Jury finishes for the day in Entwistle case

June 24, 2008 04:50 PM Email| Comments (0)| Text size – +

By Franci R. Ellement, Globe Correspondent

WOBURN -- Jurors in Neil Entwistle's double-murder trial deliberated for seven hours today without reaching a verdict. They'll get back to work at Middlesex Superior Court tomorrow.

The only clue to what the jury might be discussing came this afternoon when jurors asked for a printout of the user and login information from the Briton's laptop computer for Jan. 20, 2006, the day his wife and daughter were killed.

Judge Diane Kottmyer instructed lawyers to make the 14-page printout available to the jury.

Defense attorney Elliot Weinstein said outside the courtroom, "login activity showed that computer user Neil accessed his job user information and e-mails related to jobs … and that's all."

Prosecutors presented evidence at trial that showed that Entwistle, 29, surfed the Internet searching for sexual relationships and female escorts around the time his wife, Rachel, 27, and 9-month old daughter were killed. Weinstein said today that the computer records sought by the jury did not include any sexual material or searches.

A jury began deliberating Entwistle's fate this morning after his defense team did not call a single witness and instead offered a stunning, controversial new assertion furthering its theory that Rachel Entwistle killed her daughter and herself.

Rachel Entwistle, 27, and Lillian Rose

"Neil found Rachel and Lillian dead," Weinstein said Monday in his closing argument in Middlesex Superior Court, where he said Entwistle had returned the gun to his in-laws' home and did not report finding the bodies because he did not want to shame his wife.

"Neil saw the .22 and knew instantly what had happened, and in those moments, he knew what he had to do and what he couldn't do," Weinstein said. "He had to get the .22 back to Carver, and he couldn't call the police because he couldn't tell them what Rachel did. He wouldn't tell them because he wouldn't tarnish Rachel's memory.

"Was he thinking rationally, clearly, or correctly? Of course not. How could he? Neil drove to Carver and returned the .22."

During the trial, the defense posed the theory that Rachel, 27, shot the couple's baby, 9-month-old Lillian Rose, and then herself.

But before Monday, Neil Entwistle had never acknowledged that he saw the gun on the bed and had never admitted returning the weapon to his father-in-law's house in Carver.

He had repeatedly told investigators that he drove to his in-laws' house, but could not get inside.
Introducing a new assertion during closing arguments is typically objectionable, if not questionable, according to several local lawyers. But Middlesex prosecutors did not object to it in open court. Some say the disclosure can mean that a defense team could not see the ultimate value in calling Entwistle to the stand, but thought it crucial to insert the new assertion that he took the gun back to his in-laws.

"They were trying to have their cake and eat it, too," said former assistant district attorney, William Fallon, who has attended the trial daily. "In this case, the defendant did not take the stand, but the defense attorney gave him voice."

Prosecutors say Entwistle, 29, gave in to the pressure of financial problems and sexual dissatisfaction and attempted to begin his life anew on Jan. 20, 2006, by shooting his wife in the head and his baby point-blank in the upper chest as they snuggled in bed in the family's rented Hopkinton home.

Entwistle was arrested nearly a month later in London after flying to his parents' home in Worksop.

After more than 30 witnesses in more than 12 days of testimony, the state rested its case Monday, and the defense called no witnesses.

"It's a time-honored defense tactic," said Timothy Bradl, a former assistant district attorney who is now a defense counsel. "It is itself a statement to the jury that the government hasn't met its burden of proof."

During closing remarks, prosecutor Michael Fabbri reminded the jury that Weinstein's new assertion was not evidence in the trial and readily rejected the defense assertion that the double homicide was a murder-suicide.

"Why would Rachel commit suicide?" Fabbri asked the jury. "Is there any evidence before you that suggests she had the desire or intent to commit suicide? She was back home. She had her family and . . . what she thought was a loving husband. She was happy. She had no reason to commit suicide."

Fabbri said that Entwistle was probably "projecting his own status onto Rachel," because he had no friends here, no family, "and was failing to provide for his family." The couple had moved from Entwistle's native England to live closer to Rachel's mother after Lillian was born.

"He got to the tipping point, his own tipping point," and killed his family, Fabbri said.
But Weinstein said the investigation was compromised because forensic scientists believed early on that Entwistle was a suspect, preventing them from pursuing other ballistics, DNA, and gunshot residue testing to rule on any possible suicide. "Nobody was open to even considering the possibility of suicide," Weinstein said.

He said it was unfair that the medical examiner was not told that gunshot residue was found on Rachel's hands, that the medical examiner said it would not have made a difference, that more testing of the gun was not conducted, and that no one bothered to get a better idea of whether Rachel was suffering from postpartum depression.

"You have every right and duty to hold failure of proof against the Commonwealth," Weinstein said.

Weinstein said Rachel "put Lilly over where she thought her heart was and then shot her. . . . Then she pointed the gun toward her head, steadied it with both hands and fired. Unfortunately, she struck herself in the forehead, and she died instantly."

Yet Fabbri said Rachel could never have shot her baby, suffered that pain, and then fired the fatal shot into the top of her own head, just above the hairline. He said if a juror were to believe the defense's story and Entwistle's contention that he found blood all over his daughter's mouth, "it is unimaginable, ladies and gentlemen: You see fresh bubbles [from your daughter who was shot] and you don't call 911 and get help?" Fabbri said.

At several points during Fabbri's arguments, Entwistle's father, Clifford, shook his head at the negative assertions made by the prosecutor.

Neil Entwistle remained stoic, but flushed for much of the proceedings. And nearly two dozen family and friends of Rachel crammed into three benches of the court.