Fight over estate of Brian Walshe's father, who lived in Hull, reveals troubling accusations
PLYMOUTH — The only reason the world knows that the father of Brian Walshe left a will is that a friend took a cellphone picture of it.
Walshe is accused of destroying the will, which spells out in writing that he had been essentially disinherited by his father.
"I hereby bequeath to Brian R. Walshe my best wishes but nothing else from my estate," reads the will for Dr. Thomas Walshe.
Until now, the dispute over the will and the estate had played out quietly in Plymouth Probate Court. But now, with Walshe at the center of international attention and behind bars related to his wife, details surface.
"Brian was and is only interested in getting his father's money," wrote Dr. Fred Pescatore, a longtime friend of Dr. Thomas Walshe, in an affidavit.
Brian is accused of taking the will out of his father's house in Hull and destroying it, and then selling the contents of the home, including jewelry, a car and artwork, including an original Salvador Dali painting.
But another friend of Dr. Walshe's — Jeffrey Ornstein — had taken a picture of the will with his cell phone.
Along with a nephew, Ornstein and Pescatore's court filings worked to stop Brian from selling Dr. Walshe's waterfront home and sought an accounting of what happened to the items inside it.
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The documents also offer an explanation for why Dr. Walshe disinherited his son.
Dr. Walshe left the family when Brian was young, a family that was a "severely dysfunctional and hostile environment," Ornstein wrote.
Ornstein mentioned further problems: "Brian had been a long-term patient at Austen Riggs Center-Psychiatric Hospital, he was diagnosed as a sociopath, and this would never change."
Both referred to a more recent rift, about 10 years before Dr. Walshe's death, where Dr. Walshe said Brian stole about $800,000 from his father during a home refinance deal.
And the friends wrote that Brian's troubles weren't limited to theft.
"I even went on a trip to China with Brian and Tom and my partner at the time. I witnessed firsthand what Brian was capable of. I saw Brian attempt to smuggle out antiquities from China. When Brian was confronted, he picked up a stanchion and literally attempted to kill four or five guards that had come to talk to him about his crime. Brian is not only a sociopath but also a very angry and physically violent person," Pescatore wrote.
Brian Walshe had claimed in the court documents that he and his father had reunited and that his father wanted to live with him and his family. But Dr. Walshe's friends said in the court records that, essentially, that couldn't be more untrue.
This article originally appeared on The Patriot Ledger: Fight over estate of Brian Walshe's father reveals troubling accusations
