Hacksaw the smoking gun?
Bone fragment key clue against accused wife killer Brian Walshe: Experts
A “small bone fragment” found when police took apart a hacksaw purchased by accused killer Brian Walshe could be enough to convict him of slaying his wife if there is a DNA match, experts tell the Herald.
What part of the body the bone came from and if it contains any traces of marrow could be the socalled smoking gun in a murder case that has no body, former FBI agents and a forensic specialist say.
“If there’s a positive DNA match, that would be enough for a lot of juries,” said retired FBI supervisory special agent Todd Hulsey. “You don’t need a body. But, you can never predict what a jury will do.”
The discovery of a tainted hacksaw is part of a trove of evidence listed in court documents now being released in the case.
Those documents also state Brian Walshe, the Cohasset man accused of dismembering his wife in the first hours of the New Year, confirmed Ana Walshe was having an affair, the Herald has reported.
The entry for the hacksaw, first reported by the Herald last week, states Brian Walshe had purchased it during a post-New Year’s buying spree at Lowes and Home Depot. It was discovered Jan. 8 in a dumpster in Swampscott, police said. It had red-brown staining and “a small bone fragment,” items that are being tested for DNA, documents state.
A forensic expert schooled in criminal cases said investigators will need a toothbrush or hairbrush to use to match the DNA of the blood and bone to Ana Walshe. DNA could also be obtained elsewhere or even from one of her three young children.
“Bone fragments on a hacksaw become more about the hacksaw,” added Frank Figliuzzi, the FBI’s former assistant director for counterintelligence. “Are his fingerprints on it? When did he buy it?”
Even though it’s all circumstantial evidence, Figliuzzi said “95% of criminal cases are successful on circumstantial evidence.”
The fact prosecutors can argue the hacksaw was new means it puts it closer to the hands of the accused wife killer, all the experts agreed.
If the bone has any traces of marrow, another expert said, it will be even harsher evidence against the accused husband. Traces of marrow puts it at the center of a bone — a deep cut that suggests it was lethal.
Brian Walshe, 48, was indicted in March for the murder of his 39-yearold wife Ana Walshe in the early hours of Jan. 1. He has pleaded not guilty but is being denied bail.
This is not the first time a conviction has been sought without a body.
In the case dubbed “Missing Beauty,” the slaying of Robin Benedict in 1983 by obsessed Tufts University anatomy professor William Douglas ended with him admitting to manslaughter just as the jury was seated in his murder trial.
Benedict, who worked Boston’s Combat Zone red-light district under the name “Nadine,” vanished from professor Douglas’ home on March 5, 1983. Her body was never found.
A State Police report said he would call her several times a day, write love letters and take her to plays and concerts — all on the clock, and on the dime of tens of thousands of misused university grants, for which he was fired.
Benedict, a graphic artist with a love of oil painting had big plans, she had told another John. She had recently bought her own house in Malden and had planned to work the streets for only a couple years to build up a nest egg, then invest and retire.
Those dreams came to a violent end on March 5, 1983, when Douglas, then 41, lured her to his Sharon home and bludgeoned her to death with a sledgehammer and then stashed her body in a dumpster at a Providence mall. She was only 21 years old.
Douglas pled down to manslaughter on April 27, 1984.