NEW YORK — Authorities in Turks and Caicos are working to determine if a decomposing body found in a bay is the missing New Yorker they have been looking for over the last two weeks.
The family of Brian Tarrence hired a private investigator to help with the search and now all they can do is wait for news.
Tarrence and his wife Maria had planned on spending seven days in paradise. The couple left their home in Manhattan for what was supposed to be a relaxing, one-year anniversary celebration.
But when Maria woke up one morning and couldn’t find her husband, she knew something was wrong.
One of the last images of Tarrence was taken from security cameras outside the villa where he was staying at the Paradise Inn. It was taken around 3:40 a.m. on Wednesday, June 25, and he is alone.
His family has since hired a private investigator who was formerly with the NYPD.
Carl DeFazio lives on the island and is working closely with the Turks and Caicos Police Force.
There has been a potentially big break in this case which, as of now, is only being looked at as a death investigation.
Over the weekend, at about 6:30 a.m. Saturday, search teams found a decomposed body of man in a roughly 5-foot-deep ditch on the side of the road.
DeFazio said additional security footage that has not yet been released shows Tarrence in that same area.
The coroner will have to positivity identify the body.
DeFazio says the day before Tarrence disappeared, the couple went on a boat trip and his wife said her husband seemed off.
“The day that he did disappear, he was having some, I would say mental issues, he was not under doctors’ care, he was not under any kind of medication that I’m aware of that was shared with me, but he was acting incoherent, he wasn’t acting the same as he was and the wife was quite concerned with that,” DeFazio said.
Tarrence is a vice president at Diligent Software.
A spokesperson issued a statement, saying in part, “We have made ourselves available to fully cooperate with local law enforcement and have engaged a security firm to support the ongoing search efforts.”
DeFazio says many people have reached out to him who want to help with the search. He said at this point there is no indication a crime has been committed.
Copyright © 2025 WABC-TV. All Rights Reserved.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by PostX News and is published from a syndicated feed.)
