Philadelphia police said Eugene Horsch's Olney home at 417 Chew Ave. is now linked to the deaths of Maribel Fresses and Gabriela Amarando after investigators reviewed images and videos recovered from the house. Inspector Raymond Evers said the footage shows the women alive inside the home and later appearing dead, and police notified both families Wednesday morning.
Evers said the material tied to Fresses and Amarando was only a small portion of the evidence taken from a hard drive found at the house: more than 600,000 images, 70,000 videos and 10,000 pages of writing. He said the work is far from finished and that police will keep increasing activity at 417 Chew Avenue.
Maribel Fresses and Gabriela Amarando
Police identified the women as Maribel Fresses and Gabriela Amarando. Fresses was 27 and last seen in February 2018. Amarando was born in 1990 and had been missing since September 2012.
Evers said neither family knew Horsch or his father. He also said, “I’m not going to get into exactly what I saw,” before adding, “It’s real dark. But what we saw is these two girls alive. There’s a period of time, and it appears to us that they’re deceased. There are pieces of the video that we don’t have yet.”
Philadelphia Medical Examiner's Office
The Philadelphia Medical Examiner's Office said it could not conclusively declare the women dead without a body or body parts. The office said it would believe the individuals depicted in the images are deceased based on its review of the evidence, which leaves the case in a narrow but unusual position: police are treating the images as central evidence while the medical examiner cannot make a final death finding yet.
Evers called it “new territory for the Homicide Unit in Philadelphia” and said, “Usually, when we have a homicide investigation, we have a body. We have body parts. This time, we do not. … This is taking the energy of some really, really senior detectives in homicide to solve exactly what’s going on here.” He added, “This is going to be a very complex, long investigation.”
June 19 on Market Street
The case began around 8 a.m. on June 19 when a U.S. Park ranger saw a man inside a black BMW on the 600 block of Market Street appearing to threaten a female passenger. The ranger found two illegal handguns and around $8,000 in illegal drugs.
The female passenger gave an officer a fake ID identifying her as Blair Tonzelli, who had been reported missing in Kensington for over three years. The male driver had a fake Drug Enforcement Administration badge with Horsch's picture on it. Police and the DEA then found additional firearms, ammunition, vats of potentially hazardous chemicals, five urns filled with what are believed to be cremated remains and evidence of a narcotics grow operation at Horsch's house. The FBI was called to help investigate the substances.
Horsch was arrested on June 20 on multiple weapons and narcotics charges and was being held at Curran-Fromhold Correctional Facility. Evers said, “Our goal is to bring justice to the families. There will be increased police activity at 417 Chew Avenue. Our work is not done there.”
