The Mystery of Ana Walshe Continues

Ready for some weird wrinkles?

Ana Walshe | Instagram

Here’s why I picked up on the disappearance of 39-year-old Ana Walshe, a real estate exec who went missing on Jan. 1, 2023: The moment I saw her polished photos and read a thumbnail sketch of the case, I had a feeling it would turn into something a little stranger than your average missing person case. Then I read about how her husband Brian was facing sentencing for passing counterfeit Andy Warhol paintings and a possible new trial over allegations he embezzled from his late father’s estate, and I was sure the story would only get bigger.

I’ve been right so far.

I’ll copy my basic timeline from the previous edition of the newsletter to catch you up on things:

• Jan. 1 - Ana Walshe allegedly has a “work emergency” in DC. She supposedly is last seen between 4 and 5 that morning. She was going to take a rideshare for the 20-plus mile drive between Cohasset and Boston’s Logan Airport.

• Jan. 3 - Walshe had a plane ticket for this date. She never boarded a flight on the 1st or the 3rd.

• Jan. 4 - Walshe’s husband Brian and her DC employer report her missing.

• Jan. 5 - News of her disappearance begins to spread.

• Jan. 6 - Police begin investigating outdoors near Walshe’s current Cohasset home. At the same time, a fire breaks out in the Walshe’s previous home on Jerusalem Road.

New developments in the case haven’t diminished the mystery.

WCVB, Boston’s ABC affiliate, published a detailed case timeline, and it included additional details worth highlighting.

First — The January 6 fire that broke out at the home where Brian and Ana Walshe lived until March 2022 was called “highly strange” by Cohasset PD Chief William Quigley. However, WCVB reported Saturday that “a spokesperson for … the State Fire Marshal's Office told NewsCenter 5 that Cohasset and state investigators determined that the fire at Walshe's former home was not suspicious.”

I’ll take the State Fire Marshal’s Office at its word. We’ve all heard some cop say, “there are no coincidences” on crime dramas and true crime shows, but sometimes there are odd coincidences in life and crime. If you’ve ever traveled to another city thousands of miles from home and immediately run into someone you know, then you must admit that’s true.

To me, the keyword above is “odd.” So I’ll call the fire odd for now.

Second — Investigators continued searching Saturday along Chief Justice Cushing Highway (Route 3A) near the (current) Walshe home here in Mass. Around 1:45, TV station choppers noticed that police were draining the Walshes’ swimming pool. Make of that what you will.

Third — Here’s where I take off my professional journalist hat for a moment. I’ve learned a lot doing this for the last 18 years, and it’s made me careful to stick to what’s known or logically inferred, at best.

But even though a Twitter account called Cohasset TMZ takes an approach to the case that fits with naming the profile after one of the most infamous gossip sites on the web, it did point out an unexpected and — if nothing else — interesting connection between Ana Walshe’s employer, high-end real estate outfit Tishman Speyer in Washington, DC, and a very different news story.

Cohasset TMZ @CohassetTweet

A few people have sent us this article. Ana’s employer = Tishman Speyer. Take a read. Some shady stuff and it happened last April. Why wouldn’t she leave the country then? Nothing makes sense but this could be even bigger and crazier than it already is. dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1…

The tweet above references this Daily Mail article published on April 8, 2022. I’m embedding the link in case the tweet ever gets deleted.

The article doesn’t mention Ana Walshe. It appears completely unrelated — at first. Instead, it’s about Haider Ali, 35, and Arian Taherzadeh, 40, who were arrested in April and charged with “impersonating federal law enforcement, specifically with the Department of Homeland Security,” according to the Washington Post.

Ali and Taherzadeh were arrested on April 6. According to a Justice Dept. press release, Haider Ali pleaded guilty in October to “charges stemming from a scheme in which he pretended to be a federal law enforcement officer for a range of purposes, including to maintain a series of apartments in which he then failed to pay rent.”

The following is from the Mail article published just after Ali and Taherzadeh were arrested (the paper said it used unnamed sources and affidavits related to the case):

Ali, according to Taherzadeh, was the one able to gain access codes and a list of tenants in the Crossing DC apartment complex – owned by upscale real estate firm Tishman Speyer.

“With respect to Ali, Taherzadeh stated that Ali had obtained the electronic access codes and a list of all of the tenants in the apartment complex,” the memorandum notes. “Taherzadeh further stated that Ali was the individual that funded most of their day-to-day operation but Taherzadeh did not know the source of the funds.”

This is from later in the same article:

A regional manager for Tishman Speyer, the owners of the building where Taherzadeh and Ali's apartments were raided on Wednesday, had set up a meeting to speak with DailyMail.com on Friday morning – but the individual pulled out at the last minute. 

According to her LinkedIn, Ana Walshe became a Regional General Manager for Tishman Speyer in February 2022. Is there more than one? Or was she the one who didn’t show? It’s unclear at the moment.

Here’s another quote from later in the Mail article:

According to sources, the Tishman Speyer-owned and operated building cooperated with Taherzadeh and Ali believing the guise that they were federal agents. Building management, the sources allege, provided the duo with access to surveillance cameras, including codes to access all doors in the building and a list of personal information about a number of residents. 

I don’t want to go much further down this road, especially given what I said about the coincidences above. They certainly do happen. And most of the time, stories like this fit a mold as old as human relationships. Something went wrong between two people, and one of them took action to get rid of the other.

But in April 2022 Ana Walshe was a newly-minted Regional General Manager for Tishman Speyer when two men were arrested for impersonating feds so well a Tishman Speyer building’s management gave them access to security cams. Her husband had already pleaded guilty to art fraud and then in June it came out that he’s suspected of embezzling from his late father’s estate — a father who reportedly not only disinherited Brian Walshe but did it in a striking way, with a will that basically said, ‘good luck, bye.’

At a minimum, extralegal coincidences have piled up around Ana Walshe’s disappearance. As much as I would argue that coincidences are real and happen all the time, when they begin to accumulate, then it’s time to start wondering about the nature of the whole, true story.

Julianne Lima @JulianneLimaTV

HAPPENING NOW: @MassStatePolice, @CohassetPolice have been at Ana Walshe’s home for 3 hrs. Cohasset police spox. referred me to Norfolk Co. DA’s Office, who tells me nothing new to report other than officers are “searching the home for clues” boston25news.com/news/local/inv… @boston25

I began this update on Saturday, Jan. 7. Now it’s the 8th and so far, regional media camped out around the Walshe home have noted investigators spending hours inside the house hunting for clues. Local residents can’t resist the mystery either, and are tweeting about it, including family comings and goings, such as Walshe’s sons and husband leaving the home at one point.

And the Norfolk DA has reportedly taken over the investigation from Cohasset Police. Your guess as to what that means is as good as mine.