After deliberating since June 13, the jury Wednesday pronounced the verdict in the Karen Read case and found her not guilty of second-degree murder in the death of her Boston police officer boyfriend John O’Keefe but guilty of a lesser charge of drunken driving. Read’s lawyers have been claiming for long that she was framed by the police after she dropped O’Keefe off at a party at the resident of a fellow officer. Prosecutors argued the 45-year-old Read hit O’Keefe, 46, with her SUV before driving away, but the defense maintained O’Keefe was killed inside the home and later dragged outside.The incident took place in January 2022. It became one of the most highly watched cases. Read faced charges of second-degree murder, manslaughter and leaving the scene outside Boston. A second-degree murder conviction would have carried a life sentence.Read’s first trial ended in a mistrial in July 2024 after the jury could not reach a verdict.
O’Keefe was beaten and then left outside the home, not hit by car
Read’s defense said O’Keefe was beaten, bitten by a dog, then left outside a home in the Boston suburb of Canton in a conspiracy orchestrated by the police that included planting evidence.Prosecutors have described Read as a scorned lover who chose to leave O’Keefe dying in the snow after striking him with her SUV outside the house party. The state’s case was led by special prosecutor Hank Brennan, who called fewer witnesses than prosecutor Adam Lally, who ran the first trial against Read.Describing O’Keefe as a “good man” who “helped people,” Brennan told jurors during closing arguments that O’Keefe needed help that night and the only person who could provide it was Read. Instead, she drove away in her SUV. “She was drunk. She hit him and she left him to die,” he said.Defense attorney Alan Jackson rejected the idea that there was ever a collision at all. He and the defense called forward expert witnesses who agreed. “There is no evidence that John was hit by a car. None. This case should be over right now, done, because there was no collision,” Jackson said during closing arguments.