What's adjacent for Karen Read
Karen Read was acquitted Wednesday of the astir superior charges successful the 2022 decease of her boyfriend, Boston constabulary serviceman John O'Keefe. Why did the assemblage wide her and what's adjacent for Read?
Read was found not guilty of second-degree murder, manslaughter portion operating nether the power of alcohol, and leaving the country of bodily wounded successful O'Keefe's decease successful Canton, Massachusetts. She was lone convicted connected a complaint of operating nether the power (OUI) and was sentenced to 1 twelvemonth of probation.
Former CBS News ineligible expert Rikki Klieman, who's covered the lawsuit extensively, said the verdict was "predictable."
Karen Read lawsuit "riddled with tenable doubt"
"This was a lawsuit that I deliberation was riddled with tenable doubt," Klieman said Thursday connected "CBS Mornings."
"One of things that radical don't recognize until they get successful it connected a assemblage is what that means. If you deliberation someone's guilty, if you conjecture they're guilty, you fishy they're guilty, but you don't person a condemnation to a motivation certainty, you indispensable acquit. Doesn't mean a idiosyncratic is innocent. Just means the Commonwealth didn't beryllium its lawsuit beyond a tenable doubt."
Karen Read proceedings experts "cancel each different out"
Both the prosecution and Read's attorneys presented experts to bolster their cases, and described precise antithetic versions of events.
Prosecutor Hank Brennan said Read "was drunk, she deed him, past she near him to die." Read's lawyer Alan Jackson told the court, "There was nary collision," and that "There is nary grounds that John was deed by a car. None. How overmuch much tenable uncertainty could determination be?"
"It depends connected which adept you believe," Klieman said of the jury. "You had Commonwealth experts who had 1 theory, and you had precise bully defence experts who had the other theory. And the defence adept said that car, Karen Read's car, ne'er deed John O'Keefe. They cancel each different retired arsenic experts. And if that isn't doubt, I don't cognize what is."
Klieman besides highlighted the relation of pb investigator Michael Proctor, who was fired by Massachusetts State Police for his behaviour portion handling Read's case.
"He was idiosyncratic who besides supervised 1 of the astir sloppy constabulary investigations of each time," she said.
Karen Read attorneys had "dress rehearsal" advantage
In 2024, Read's archetypal proceedings ended with a mistrial owed to a "starkly divided" hung jury. In her 2nd trial, jurors deliberated for astir 20 hours.
"In this case, the defence intelligibly had an vantage due to the fact that they had had a formal rehearsal. They knew what their anemic points were," Klieman said.
"Alan Jackson is 1 of the champion transgression defence lawyers successful the country. And Hank Brennan is besides close up determination arsenic a defence lawyer. He was appointed arsenic peculiar prosecutor. So, for a pupil of the law, if you tin instrumentality emotion retired of it, to ticker them enactment was a happening of existent quality and it could thatch young lawyers however to effort cases."
What's adjacent for Karen Read?
Read is inactive facing a civil wrongful decease lawsuit that was filed by O'Keefe's household successful August 2024. It was filed successful Plymouth Superior Court successful Brockton, Massachusetts, and seeks astatine slightest $50,000 successful damages. Klieman said the civilian lawsuit volition diagnostic a overmuch lighter load of impervious than the transgression trial.
"First of all, we person to retrieve that idiosyncratic died present who was a precise decent quality being by each accounts," Klieman said. "The civilian lawsuit is successful a civilian court, it's successful a antithetic courthouse, antithetic load of proof, impervious to [standard of] 'a preponderance of evidence.' As I ever say, that's similar a feather connected the scale, whereas impervious beyond a tenable doubt, you request similar a pb balloon. And truthful is determination a large accidental that they volition prevail — that is, the household — successful the civilian court? Yes, they person a large chance. And precise smart, they besides sued the bars who they claimed over-served her. And determination was nary question she was drunk that night."
Read has not been deposed yet successful the civilian case. A justice ruled successful November that it could hold until her 2nd transgression proceedings ended.
In a civilian trial, Read would lone beryllium liable for monetary damages if she's recovered liable for O'Keefe's death.
Matt Schooley is simply a integer shaper astatine CBS Boston. He has been a subordinate of the WBZ quality squad for the past decade.
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