Neil Entwistle Had Become a Person of Interest to the Whole World
By the time British police showed up to escort him to the interview with Hopkinton detectives, the handsome and boyish Entwistle was the subject of international speculation.
People the world over had surfed to www.rachelandneil.org, the elegantly-designed website Entwistle and his wife had made to showcase their impish baby, Lillian. They ogled pictures the young couple had taken during vacations to the Mediterranean, to York, to Martha's Vineyard in the U.S.
Media on both sides of the Atlantic, and the general public as well saw the good-looking couple, Rachel with her bright and open smile, Neil, broad-shouldered and fair-haired, their adorable baby, and wondered at how. How Rachel and Lillian ended up dead, swaddled in bedclothes in a dark house near Boston, a house the Entwistles had rented 10 days before for over $2500 a month — even though neither Neil nor Rachel had a job. Rachel and Lillian were apparently executed, then covered up and left alone. Until the morning of the 27th, Britons and Americans alike were wondering exactly where Neil Entwistle was, and if he too was a victim.
Britains who had studied with American-born Rachel Entwistle wrote messages of anger and mourning in the guestbook at rachelandneil.org. Americans took in Neil Entwistle's good looks, his winning smile, and wondered if they were seeing a slightly new twist on an old story, one that was far too familiar to any American who followed high-profile crimes in the news.
This story inevitably began with a disappearance or a mysterious murder, usually of an attractive, bright, and well-liked young woman. That woman might be pregnant when she vanished, or worse, have an infant depending on her. Sometimes, the infant was murdered or disappeared as well. The husband would come under suspicion immediately, because statistics tend to support the contention that the culprit is most often the spouse in such cases. Frequently, the husband might be, like Neil Entwistle, the picture of what many women might feel they really want in a man. Clean-cut Briton Neil Entwistle certainly didn't give the impression he might be a purveyor of Internet porn, or a pyramid-scheme scammer.
Comments in the Entwistle's online guestbook, which does not appear to be available now, indicated that Rachel had more than once referred to Neil Entwistle as her "Prince Charming." From their meeting during a year of school Rachel took in the U.K. while completing her degree at Holy Cross in Massachusetts, she seemed smitten. In photos the Entwistles made on their Mediterranean cruise in 2004, Rachel's smile appeared genuine as she gazed into the camera. She seemed to be a woman who was very much in love.
 |
| Rachel Entwistle and daughter Lillian |
Neil Entwistle's charm began to seem less sincere in the days after his wife and daughter were murdered. On the Internet, it began to appear as if Entwistle might have been involved in ventures that were, at the least, unsavory. One website that purported to sell computer parts, www.embeddednt.com, was registered to a Neil Entwistle just one street number off from Entwistle's in-law's address in Carver, MA. This site was a little vague and confusing as to what it offered, but perfectly legitimate in comparison to www.srpublications.co.uk. This website, now unavailable save through The Internet Wayback Machine, offered manuals on methods to enhance penis size and money-making schemes that seemed too easy, too quick to pay off in a 'big way.' Connected to srpublications.co.uk were two other domains, deephotsex.com, and thebigpenismanual.com. All three domains were registered under the same address in the United Kingdom:
10 Heslington Road
YO10 5DD
York
For srpublications.co.uk, a Neil Entwistle was listed as the registrant. Though the Heslington Road address was the same for the other two domains, a "Mark Smith" was listed as the registrant.
Then it was discovered that an account on eBay, a popular online auction site, was using srpublications as a screen name. That account had a year of positive feedback from buyers for various types of legitimate software as well as software that purported to teach the user how to make $20,000 in one week, using the internet. Beginning January 6, 2006, the feedback from buyers was almost universally negative. Most significant were comments left on Jan. 8 by a buyer using the screen name live-wire00. One example: "Rachel Entwistle is a thieving Liar(,) do not buy here!!"
Writing to me via my true crime weblog, HuffCrimeBlog.com, an eBay user named Anne gave the following information:
"Some of the software was being sold under the name Neil Entwistle, some under the name Rachel - whether that means both were involved or whether only one I don't know..."
Anne went on to state that electronic communication from Neil would come from an address using IEE — the Institute of Electrical Engineers. A check of the registration information for rachelandneil.org revealed Entwistle had given the following e-mail address — nentwistle@ieee.org.
The names Rachel and Neil Entwistle were then tied to the sketchy business srpublications, and possibly a known e-mail address of Neil Entwistle's, as well. It seemed that someone — either Entwistle or someone using his and his wife's names — was running a series of websites and eBay accounts designed to shaft buyers and yield maximum profit for the sellers.
But running an online scam is a long way from murder.
British Police were careful the morning of the 27th in the way they announced Neil Entwistle's trip to the American Embassy. Entwistle was going voluntarily, and he was being treated by Massachusetts police as a potential witness.
In a statement to the press, Middlesex, MA D.A. Martha Coakley was less diplomatic. "He is clearly a person of interest, as any husband in a case like this would be," said Coakley.
A friend of Rachel Entwistle's wrote to me regarding the suggestion by some in the British press that Rachel might have been her husband's partner in some of these online "ventures".
"She was a very moral woman and would never even take an extra penny if someone gave her the wrong change back. If she knew, she would have been floored but I don't think she would have asked for a divorce. She would have asked him to change and get a real job and, most importantly, pay those people back he scammed."
Neil Entwistle is not currently a suspect in his wife's murder, and there are no plans at the moment for him to be extradited back to the U.S.
Previous Page
For more daily crime news
default
increase
decrease
email
print
