Massachusetts
Judge sets trial date for man charged with killing his wife
BOSTON (AP) — A judge has set a date of Oct. 20, 2025, for the trial of a Massachusetts man charged with killing his wife.
Brian Walshe faces first-degree murder, misleading a police investigation and other charges in the death of his wife, Ana Walshe, whose body has never been recovered. He has pleaded not guilty to all charges.
Walshe, dressed in a suit and his wrists in handcuffs, appeared Monday in Norfolk Superior Court before Judge Diane Freniere, who recently took over the case.
Walshe’s defense team is seeking documents related to the handling of two other cases by Norfolk County investigators — including the Karen Read murder trial and the alleged killing of Sandra Birchmore by a Stoughton, Massachusetts, detective Matthew Farwell.
Freniere didn’t rule Monday.
Defense attorneys are specifically seeking emails and text messages from the lead investigator on the Karen Read case, Trooper Michael Proctor, who helped lead the investigations that resulted in the arrests of both Walshe and Read.
Prosecutors have said some of the information sought by defense attorneys is privileged or exempt because of a pending federal prosecution.
Ana Walshe, who is originally from Serbia, was last seen early on Jan. 1, 2023 following a New Year’s Eve dinner at her Massachusetts home with her husband and a family friend, prosecutors said.
Brian Walshe said she was called back to Washington, D.C., on New Year’s Day for a work emergency. He didn’t contact her employer until Jan. 4. The company — the first to notify police that Ana Walshe was missing — said there was no emergency, prosecutors said.
Prosecutors have said that starting Jan. 1 and for several days after, Brian Walshe made multiple online searches for “dismemberment and best ways to dispose of a body,” “how long before a body starts to smell” and “hacksaw best tool to dismember.”
Prosecutors have also said that Ana Walshe had taken out $2.7 million in life insurance naming her husband as the sole beneficiary.
Walshe was also sentenced earlier this year to more than three years behind bars over an unrelated art fraud case involving the sale of two fake Andy Warhol paintings. He was ordered to pay $475,000 in restitution.
Walshe’s scheme, prosecutors said, started with his selling the two original Warhol paintings in 2011 to a gallery. From there, he obtained replicas of the paintings in 2015 and sold those to a buyer in France before trying to sell the two fake abstracts on eBay.
Florida
Woman sentenced to life for zipping boyfriend into suitcase, suffocating him
A Florida woman was sentenced Monday to life in prison for zipping her boyfriend into a suitcase and leaving him to die of suffocation amid a history of domestic and alcohol abuse.
Circuit Judge Michael Kraynick imposed the sentence in Orlando on Sarah Boone, 47, for the 2020 killing of 42-year-old Jorge Torres.
A jury deliberated only 90 minutes Oct. 25 before convicting Boone of the second-degree murder of Jorge Torres after a 10-day trial. Boone had insisted she was herself a victim of domestic violence at the hands of Torres and had rejected a plea deal offer of a 15-year sentence.
Torres’ family members testified at the hearing that his death has torn them apart.
In her own statement, Boone went through a litany of abuse by Torres she said occurred over many years, decried the way her trial was handled and covered by the media, yet asked forgiveness for her actions.
At first, Boone told Orange County Sheriff’s Office investigators that she and Torres had been drinking heavily and playing hide-and-seek on Feb. 23, 2020, in their Winter Park, Florida, residence when they thought it would be amusing for the 103-pound (47-kilogram) Torres to climb into the suitcase. Winter Park is a suburb of Orlando.
They had been drinking alcohol and she decided to go to sleep, figuring that Torres could get out of the suitcase on his own, she told detectives in an arrest report.
When she woke up the next morning, she didn’t find Torres but then remembered he was in the suitcase. She unzipped the suitcase and found him unresponsive, the arrest report said.
Boone was charged with second-degree murder after investigators found videos on her cellphone in which Torres is heard yelling from inside the suitcase that he couldn’t breathe and repeatedly calling out Boone’s name, according to the arrest report.
“She decided to keep (Torres) in the suitcase when he said he could not breathe in it to terrorize him,” prosecutor William Jay said in a court filing. “She then struck him with a baseball bat.”
Boone rejected a plea offer from prosecutors that would have imposed a 15-year prison sentence in exchange for her guilty plea to a reduced manslaughter charge.
During her trial, Boone testified that past violent incidents between her and Torres caused her to perceive a threat of imminent harm and that she acted in self-defense by keeping him in the suitcase.
Mississippi
Trial set for man charged in killing of college student
OXFORD , Miss. (AP) — A man is set to go on trial starting this week in the 2022 killing of a University of Mississippi student who was well-known in the local LGBTQ+ community.
Sheldon “Timothy” Herrington Jr. of Grenada, Mississippi, is charged with capital murder in the death of Jimmy “Jay” Lee, 20, who was last seen July 8, 2022, at an apartment complex in Oxford.
Lee’s body has not been found. In October, a judge declared him dead after Lee’s parents requested that declaration.
Herrington has maintained his innocence.
Both Herrington and Lee had graduated from the University of Mississippi. Lee was pursuing a master’s degree.
Police said cellphone history showed conversations between Herrington and Lee the morning that Lee disappeared. They said Herrington also searched online about international travel and “how long it takes to strangle someone” minutes after Lee said he was on his way to Herrington’s apartment.
Surveillance video recorded Herrington running from where Lee’s car was found, and he was later seen picking up a shovel and wheelbarrow at his parents’ house, authorities said.
Herrington, who had graduated from the university, was arrested two weeks after Lee vanished, then released five months later on a $250,000 bond after agreeing to surrender his passport and wear an ankle monitor. A grand jury in March 2023 indicted him on a capital murder charge.
Prosecutors have announced they do not intend to pursue the death penalty, meaning he could get a life sentence if convicted.
Judge sets trial date for man charged with killing his wife
BOSTON (AP) — A judge has set a date of Oct. 20, 2025, for the trial of a Massachusetts man charged with killing his wife.
Brian Walshe faces first-degree murder, misleading a police investigation and other charges in the death of his wife, Ana Walshe, whose body has never been recovered. He has pleaded not guilty to all charges.
Walshe, dressed in a suit and his wrists in handcuffs, appeared Monday in Norfolk Superior Court before Judge Diane Freniere, who recently took over the case.
Walshe’s defense team is seeking documents related to the handling of two other cases by Norfolk County investigators — including the Karen Read murder trial and the alleged killing of Sandra Birchmore by a Stoughton, Massachusetts, detective Matthew Farwell.
Freniere didn’t rule Monday.
Defense attorneys are specifically seeking emails and text messages from the lead investigator on the Karen Read case, Trooper Michael Proctor, who helped lead the investigations that resulted in the arrests of both Walshe and Read.
Prosecutors have said some of the information sought by defense attorneys is privileged or exempt because of a pending federal prosecution.
Ana Walshe, who is originally from Serbia, was last seen early on Jan. 1, 2023 following a New Year’s Eve dinner at her Massachusetts home with her husband and a family friend, prosecutors said.
Brian Walshe said she was called back to Washington, D.C., on New Year’s Day for a work emergency. He didn’t contact her employer until Jan. 4. The company — the first to notify police that Ana Walshe was missing — said there was no emergency, prosecutors said.
Prosecutors have said that starting Jan. 1 and for several days after, Brian Walshe made multiple online searches for “dismemberment and best ways to dispose of a body,” “how long before a body starts to smell” and “hacksaw best tool to dismember.”
Prosecutors have also said that Ana Walshe had taken out $2.7 million in life insurance naming her husband as the sole beneficiary.
Walshe was also sentenced earlier this year to more than three years behind bars over an unrelated art fraud case involving the sale of two fake Andy Warhol paintings. He was ordered to pay $475,000 in restitution.
Walshe’s scheme, prosecutors said, started with his selling the two original Warhol paintings in 2011 to a gallery. From there, he obtained replicas of the paintings in 2015 and sold those to a buyer in France before trying to sell the two fake abstracts on eBay.
Florida
Woman sentenced to life for zipping boyfriend into suitcase, suffocating him
A Florida woman was sentenced Monday to life in prison for zipping her boyfriend into a suitcase and leaving him to die of suffocation amid a history of domestic and alcohol abuse.
Circuit Judge Michael Kraynick imposed the sentence in Orlando on Sarah Boone, 47, for the 2020 killing of 42-year-old Jorge Torres.
A jury deliberated only 90 minutes Oct. 25 before convicting Boone of the second-degree murder of Jorge Torres after a 10-day trial. Boone had insisted she was herself a victim of domestic violence at the hands of Torres and had rejected a plea deal offer of a 15-year sentence.
Torres’ family members testified at the hearing that his death has torn them apart.
In her own statement, Boone went through a litany of abuse by Torres she said occurred over many years, decried the way her trial was handled and covered by the media, yet asked forgiveness for her actions.
At first, Boone told Orange County Sheriff’s Office investigators that she and Torres had been drinking heavily and playing hide-and-seek on Feb. 23, 2020, in their Winter Park, Florida, residence when they thought it would be amusing for the 103-pound (47-kilogram) Torres to climb into the suitcase. Winter Park is a suburb of Orlando.
They had been drinking alcohol and she decided to go to sleep, figuring that Torres could get out of the suitcase on his own, she told detectives in an arrest report.
When she woke up the next morning, she didn’t find Torres but then remembered he was in the suitcase. She unzipped the suitcase and found him unresponsive, the arrest report said.
Boone was charged with second-degree murder after investigators found videos on her cellphone in which Torres is heard yelling from inside the suitcase that he couldn’t breathe and repeatedly calling out Boone’s name, according to the arrest report.
“She decided to keep (Torres) in the suitcase when he said he could not breathe in it to terrorize him,” prosecutor William Jay said in a court filing. “She then struck him with a baseball bat.”
Boone rejected a plea offer from prosecutors that would have imposed a 15-year prison sentence in exchange for her guilty plea to a reduced manslaughter charge.
During her trial, Boone testified that past violent incidents between her and Torres caused her to perceive a threat of imminent harm and that she acted in self-defense by keeping him in the suitcase.
Mississippi
Trial set for man charged in killing of college student
OXFORD , Miss. (AP) — A man is set to go on trial starting this week in the 2022 killing of a University of Mississippi student who was well-known in the local LGBTQ+ community.
Sheldon “Timothy” Herrington Jr. of Grenada, Mississippi, is charged with capital murder in the death of Jimmy “Jay” Lee, 20, who was last seen July 8, 2022, at an apartment complex in Oxford.
Lee’s body has not been found. In October, a judge declared him dead after Lee’s parents requested that declaration.
Herrington has maintained his innocence.
Both Herrington and Lee had graduated from the University of Mississippi. Lee was pursuing a master’s degree.
Police said cellphone history showed conversations between Herrington and Lee the morning that Lee disappeared. They said Herrington also searched online about international travel and “how long it takes to strangle someone” minutes after Lee said he was on his way to Herrington’s apartment.
Surveillance video recorded Herrington running from where Lee’s car was found, and he was later seen picking up a shovel and wheelbarrow at his parents’ house, authorities said.
Herrington, who had graduated from the university, was arrested two weeks after Lee vanished, then released five months later on a $250,000 bond after agreeing to surrender his passport and wear an ankle monitor. A grand jury in March 2023 indicted him on a capital murder charge.
Prosecutors have announced they do not intend to pursue the death penalty, meaning he could get a life sentence if convicted.
