Washington, D.C

Mom of Three Mysteriously Vanishes After Leaving for D.C. Real-Estate Job

Published

2 years ago

January 6, 2023

A Massachusetts mom of three, whose husband is awaiting sentencing in an artwork fraud case for promoting a pair of phony Warhols to an unsuspecting purchaser, vanished on New Yr’s Day and not using a hint, cops mentioned Friday.

Ana Walshe, 39, lives together with her household in Cohasset, Massachusetts, and commutes weekly to Washington, D.C., the place she works as a property supervisor, in response to Cohasset Police Chief William Quigley. She left dwelling round 4 a.m. on Jan. 1, in response to Quigley, who mentioned her husband, Brian, was asleep on the time. (He stays beneath dwelling confinement within the Warhol case.) Walshe had ordered a automobile from a rideshare service to take her to Boston’s Logan Airport for a flight to the nation’s capital, Quigley mentioned.

Walshe had been scheduled to move again to D.C. on Jan. 3, however bumped up her plan by two days “to deal with some kind of emergency at one of many properties that she manages,” Quigley mentioned at a press convention on Friday, noting that Walshe departed together with her baggage, private belongings, and cellphone, which has been off since Jan. 1.

There isn’t any report of Walshe ever getting on a airplane that day—or since. Police have additionally been unable to verify whether or not or not Walshe even made it to the airport, or if she ever bought right into a rideshare car. However an unnamed member of the family—the Walshes have three sons between the ages of two and 6—confirmed she certainly walked out of the home the day she is believed to have disappeared, in response to Quigley.

On Jan. 4, Brian Walshe known as police to report his spouse lacking. Her employer, actual property behemoth Tishman Speyer, concurrently contacted authorities to say Ana Walshe, who cops say speaks with an Japanese European accent, had disappeared.

At Friday’s press convention, Quigley acknowledged Brian Walshe’s “authorized historical past,” with out additional clarification, however mentioned the incident is “not believed to have any relation to this case.”

Brian “has been absolutely cooperative,” as has Tishman’s safety division, in response to Quigley. The couple personal a $1.4 million townhouse within the Friendship Heights part of Washington, D.C., which has been searched by police, who discovered the pair’s automobile within the driveway however “no indicators of her there,” Quigley mentioned. Ana Walshe’s debit and bank cards haven’t been used since she left on Jan. 1, and her “digital footprint” has additionally been nonexistent, he informed reporters.

As for why Walshe wasn’t reported lacking for a number of days, Quigley defined that she labored lengthy hours and that it’s “not irregular” for her to “not contact dwelling immediately.” Detectives are treating the case as a lacking individuals investigation, though they haven’t any proof of foul play, in response to Quigley. Maybe she “simply wanted a break,” since “life is difficult generally… generally life will get chaotic,” Quigley mentioned. If that’s certainly so, he continued, “we simply want a name from her or somebody who has talked to her.”

Brian Walshe was unable to be reached for touch upon Friday.

The fees towards Brian Walshe, who “as soon as purchased each ounce of [Boston restaurant Deuxave’s] white truffles and each wine from his beginning yr throughout dinner,” in response to The Boston Globe, stem from the 2016 sale of two canvases from Andy Warhol’s “Shadows” sequence.

After convincing a school pal he might get value for the (real) works, Walshe put them up on the market for $80,000 through his spouse’s eBay account, courtroom information present. However whereas he posted pictures of the true factor, what he delivered to the purchaser, after consummating the deal outdoors the eBay platform, had been phony, Walshe admitted in courtroom final yr.

Walshe in the end bought the legit “Shadow” work and “offered info” to the federal government that allowed them to “observe the work to the place they’re at present,” and “decide with respect to forfeiture,” in response to a memo submitted to the courtroom by protection legal professionals.

One of many two Warhols on the middle of Brian Walshe’s case.

U.S. District Court docket for the District of Massachusetts

The fees towards Walshe carry a most mixed sentence of as much as 50 years and a $1 million positive. The federal government was set to conform to a sentence that included no jail time in any respect, prosecutors mentioned in a June 2022 courtroom submitting. Nonetheless, after Walshe allegedly embezzled funds from his late father’s property whereas out on bail within the Warhol case, they’re now asking for 30 months in federal jail.

“We do not need a sentencing date as of but,” protection lawyer Tracy Miner informed The Day by day Beast on Friday.

The Warhol state of affairs actually additionally concerned Ana Walshe, in response to an FBI affidavit filed in 2018 that sought permission from a federal choose to look her e-mail accounts, cellphone, and particular person, alongside together with her residence.

Though she was not in the end prosecuted for her alleged function within the fraud, the affidavit, which identifies her by her earlier final identify, says she “participated within the sale of the work,” accusing her of getting communicated with the purchaser who bought duped and dealing with the phony paintings previous to the sale. She was additionally named in a lawsuit introduced by the customer of the counterfeit works, L.A. gallery proprietor and hip-hop impresario Ron Rivlin. (Rivlin didn’t reply to The Day by day Beast’s request for touch upon Friday.)

Following an extended, drawn-out course of in courtroom, Brian Walshe pleaded responsible in 2021 to wire fraud, interstate transportation for a scheme to defraud, possession of transformed items, and fascinating in an illegal financial transaction. In June, as he awaited sentencing, the choose overseeing the case accused Walshe—whose late father had disinherited him earlier than his demise in 2018, in response to courtroom filings—of illegally serving to himself to greater than $100,000 in money, work by Miro and Dali, pottery and artwork glass, and “even a automobile” belonging to his dad’s property, which he then bought off.

One submitting features a sworn affidavit from Brian Walshe’s cousin, who attested that it was “frequent information amongst… family and friends members” that Brian “absconded with nearly a million {dollars} from [his father] in prior years.”

On the opposite facet of the coin, Ana Walshe and members of her household over the summer time despatched letters to the choose, praising Brian for taking good care of his mom and mother-in-law, who suffered a mind hemorrhage in December 2021.

“Throughout my mom’s sickness and past, Brian continued to be in contribution and deal with charity work, function a coach inside his transformational management academy, proceed to care for his ailing aged mom and be there for his sons day in and day trip,” Ana wrote in a single.

Her personal current on-line exercise didn’t seem ominous in any means. Somebody with a display screen identify that matches Walshe’s e-mail tackle positioned a bid on a low-mileage 2008 Porsche 911 Carrera S Cabriolet on Dec. 11, following bids on two comparable fashions, in addition to a 2016 Jaguar F-Kind convertible, over the previous three weeks. Ana’s remaining Instagram put up earlier than she disappeared, on Dec. 31, learn: “Take the danger of optimism.”

In the meantime, her pals and family members have themselves taken to social media in a determined try to find her.

“My bestest buddy, the kindest and most beneficiant soul is lacking!” one pleaded in a Thursday night time Fb put up. “assist discover Ana!”

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Washington, D.C

Welcome to Washington: On the Eve of the Inauguration, Monumental Advice

Published

1 hour ago

January 16, 2025

Press Room

Welcome to Washington: On the Eve of the Inauguration, Monumental Advice

Image by William Rudolph.

I love watching the brides pose for photos by the Lincoln Memorial and the teenagers wriggle through TikTok choreography near the Washington Monument. Their modern hopes breathe life into the centuries-old wisdom of our capital city.

I have lived in Washington DC for years and still can’t get enough of it. On sunny Saturday morning walks, my pace is casual, but the insights are profound. DC is a living lesson about what George Washington described as “the last great experiment for promoting human happiness.” The Inauguration brings new people to Washington DC and I hope they will love and learn from the city as much as I do.

One of my favorite monuments is near the Capitol. Two iron cranes stand together. Their wings thrust upward, and barbed wire falls from their beaks. Around them is a complicated mix of names: Japanese Americans who died fighting for us in World War II, and the internment camps to which their families and friends had been forced. Yet I am fiercely proud to be an American when, amidst these names, I read President Reagan’s words: “Here we admit a wrong. Here we affirm our commitment as a nation to equal justice under the law.” Few countries I’ve lived in have the strength to admit such a grave national error.

That urge for improvement is in our national genes. As the Constitution states, we’re constantly trying to “form a more perfect union.”

Sure enough, a few miles away under a white marble dome stands a statue of Thomas Jefferson. He, too, speaks to us of striving for perfection: “…Laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind. As that becomes more developed, more enlightened … institutions must advance also to keep pace with the times.”

While I respect the somber challenge of those words, I love his next, more whimsical, sentence: “We might as well require a man to wear still the coat which fitted him when a boy as civilized society to remain ever under the regimen of their barbarous ancestors.”

From a breezy hill in northeast Washington DC, President Lincoln also challenges us. It’s the cottage where he and his family escaped the city’s summer heat, though Lincoln daily commuted to the White House. His dusty horseback ride revealed the stakes of the Civil War: wounded soldiers bumping along in ambulances and former slaves surviving in hastily built camps after escaping behind Union lines.

Lincoln welcomed allies and adversaries alike to the cottage for advice, sometimes looking out from the veranda over the not-yet-completed Capitol and Washington Monument. As a modern visitor 150 years later, I can stand in the same place. The buildings are completed. But which of Lincoln’s hopes and fears are still in progress?

At a newer memorial, Martin Luther King, Jr offers optimism about the timescale of our national effort: “We shall overcome because the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.”

At an even newer memorial closer to the Capitol, President Eisenhower puts a worldwide spin on our work of becoming a more perfect union: “We look upon this shaken earth, and we declare our firm and fixed purpose – the building of a peace with justice in a world where moral law prevails.”

Strolling through the city, I love listening to leaders from different periods of our great experiment. I hope our elected representatives will as well.

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Washington, D.C

DC gets ready to celebrate the nation’s 250th anniversary – WTOP News

Published

9 hours ago

January 15, 2025

Press Room

DC gets ready to celebrate the nation’s 250th anniversary – WTOP News

D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser and America250 Chair Rosie Rios joined students at a bilingual elementary school to kickoff D.C.’s chapter of the commission preparing to celebrate the nation’s 250th anniversary.

Students at Powell Bilingual Elementary School in Petworth greeted Bowser with a rousing introduction, as she introduced them to a new vocabulary word: “Semiquincentennial.” The word describes the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.

Bowser told the students D.C.’s 250th celebration should be the biggest and the best, and said, “Throwing a big party for thousands of people is a big task. But in Washington, D.C., we welcome visitors for big events all the time.”

D.C.’s festivities, though, will be part of a nationwide effort to throw a celebration of America like none other.

America250 is a nonpartisan initiative working to involve Americans from every state and U.S. territory in the Semiquincentennial, which will be in 2026.

Rios told the students about “America’s Field Trip,” explaining it’s a contest for those in “grades 3-12 who get to answer the question, ‘What does America mean to me?’ The beauty of this program is that the award recipients get to choose from a series of backstage experiences with our federal agencies, most of which have never been offered to the public before.”

Those field trip sites include a variety of historic and cultural landmarks across the country.

Rios recalled the nation’s bicentennial in 1976, when she was just 10 years old. Her parents had come to the U.S. from Mexico in 1958, and she said the evening of July 4, 1976, “was a cloudy night in Heyward, California, but those fireworks were never brighter.”

“On that night, I felt I had the whole world in front of me. I did feel that anything was possible,” Rios said.

She said she’s eager to hear from others about their family histories and their hopes and dreams for the future.

Another feature of the America250 celebration is “Our American Story,” which includes a chance for residents to nominate someone they know to share their histories, which, if selected, will be preserved at the Library of Congress.

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Washington, D.C

Inauguration Day: Timeline of key inaugural events

Published

17 hours ago

January 15, 2025

Press Room

Inauguration Day: Timeline of key inaugural events

WASHINGTON – Nearly a quarter million ticketed guests are expected to attend Donald Trump’s second inauguration on Monday, January 20, 2025, in the nation’s capital. The festivities begin over the weekend and continue until the Tuesday following Inauguration Day.

On Monday, the ceremony will take place on the West Front of the U.S. Capitol. Security screening gates are expected to open at 5 a.m. Ticketed guests should arrive by 11:30 a.m.

Here are some key events on the schedule if you are planning to attend:

Timeline:

Saturday, January 18

Trump will attend a reception and fireworks display at Trump National Golf Club in Sterling, Virginia.

Vice President-elect JD Vance will participate in a reception for incoming Cabinet members and host a dinner.

READ MORE: Inauguration Day: Security tightens in DC one week before Trump takes office

Sunday, January 19

Trump will take part in a wreath-laying ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery.

Trump will hold a MAGA Victory rally at Capital One Arena in Washington, D.C., at 3 p.m., with a performance by the Village People.

Trump will host a candlelight dinner with campaign donors.

Monday, January 20 (Inauguration Day)

Trump will attend a worship service at St. John’s Episcopal Church in downtown D.C.

Trump and incoming first lady Melania Trump will join the Bidens for tea at the White House.

Inauguration Day Forecast: Slight chance for snow showers early Monday

What we know:

Inaugural Ceremonies at the U.S. Capitol

The ceremonies will take place on the West Front of the U.S. Capitol.

Security screening gates open at 5 a.m., music begins at 9:30 a.m. Ticketed guests should arrive by 11:30 a.m.

The theme, “Our Enduring Democracy: A Constitutional Promise,” recognizes the Founders’ commitment to preserving democracy.

Carrie Underwood will perform “America the Beautiful” before Trump takes the oath of office at 12 p.m. Former Presidents Obama, Bush, and Clinton are expected to attend.

A farewell to former President Biden and Vice President Harris will occur around noon.

Trump will gather with aides and lawmakers for the President’s Signing Room Ceremony at the U.S. Capitol to sign executive orders or memorandums.

The JCCIC Congressional Luncheon will follow, attended by the new president, vice president, Senate leaders, and JCCIC members.

Trump will review military troops at the East Front steps of the U.S. Capitol, followed by a presidential parade down Pennsylvania Avenue to the White House.

READ MORE: Inauguration Day 2025: Road closures, routes and timing

At the White House, Trump will participate in the traditional Oval Office signing ceremony for executive orders or nominations.

Trump will attend three Inaugural balls: Commander in Chief Ball, Liberty Inaugural Ball, and the Starlight Ball. He is scheduled to speak at all three balls.

Commander in Chief Ball focused on military service members
Liberty Inaugural Ball geared toward Trump supporters
Starlight Ball will focus on high-dollar donors

What’s next:

Tuesday, January 21

Trump will attend the National Prayer Service, an interfaith event at the Washington National Cathedral.

The Source: Information in this article comes from The Trump Vance Inaugural Committee, the Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies, and the Associated Press.

NewsInauguration DayDonald J. TrumpMelania TrumpWashington, D.C.

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