Police say videos and images recovered from an Olney home appear to show two women alive and later dead.
PHILADELPHIA — A sprawling investigation of an Olney home has become a death investigation after detectives found digital images and videos that appear to show two women who disappeared years ago alive inside the property and later dead, Philadelphia police said.
Police identified the women as Maribel Fresses, who was 27 when she disappeared in 2018, and Gabrielle Amarando, who was 22 when she disappeared in 2012. Their bodies have not been recovered, leaving investigators without the physical remains normally used to establish a cause and manner of death. Police said the women’s families were notified after investigators reviewed the material.
The discovery marks the most significant development yet in an investigation that began in June and has led authorities to repeatedly search a home in the 400 block of West Chew Avenue. The property is associated with 44-year-old Eugene Horsch and his late father, Raymond Horsch. Eugene Horsch has not been charged in connection with the deaths or disappearances of Fresses or Amarando.
Police Inspector Raymond Evers said detectives found the images while reviewing a large collection of electronic evidence seized from the house. Authorities have recovered more than 600,000 images, about 70,000 videos and more than 10,000 pages of writings, manuscripts and drawings, according to police. Investigators said they had examined only a small portion of that material as of Wednesday.
The footage reviewed so far includes images of Fresses and Amarando alive in the home as well as later material in which they appear to be dead, police said. Evers described some of the evidence as disturbing but did not publicly detail what the recordings showed. Investigators are also trying to determine when the material was created and whether it has been altered.
Police said the Philadelphia medical examiner reviewed information from the investigation but cannot issue death certificates or determine causes of death without recovered remains. Investigators said the medical examiner’s assessment was that, if the images are authentic and unaltered, the women depicted in them are dead. That leaves police in an unusual position: pursuing evidence of deaths without having located bodies.
The investigation began after Eugene Horsch was encountered near Independence Mall on June 19. Authorities said officers recovered guns, drugs and fraudulent federal credentials. A woman with Horsch also possessed identification bearing the name Blair Tonzelli, another woman who had previously been reported missing. That discovery helped lead investigators to the West Chew Avenue property.
Searches of the home have since produced firearms, gun parts, fraudulent federal identification, electronic devices, urns believed to contain cremated remains and containers holding unknown substances, police said. Some of those substances were sent for laboratory testing. Investigators also examined portions of the property and its sewer system as they searched for possible evidence tied to missing-person cases.
The home had already drawn scrutiny because of two other disappearances. Tonzelli had been linked to the property during the investigation, while Amy McHale, the former wife of Raymond Horsch, was last known to have been at the house before she disappeared in 2016. Police have not announced that either woman has been found, and authorities have not publicly established that their disappearances are connected to Fresses or Amarando.
Eugene Horsch remains in federal custody on charges unrelated to the suspected deaths. Court records cited by local news organizations show he was federally indicted on allegations involving firearm possession by a convicted felon and an unlawfully produced document and authentication feature. Those accusations have not been adjudicated, and police have not accused him of killing Fresses or Amarando.
Investigators said additional searches and forensic work are expected as detectives examine the remaining digital material and try to establish a timeline for the women’s movements and the recordings recovered from the property. Police have said the scale of the evidence means the investigation could be lengthy, and key questions — including how the women died, when they died and who was responsible — remain unanswered.
Author note: Last updated August 13, 2026.