Karen Read’s Murder Case to Be Retried After Jury Declares Mistrial – One America News Network
OAN Staff Blake Wolf
10:53 AM – Friday, August 23, 2024
A judge involved in the case of Karen Read has ruled that she can be retried for murder in regards to the death of her boyfriend, a Boston police officer.
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Read is accused of killing her boyfriend, John O’Keefe, in January 2022 by allegedly ramming into him with her SUV and leaving him for dead in a snowstorm.
The incident occurred in 2022, when Read drove her car and dropped off her highly intoxicated boyfriend at a party at the residence of one of his fellow police officers. He was later found dead, laying on the ground in front of the house.
Subsequently, Read was accused by police of hitting him with her car before driving away.
The slain Boston officer’s autopsy report stated that the cause of death was “hypothermia and blunt force trauma.”
However, after the case went to trial, the judge declared a mistrial following a “deadlock within the jurors” on the fifth day of deliberations.
After the mistrial announcement, Read’s lawyers presented evidence regarding four jurors who stated that the jury was only deadlocked on a manslaughter charge, and they also said that the jury unanimously agreed Read was not guilty of second-degree murder or guilty of leaving the scene of a deadly accident.
Additionally, Read’s lawyers argued that the murder charge and leaving the scene of a deadly accident should be thrown out, citing an unconstitutional double jeopardy.
Nevertheless, the judge dismissed the argument, saying, “Where there was no verdict announced in open court here, retrial of the defendant does not violate the principle of double jeopardy.”
Prosecutors in the case have criticized the defense on an “insubstantial but sensational post-trial claim” based in “hearsay, conjecture and legally inappropriate reliance as to the substance of jury deliberations.”
The retrial is set to take place on January 27th.
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