Serbia: Ana Walshe’s mother seeks official info about case

BELGRADE, Serbia (AP) — The Serbian mother of a Massachusetts woman who has been missing since New Year’s Day and whose husband is charged with murder, will ask the United States for official information about her daughter’s disappearance, Serbia’s Foreign Ministry said Saturday.

Milanka Ljubicic, the mother of Ana Walshe, signed a formal request to receive documentation about the case as next of kin, the ministry said in a statement. The request has been sent to Serbia’s Consulate in New York and will be submitted to relevant U.S. authorities, the ministry added.

Brian Walshe, 47, has been charged with murder in the case of Ana Walshe, 39, whose body hasn’t been found. The couple, who have three young children who are now in state custody, lived in the affluent coastal community of Cohasset, about 15 miles (25 kilometers) southeast of Boston.

Ana Walshe was reportedly last seen leaving their home in the early morning hours of Jan. 1, purportedly to take a ride-hailing vehicle to Logan International Airport for a flight to Washington, authorities said. But police have found no indication that she either took a vehicle or boarded any flight out of Logan.

She was reported missing Jan. 4 by her employer in Washington, where the couple has a home and to which she often commutes during the week for work at a real estate company, authorities said.

Prosecutors said earlier this week that Brian Walshe had gone online to look up ways to dismember and dispose of a body, and that items belonging to the woman with Ana Walshe’s DNA were found at a trash processing facility.

Walshe’s disappearance has been followed closely in her native Serbia where her mother still lives. Ms. Ljubicic has told local media she could not believe that her son-in-law would harm her daughter.