A Massachusetts lady gets on test once more for the fatality of her law enforcement officer sweetheart, after a court was incapable to get to a judgment in the preliminary murder test in 2015.
Karen Read is charged of eliminating her sweetheart, John O’Keefe, a Boston law enforcement officer, in January 2022. The prosecution declares that, complying with an evening of alcohol consumption in Canton, Read struck O’Keefe with her SUV beyond a personal home, after that left the scene. A postmortem examination discovered that he passed away of hypothermia and candid pressure injuries to the head.
Read’s defense lawyer have actually long fixated accusations that the offender was the topic of a whitewash.
Read has actually kept her virtue. She begged innocent to fees consisting of second-degree murder, car homicide while running a car intoxicated of alcohol and leaving the scene of an accident creating fatality.
Throughout opening up declarations Tuesday in Norfolk Region Superior Court in Dedham, unique district attorney Hank Brennan concentrated on various accounts Review has actually given up meetings with the media, in which he declares Read makes a collection of “admissions.” Brennan introduced his intent to existing Read’s various declarations to the media as crucial proof in the Republic’s situation.
” You are mosting likely to speak with her very own lips, and a number of her declarations, her admissions to her phenomenal drunkenness. Her admissions to driving the Lexus. Her admissions to being upset at John that evening,” he claimed.
Brennan guided the court’s interest to a clip of the offender’s meeting from October 2024.
” I really did not believe I ‘struck him,’ struck him,” Read claimed in the meeting. “However could I have clipped him, could I have touched him in the knee and paralyzed him?”
Karen Read talks with her protection group throughout her 2nd murder test at Norfolk Superior Court, April 22, 2025 in Dedham, Mass.
Stuart Cahill/The Boston Herald using AP
Brennan informed jurors they will certainly see a host of video clip and DNA proof throughout the test, including what he claimed is DNA of O’Keefe’s hair recuperated from Read’s bumper.
He additionally indicated proof drew from Read’s Lexus, which he claimed will certainly reveal that the offender’s car turned around a minimum of 70 feet around the moment of the claimed murder. Brennan consistently highlighted the damaged taillight determined on the offender’s car as proof that her Lexus struck O’Keefe.
Defense lawyer Alan Jackson insisted in his opening up declaration that Read did not trigger the fatality of O’Keefe.
” There was no accident with John O’Keefe,” Jackson duplicated 3 times.
Jackson claimed the assertion that O’Keefe was struck by Read’s Lexus SUV is “unlike scientific research.”
” John O’Keefe did not pass away from being struck by a car, duration,” Jackson claimed.
Jackson guaranteed to reveal the court that the cops examination on which the Republic has actually based its situation is “filled with mistakes.”
He made various recommendations to individual connections that examining police officers accepted witnesses in this situation, consisting of Boston policemans Brian Albert, that possessed the home where O’Keefe was discovered dead on the yard.
The lawyer additionally slammed the participation of previous Massachusetts State Authorities Cannon Fodder Michael Proctor, the lead private investigator in the event. Jackson presented Proctor as “a longtime family members pal of the Alberts that has actually been reproached by his very own firm,” mentioning his termination by state cops.
” You’ll see from the proof in this situation that this situation brings a hatred, one that is spread out via the examination,” Jackson claimed. “It’s spread out via the prosecution from the actual begin, from the dive, a cancer cells that can not be eliminated, a cancer cells that can not be healed, which cancer cells has a name. His name is Michael Proctor.”
The lawyer guaranteed to reveal the court individual sms message in between Proctor and his secondary school close friends, in which he made repulsive and sexist remarks concerning Read. Jackson after that declared that Proctor confessed in the exact same message discussion to confiscating the offender’s cellular phone without her approval and looking her phone for naked pictures.
Proctor’s family members reacted to Jackson’s opening declaration, calling it “yet an additional instance of the horrible, and outrageous manufacture of lies that personifies their protection method” in a declaration to ABC Boston associate WCVB.
” Jackson is under no vow to level; he does not need to talk actually,” the declaration proceeded. “The protection group remains to do anything to disperse from realities of the situation and remains to make use of unacceptable examples like casting a person as a cancer cells. We completely think the fact will certainly dominate in this situation, and justice for Policeman John O’Keefe and his family members will be accomplished.”
Karen Read shows up with her lead defense lawyer Alan Jackson, left, for her test at Norfolk Superior Court, April 22, 2025, in Dedham, Mass.
Charles Krupa/AP
The Republic’s initial witness, Timothy Nuttall, a Canton fireman and paramedic that provided clinical help to O’Keefe, affirmed that he listened to Read claim, “I struck him,” at the scene.
” She claimed, ‘I struck him, I struck him, I struck him,'” Nuttall claimed. “I remember it extremely definitely.”
In his interrogation, Jackson concentrated on the witness’ capability to properly remember information from that early morning.
Jackson indicated a variance in between Nuttall’s testament in Read’s initial test, where he mentioned that Read claimed, “I struck him,” two times, and his declarations Tuesday in court, where he currently declares she duplicated the declaration 3 times.
” So your memory is more clear today, currently, as you rest right here, than it was a year back, when you affirmed it was 2 times?” Jackson asked.
” Yes, sir,” Nuttall claimed with a nod.
The following witness, Kerry Roberts, affirmed that she saw Read indicate an irregularity in the taillight of her SUV the early morning that O’Keefe was discovered which she remembered seeing an item missing out on.
Roberts will certainly resume her testament on Wednesday. The test is anticipated to last 6 to 8 weeks.
Hours prior to the process started on Tuesday, approximately 2 lots militants sustaining Read collected near the court house. Court Beverly Cannone got a 200-foot no-protest area around the court house for guaranteeing a reasonable test.
A guy “remaining and recording” within the barrier area was detained Tuesday early morning after cops claim he disregarded several demands to leave the area, Massachusetts State Authorities claimed. The Arlington guy was anticipated to be arraigned Tuesday on a trespassing cost, cops claimed.
ABC Information’ Nadine El-Bawab added to this record.
