Entwistle Pleads Not Guilty To Murder

A British man pleaded not guilty Thursday to first-degree murder charges and was ordered held without bail in the shooting deaths of his wife and infant daughter at their suburban Boston home.

Neil Entwistle, 27, was arrested last week in his native England, where he flew a day after his wife, Rachel, and 9-month-old daughter Lillian were shot to death. He was flown back to Massachusetts by U.S. authorities on Wednesday after he agreed not to fight extradition.

Entwistle arrived at his arraignment in Framingham District Court in a police cruiser after spending the night in a holding cell at the Hopkinton Police Department, in the same town where he once lived with his family, CBS News correspondent Bianca Solorzano reports. He was handcuffed, shackled at the legs and wearing a bullet-proof vest.

There was extra security on hand at the district courthouse, reports Christina Hager of CBS station WBZ-TV in Boston. The crush of media outside the courthouse slowed traffic to a crawl on nearby Route 126. One passing motorist yelled at the assembled reporters: "Burn that baby killer."

Entwistle did not speak during the brief hearing as his lawyer, Elliot Weinstein, entered the plea on his behalf. District Court Judge Robert Greco ordered Entwistle held without bail pending a March 15 hearing, although the case could be transferred to Superior Court before then. The brief court session was broadcast live on cable television news stations.

Entwistle was then taken to the jail inside the Middlesex District Court building in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Afterward, Weinstein lashed out at the extensive media coverage of the case. The hearing was televised live on U.S. cable television news stations.

"I don't know that Mr. Entwistle will ever be able to get a fair trial on these charges," Weinstein said outside the courthouse. "I am certain that anybody watching this telecast or reading the reporting of today's arraignment has already formed an opinion with respect to Mr. Entwistle's guilt. ... And that opinion is based on absolutely no facts and absolutely no evidence, and that is quite unfortunate."

He declined to take questions, saying: "I am not going to continue the publicity mill that surrounds this case."

More than a dozen of Rachel Entwistle's family and friends filled the first three rows of the courtroom. The women carried bouquets of lilies and roses tied with long white ribbons.

Rachel Entwistle's mother, Priscilla Matterazzo, never took her eyes off her son-in-law.

A family spokesman, Joseph Flaherty, read a statement from the Matterazzos outside the courthouse.

"To think that someone we loved, trusted and opened our home to could do this to our daughter and granddaughter is beyond belief," he said. "From what we have learned through the course of the investigation, we are now only coming to realize the level of his deceit.

"Neil betrayed our trust in so many different ways that it is almost impossible to describe," Flaherty said.

Prosecutors say Entwistle shot his wife and daughter on Jan. 20 at their home in Hopkinton with his father-in-law's .22-caliber handgun. Legal experts tell Hager the evidence that has been made public so far against Entwistle is overwhelming.

He was despondent over mounting debts and may have planned to turn the weapon on himself, according to Middlesex District Attorney Martha Coakley. Instead, he flew to the United Kingdom on Jan. 21 and stayed at his parents' home in Worksop, in central England.

The bodies were discovered by police on Jan. 22, under a pile of blankets on a bed. Search warrant affidavits describe how Rachel Entwistle's relatives called police after the couple organized a dinner party but did not answer their door when guests arrived.

"The description of the bodies really didn't match what the police found at the scene," says CBS News legal analyst Wendy Murphy. "I think this is a guy who is desperately trying to cover up what he had done, but really couldn't even get his story straight."

In the days before the slayings, Entwistle did research online about ways to kill people and how to commit suicide, according to the affidavits made public this week. He also trolled the Internet for escort services and other Web sites offering help finding sexual partners, the documents allege.

Entwistle met Rachel Souza, a Holy Cross student from Kingston, in 1999 at Britain's University of York, in northern England, where she was spending the year abroad.

The couple married in 2003 and lived in England. In April 2005, Lillian was born. The couple moved to Carver in southeastern Massachusetts last summer and lived with Rachel's relatives.

Last month, they moved into a Colonial-style home they rented in Hopkinton for $2,700 a month. Ten days later, Rachel and Lillian Entwistle were found dead.