Friend describes worry, search
Testifies of wait inside Entwistles' Hopkinton home
WOBURN - Joanna Gately stood by Rachel Entwistle during the many milestones of the new mother's life since they became close at Holy Cross.
Gately traveled to England when Lilly was born. She stayed at her friend's family home in Carver for two weeks after Rachel moved back to the United States. She even accompanied the Entwistles as they signed the lease on their first house in Hopkinton.
And so Gately instinctively knew something was terribly wrong that Saturday night in January 2006, when she found no one home to meet her and her sister, Maureen, as they arrived for dinner.
The two kept vigil in the car during the cold night, spent hours driving up and down Route 9 looking for her friend's BMW, and several more hours in the living room of the Hopkinton house, waiting for Rachel.
What Gately did not know, however, was that as she sat downstairs, Rachel Entwistle lay with her baby upstairs in the second-floor bedroom, shot to death.
"The situation was very unlike Rachel; I was concerned," Gately testified yesterday in Middlesex Superior Court, referring to the night of Jan. 21. Her testimony came on the third day in the trial of Neil Entwistle, 29, who is charged with the killings on Jan. 20, 2006.
Witnesses said yesterday that Entwistle bought a one-way ticket minutes before he boarded a
Despite a house check by police on the Saturday night Gately was there and a search by the Gately sisters the following morning, the bodies of Rachel, 27, and Lillian, 9 months, were not found until Sunday afternoon during a second police search.
Gately said a neighbor let the sisters into the Entwistle home Sunday morning using the keypad code she learned from the owners. The Gately sisters saw that the television was left on in the living room, noticed the phone missing from the kitchen, the toilet in the master bedroom suite used, and heard music coming from Lilly's room.
"There were many things unusual that night," Gately said.
Hopkinton police Officer Aaron O'Neil also testified yesterday. On cross-examination, defense lawyer Elliot Weinstein grilled the officer, who along with Hopkinton police Sergeant Michael Sutton opened the Entwistles' front door with a movie rental card from Blockbuster and did the initial search.
"Blockbuster - the item of choice for law enforcement to get past the lock because it is softer and more pliable," Weinstein mocked.
Then Weinstein berated O'Neil for failing to find the bodies.
"Your purpose for going inside was to look around the place, to see if you could find anyone," Weinstein said. "You looked. You looked carefully because you weren't going to be careless. Did you find anybody?"
O'Neil acknowledged that neither he nor Sutton found anyone. But he said he searched the lower level of the home while Sutton searched upstairs. Sutton is expected to testify today.
Rachel and Lillian were later found in bed under a comforter and pillow.
Gately testified that her friend never divulged that she was having financial or marital problems.
"It was a very loving relationship, a new family with a new baby," Gately said. "They seemed very happy and excited."
Another witness who testified yesterday, Pamela Jackson of Hopkinton said she, too, was struck by the couple's love and Neil Entwistle's devotion to Lilly.
"They were very happy," she said. "They told me how they met and showed me graduation pictures [of Rachel]. Every time the baby would coo or make a sound . . . he would actually avert his eyes and just concentrate on the baby. He beamed."
Jackson, the town's 'welcome lady,' said that during a 50-minute visit, Entwistle asked her about the local schools, groups for mothers, and the Hopkinton Country Club. He also told her that he was a computer engineer, was involved in the insurance industry, and had plenty of money, she said.
The night before his flight home to England, Entwistle made seven attempts to withdraw large sums of money from the joint account he shared with Rachel, but was denied all but $800, witnesses said yesterday. His account was overdrawn, but covered by a line of credit that amounted to $2,375.50, witnesses said.
After Jackson testified - and during testimony from a Massachusetts Port Authority employee - Entwistle's mother, Yvonne, became emotionally overwhelmed and was escorted, red-faced and teary-eyed, by her husband, Clifford, from the courtroom.
