Brian Walshe, the Massachusetts man accused of killing his wife on New Year’s Day 2023 and lying about where she went, was sentenced in Boston’s federal court Tuesday in a separate art fraud case.
A judge sentenced Walshe to 37 months on each art fraud, to run concurrently. The 37 months will also run concurrent to any state sentence Walshe may face in the murder case being brought in the killing of his wife, Ana Walshe.
Walshe did not speak on his behalf during the sentencing, except to say he didn’t have anything to add. He was ordered returned to state custody immediately.
Walshe faces a first-degree murder as well as misleading a police investigation/obstruction of justice and improper conveyance of a human body for allegedly killing his wife at their Cohasset home, dismembering her and disposing of her body. He has pleaded not guilty and was ordered held without bail.
Before that, he was embroiled in an art fraud case in which he pleaded guilty to wire fraud and other federal charges involving phony Andy Warhol paintings. Walshe took photos of a friend’s authentic Andy Warhol paintings and used the photos to sell replicas on eBay, according to court documents.
The case started in 2016 when a buyer saw two Andy Warhol paintings for sale on eBay. The listing, according to prosecutors, included photographs of authentication stamps. The buyer arranged to buy those paintings, part of the “Shadows” series, for $80,000. However, after having an assistant pick the paintings up, the buyer discovered there were no authentication stamps and that the canvas looked new. This ultimately led to an FBI investigation.
Brian Walshe had gained access to the paintings by telling a friend, who was the lawful owner of the paintings, that he could help sell them for a good price, the court documents state. However, that friend told investigators that after Brian Walshe took the art, he was unable to contact him. The art in question was valued at hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Brian Walshe was arrested in that investigation in 2018. He would ultimately plead guilty to one count each of wire fraud, interstate transportation for a scheme to defraud, possession of converted goods and unlawful monetary transaction.
Prosecutors had requested that Walshe be sentenced to the 37 months, or just over three years, in prison, another three years of supervised release and to pay restitution, saying that Walshe obstructed justice after he pleaded guilty for giving false information in a financial statement to the probation office.
“The conduct underlying the defendant’s obstruction of justice is troubling. At the same time, it should not distract from the real issue: the defendant’s years long scheme of fraud, which had devastating consequences for the victims,” prosecutors wrote, adding that Walshe’s “misleading of the Court is an extension of his criminal conduct (although all the more brazen in that he attempted to deceive the Court).”
Walshe’s attorney, Tracy Miner, asked the judge to impose a sentence of time served, with three years of supervised release, as a prior judge had determined in 2021, before the financial issue prosecutors mentioned.
She wrote that the financial issue, “Walshe’s failure to include any assets he received as personal representative of his father’s estate or expenditures made on behalf of his father’s estate on his personal financial statement does not constitute obstruction of justice.”
The sentencing memos mention the murder case against Walshe. Prosecutors said that both parties urged that sentencing in federal court not take those state charges into account.
“That case will go forward, as it should, in Norfolk Superior Court. Those allegations are too serious to be considered in this case, without being proven beyond a reasonable doubt, and a federal sentencing hearing is not proper forum to prove them,” prosecutors wrote.
Walshe’s lawyer wrote that the man was trying to gather necessary information about the account he received and spent from his father’s estate when “his wife went missing and he was subsequently arrested and held without bail.”
“Rather than request additional time and judicial process to obtain the necessary documents, given the pending state court charges against him, on the advice of counsel, Mr. Walshe hereby invokes his fifth amendment privilege with respect to providing any additional financial statements to this Court,” Miner wrote.
Read the sentencing memos below:
Brian Walshe shook his head as the charges of first-degree murder, misleading a police investigation and improper conveyance of a human body that a grand jury brought against him were read out in Norfolk Superior Court in Dedham and pleaded not guilty.
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