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Briton accused of fatally shooting wife and baby
Neil Entwistle is charged in the fatal shootings of his 27-year-old wife, Rachel, and their nine-month-old daughter, Lillian Rose, in January 2006. His defence attorney said 29-year-old Entwistle was a loving husband and father who was so crazed with grief after discovering their bodies in their Hopkinton, Massachusetts, home that he flew to England to be consoled by his parents.
The lawyers gave their opening statements on Friday in Middlesex District Court after four days of jury selection. The jurors have been warned to expect testimony to be "graphic" and "gruesome." Entwistle, 29, originally from Worksop in the East Midlands, has pleaded not guilty to murdering his wife and daughter with his father-in-law's gun.
Trying to portray Entwistle as a caring father who could not have killed his wife and nine-month-old daughter, the defense asked the first witness to take the stand, the mother of his murdered wife, about Entwistle's behaviour as a spouse and parent. Appearing calm and composed, Priscilla Matterazzo confirmed that Entwistle helped cook and wash dishes when the couple lived in her home. Asked if he tended to his baby daughter when she woke crying in the night, she replied: "Sometimes."
Police found Rachel lying curled up with her nine-month baby clutched to her chest when they responded to a January 22 call from worried relatives who had not seen the two in some time. Baby Lillian had been shot through the stomach and the bullet passed through to her mother, who had also been shot in the head.
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