degree. Three days later, on Thursday, December 18, 2025, he was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. On January 24, 2026, Anna's loved ones finally got to have a memorial service for her at the Nativity Assumption of the Virgin Mary Greek Orthodox Church in Cohasset. The church was packed with mourners who loved Anna and who had been waiting for a long time to officially say goodbye. Anna's mother even joined via a live stream from Serbia. There's still a lot of loose ends and theories because Ana's body was never found. We don't ultimately know exactly what did happen. But one interesting note about this is when it comes to the idea of was this premeditated or was it not? According to one juror's interview, the jury ultimately chose first degree murder, not because they believed the murder was planned prior to January 1st, but because Brian could have stopped at any point in the process, including right before killing Ana. So usually first degree is like premeditation, which we know that he wasn't googling those things before she had died. Most likely. But interesting that they still went ahead and chose first degree murder, given that.
- [77:52]
C
I'm gonna go back and watch what the instructions to the jury were and how they interpreted their instructions. Cause I feel like depending on the judge and how you interpret your instructions or what each thing really means. Yeah, that is really interesting.
- [78:08]
B
Yeah, definitely. Definitely.
- [78:11]
C
Another loose end is the ransom note. Did Brian send this ransom note? Whether he did or didn't, it never came up in court. Right. So unclear. On that, police did serve Google with a search warrant for any records related to the Gmail account that sent the ransom note. But we don't know if Google was able to identify the account owner or not.
- [78:31]
B
And unfortunately, there are a lot of sickos out there that do send fake notes to police during investigations.
- [78:37]
C
Yeah, I mean, we had it in our case on Phoenix Colden. Her parents got calls from multiple people messing with them.
- [78:45]
B
Yeah, I know. It's so sad. There's also this thing that we didn't really cover in this episode because it's confusing how important it actually was. But there was a weird hole in Brian's bedroom ceiling. So he had been texting people about getting the ceiling repaired. In between Ana's disappearance and his arrest. This did come up at trial, but prosecutors never really explained why they felt this ceiling hole was related to the murder. But Brian's landlord later sued him after being unable to re rent the house because of Ana's murder. And as part of that suit, the landlord claimed Brian climbed into the attic and kicked a hole in the ceiling. Brian and Ana also were reportedly sleeping in separate rooms, and the ceiling hole was in his bedroom, not hers. So it's just, like, unclear what he was doing with this weird ceiling hole.
- [79:30]
C
Like, if he was, how did it get there?
- [79:31]
B
Going into her room through the ceiling and, like, spying on her or something, or just very, very strange.
- [79:37]
C
Oh, my God. There's also a lot of questions about Brian's mom and any potential involvement she may have played in this. Police were apparently suspicious enough of her that they were able to get a warrant and install a tracking device on her car. This was the same day that they arrested Brian. Actually, she apparently didn't like Anna and had reportedly recently hired a PI to try to expose Anna for cheating. Ana also told friends that Brian's mom saw a psychic who told her that Anna was having an affair. Plus, Brian's family history was messy. According to Brian's attorney, he had allegedly experienced serious emotional abuse from his mother during his childhood. Friends said that Brian also accused his father of physical and emotional abuse, as well as neglecting him to go out partying. We do know that Brian disposed of a lot of bags believed to contain Ana's DNA near his mom's condo, including a visit to a dumpster at her condo complex. Plus, Brian's mom was in court to support Brian during his trial, sometimes blowing him kisses from the gallery. So it's unclear if Brian's mother knew anything about his crime or not. And a lot of people question whether the tracking device was just an example of police casting a wide net, trying to do their diligence. Potentially another Sherlock moment. But we don't really get anything about his mom.
- [80:59]
B
And, you know, that's really where the case rests today. Ana was ultimately never found and Brian is spending the rest of his life behind bars. And three children lost both of their parents, which is really, I think, the saddest part in all of this.
- [81:15]
C
Devastating.
- [81:16]
B
And today, you know, we like to talk about activism and stuff at the end of the episodes. So today we did want to highlight nova, the national organization for victim advocacy. NOVA trains advocates and crisis responders so they can provide effective and compassionate victim assistance. They offer credentialing to ensure those working directly with crime victims meet and maintain the highest standards and professional core competencies. They promote public policy supporting victims rights and are dedicated to meaningful change and help for victims and their families. That's coming straight from their website. That's trinova.org that's actually something that you can be a part of. You can volunteer with them and get some of this training that they have to offer. And also if you are experiencing intimate partner violence yourself, you can reach the National Domestic violence hotline at 1-800-799-7233 or by texting START to 88788. And they also offer live chat on the hotline.org.
- [82:11]
C
yeah. Another resource I've mentioned in the past is theloveisrespect.org quiz. This could be a great tool if you have someone in your life that might be in an unhealthy relationship, but you're not in the position but you're not in the position to directly address it. It's a quiz. They answer questions about their relationship and it, it could get the wheels turning and provide a way to have a conversation with them. And there's safety measures that are in place on the website where if you hit the escape key twice, it goes to Google to hide the quiz. So it could be a good resource to share with someone you know.
- [82:44]
B
And with that, we'll go to the missing person that we want to highlight this week. This week we want to highlight the case of Latrice Nelson. She's missing from Washington, DC. Latrice is described as female, black, 37 years old and 5 4, 140 pounds at the time of her disappearance. Her hair was also styled in long Senegalese braids with gold accents. She has a tattoo of a butterfly on her right hand, a tattoo of a cross on her left arm, and a tattoo of the name Taijan on her left hand. Her ears are also pierced. Nelson was last seen on the 600 block of Edgewood Street Northeast in Washington, D.C. at 8:45pm on July 16, 2018. She has never been heard from again. She was not reported missing until September 5th. Few details are available in her case, but anyone who knows anything about Latrice can contact the Metropolitan Police Department at 202-576-6768.
- [83:41]
C
And that is all we have for this episode of Clues. Again, we want to hear from you guys. Your thoughts, theories, any feedback. It's what makes this community so special.
- [83:49]
B
And at Crime House, we value your support. You can share your thoughts on social media and remember to rate, review and subscribe and follow Clues to help others discover our show. I know.
- [83:59]
C
Oh, we're almost to 100k.
- [84:00]
B
Almost to 100,000 on YouTube. It's so. I'm so excited about that. I can't believe you guys.
- [84:04]
C
Here we go, guys. Thank you for being here. Thank you for all your Webby votes. We are just blown away by this community and the Clues Crew. Clues Crew, we see you out there.
- [84:15]
B
All right, that's all we have. Bye, guys.
- [84:23]
C
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- [84:48]
B
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- [85:11]
C
Edu Events.
- [85:13]
B
For information on program outcomes, visit carrington. Edu Sci.