Karen Read found not guilty of murder in retrial on police officer boyfriend’s death
Read was accused of killing her boyfriend John O’Keefe in 2022.
ByNadine El-Bawab, Erin Murtha, and Meredith Deliso
Karen Read found not guilty of murder and manslaughterA jury acquitted Read of second-degree murder, manslaughter and of fleeing the scene in the death of her boyfriend and Boston police officer John O’Keefe in 2022.
Josh Reynolds/AP
A Massachusetts jury found Karen Read not guilty of murdering her Boston police officer boyfriend in 2022, nearly a year after her first prosecution ended in a mistrial.
She was acquitted of the most serious charges, including second-degree murder, manslaughter and leaving the scene after an accident resulting in death.
The jury did find her guilty of operating under the influence of liquor. The judge immediately sentenced her to one-year probation, the standard for a first-time offense.
Cheers could be heard from outside the courthouse, where supporters of Read have gathered, while the verdict was being read. Read embraced her legal team and cried following the verdict.
A new “20/20” special, “Karen Read: The Verdict,” airing Wednesday, June 18, from 8 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET on ABC and streaming the next day on Hulu, examines the case.
The jury began deliberating the afternoon of June 13 in Norfolk County before reaching a verdict Wednesday afternoon.
Prosecutors alleged Read hit her boyfriend, John O’Keefe, with her car outside the Canton home of fellow police officer Brian Albert after a night of heavy drinking in January 2022 and then left him to die there during a major blizzard.
The defense had argued that Read’s vehicle did not hit O’Keefe and instead said O’Keefe was attacked by a dog and beaten by other people who were in the house before he was thrown out in the snow to die.
Read pleaded not guilty to the charges and has maintained her innocence.
In brief remarks upon leaving the courthouse, she thanked her “amazing supporters” for their financial and emotional support for the past nearly four years.
“No one has fought harder for justice than John O’Keefe than I have — than I have and my team,” Read added.
Following the verdict, several of the witnesses who testified against Read called the result of the retrial “a devastating miscarriage of justice.”
“Today, our hearts are with John and the entire O’Keefe family. They have suffered through so much and deserved better from our justice system,” members of the Albert and McCabe families said in a statement. “While we may have more to say in the future, today we mourn with John’s family and lament the cruel reality that this prosecution was infected by lies and conspiracy theories spread by Karen Read, her defense team, and some in the media.”
MORE: Karen Read retrial: Key takeaways as jury gets the case
During deliberations, the jury asked four questions, including, “If we find not guilty on two charges but can’t agree on one charge, is it a hung jury on all three charges or just one charge?” the judge told attorneys in court.
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The judge told the jury she is not able to respond to their question, telling attorneys it was a “theoretical question.”
The jury also asked about the time frame for when Read is accused of driving under the influence, whether video clips from Read’s interviews about the case are to be considered as evidence and if she is convicted on a sub-charge, if that would mean she is guilty on the overall charge.
In an unusual moment, Judge Beverly Cannone told the courtroom earlier Wednesday that the jury had indicated during the lunch break that they had reached a verdict, then updated that they did not have a verdict. Cannone sealed that verdict slip and informed the court that there was not yet a verdict “because, as we all know, there is no verdict until it is announced and recorded in open court.” The verdict was then read in court about 30 minutes later.
Read’s first trial ended in a mistrial in July 2024 after the jury could not reach a verdict.
At least four jurors who served on her first trial last year have confirmed that she was found not guilty of second-degree murder and leaving a scene of personal injury and death, according to Read’s attorneys. However, the jury could not agree on the third charge of manslaughter while operating a motor vehicle under the influence, the attorneys said.
Her lawyers filed multiple appeals, all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, claiming Read should not be retried on the counts the jury apparently agreed on, saying it would amount to double jeopardy. Each appeal was denied.
MORE: Supreme Court denies Karen Read’s double jeopardy appeal
Read’s attorneys made motions for a mistrial twice during her second criminal trial, both of which were denied by the judge.
Like her first trial, Read did not take the stand in her own defense.
“I am not testifying,” Read said to reporters outside the courthouse on June 10. “[The jury has] heard my interview clips. They’ve heard my voice. They’ve heard a lot of me.”
Read had added one of the alternate jurors from her first trial to her legal team for the retrial. Victoria George, the alternate juror, is a licensed civil attorney in Massachusetts.
A timeline of the Karen Read case and the story behind the high-profile Massachusetts murder trial
By Matt Schooley
Updated on: January 13, 2026 / 2:03 PM EST / CBS Boston
Karen Read was found not guilty of the most serious charges in her high-profile Massachusetts murder retrial in June 2025. In their fourth day of deliberations, jurors acquitted Read of second-degree murder and manslaughter in the death of her boyfriend, Boston police officer John O’Keefe. She was convicted of driving under the influence of alcohol.
Read’s first trial, which started in April 2024 at Norfolk Superior Court in Dedham, ended months later in a mistrial due to a “starkly divided” hung jury.
After months of additional pretrial hearings following the mistrial, jury selection in Read’s second trial began on April 1, 2025. The jury got the case and began deliberations on June 13, 2025.
Read was accused of hitting O’Keefe with her SUV in 2022 and leaving him to die. Defense attorneys argued she was the victim of an elaborate cover-up and was being framed by a group of people that included law enforcement.
Here is a look at the timeline of events in the Karen Read investigation and trials.
January 29, 2022 – the night John O’Keefe died
Shortly after midnight: Karen Read, John O’Keefe and a group of friends went to the Waterfall Bar and Grill in Canton on the night of January 28, 2022. According to prosecutors, Read consumed several alcoholic beverages. Read drove O’Keefe to the home of Boston police officer Brian Albert. That is where police said people from the bar were meeting back up.
1 a.m.: Court documents later revealed that in the weeks before and even the hours leading up to the night out, text messages between Read and O’Keefe as well as voicemails showed a strained relationship. Investigators said that around 1 a.m. on January 29, Read allegedly left O’Keefe a voicemail that said “…you are a f—— loser, f— yourself” and “John, I f—— hate you.”
4-5 a.m. – At 4:23 a.m. while heavy snow was falling, O’Keefe’s niece called Jennifer McCabe, Brian Albert’s sister-in-law and a friend of O’Keefe’s. She said Read was “distraught” because O’Keefe had not come home and was not answering his cellphone. According to court documents, McCabe said she heard Read screaming “John didn’t come home. We had a fight.” Around 5 a.m. Read called another woman whose husband was friends with O’Keefe. Prosecutors alleged that Read said while they searched “What if he’s dead? What if a plow hit him? … I don’t remember anything from last night, we drank so much I don’t remember anything.”
5:07 a.m. – Read, McCabe, and the third woman went to look for O’Keefe. Prosecutors said Read mentioned to the women that she had a crack in her tail light and wondered if she could have hit O’Keefe. At 5:07 a.m., a surveillance camera at O’Keefe’s house shows Read’s SUV coming “extremely close” to O’Keefe’s SUV in the driveway. Prosecutors say no tail light pieces were found in the driveway. Read’s defense argues the vehicle did strike the SUV, breaking the tail light and providing an explanation for damage to SUV.
6 a.m. – Around 6 a.m., Read sees O’Keefe lying in the snow outside Brian Albert’s home. An emergency responder said that while hysterical and inconsolable, Read repeatedly says “I hit him. I hit him.” The defense argues that one of the first responding officers from Canton police gave “false and deceptive testimony” to the grand jury that would later indict Read.
January 29, 2022 – Prosecutors and defense attorneys agree that at some point the morning O’Keefe was killed, someone googled “hos (sic) long to die in cold.” The sides disagree on when the search was made. Prosecutors say the search happened at 6:23 a.m. and 6:24 a.m. after O’Keefe’s body was found. The defense says a federal forensic expert determined the search was made at 2:27 a.m., before police were alerted that O’Keefe’s body had been found.
How did John O’Keefe die?
January 29, 2022 – Police say they found a broken cocktail glass and pieces of tail light at the scene. A forensic toxicologist estimated that Read’s blood alcohol content (BAC) would have been around .13-.29 around 12:45 a.m., more than the legal limit.
January 31, 2022 – An autopsy is completed on O’Keefe. Prosecutors said the medical examiner ruled the cause of death was blunt impact injuries to the head and hypothermia. They say the medical examiner did not find “any obvious signs of an altercation or a fight.”
Karen Read arrested
February 2, 2022 – Read appears in Stoughton District Court for the first time, pleading not guilty to manslaughter, motor vehicle homicide, and leaving the scene of a motor vehicle collision causing death.
June 10, 2022 – A Norfolk County grand jury indicts Karen Read on charges of second-degree murder, manslaughter while operating under the influence of alcohol, and leaving the scene of personal injury and death. Read is arraigned on the new charges in O’Keefe’s death. She pleaded not guilty in Norfolk Superior Court in Dedham and was ordered held on $100,000 bail. Read made bail and was released.
Karen Read’s defense claims she was framed
May 3, 2023 – Defense attorneys Alan Jackson and David Yannetti allege that O’Keefe was involved in a fight inside Brian Albert’s home. They claim O’Keefe was beaten and his body was later dumped outside. Jackson and Yannetti focused on wounds to O’Keefe’s arms, which they said showed he was attacked by Albert’s dog during the fight.
“This is not just fishing,” Jackson said during the May 3 hearing. “We’ve got a fish on the hook, we just need the court to help us reel it in.” Norfolk Assistant District Attorney Adam Lally argued that O’Keefe never went in the home and added “There is no evidence that Mr. O’Keefe was beaten and left for for dead.”
May 24, 2023 – During a pretrial hearing, Read’s attorneys laid out what they allege to be a cover-up by law enforcement.
“Certainly the Massachusetts State Police is involved. There are people that were in that house that are involved,” Jackson said. “Brian Albert is involved. Jennifer McCabe is involved. The rest of the folks that were in that house, there’s some level of involvement by every one of them. Every single one of them. We’re not going to rest until we get to the bottom of exactly who’s behind this cover-up. Not only Karen Read deserves this. John O’Keefe deserves this, and has deserved this from moment one. And that’s why they’re not going to rest.”
Following the dramatic hearing, Read spoke to reporters for the first time.
“We know who did it. We know. And we know who spearheaded this cover-up. You all know,” Read said on the courthouse steps. “I tried to save his life. I tried to save his life at 6 in the morning, I was covered in his blood. I was the only one trying to save his life.”
Courtroom battles over evidence
August 1, 2023 – Judge Beverly Cannone denied a prosecution request for a gag order in the case. The Norfolk District Attorney’s office had asked for the gag order saying witnesses were being harassed. Yannetti countered by saying it was prosecutors who are “controlling the narrative.”
August 25, 2023 – Norfolk County District Attorney Michael Morrissey released a video statement slamming what he described as “absolutely baseless” harassment of witnesses in the case.
“Conspiracy theories are not evidence,” Morrissey said. “The idea that multiple police departments, EMTs, Fire personnel, the medical examiner, and the prosecuting agency are joined in, or taken in by, a vast conspiracy should be seen for what it is – completely contrary to the evidence and a desperate attempt to re-assign guilt.”
Why was “Turtleboy” arrested?
October 11, 2023 – Aidan Kearney, the blogger who operates the site “Turtleboy News,” was arrested on charges of witness intimidation related to the Karen Read case. Kearney had been covering the case for months, often recording himself confronting witnesses. His defense attorney told the judge that Kearney was exercising his First Amendment right.
December 26, 2023 – A judge revoked Kearney’s bail amid new assault and battery charges. Kearney allegedly went to his ex-girlfriend’s home, demanded to see her phone, then shoved her during a confrontation. Kearney remained in jail for nearly two months but was later released on personal recognizance.
Evidence under scrutiny
February 22, 2024 – In court filings, prosecutors said they have DNA evidence recovered from a broken tail light that implicates Read in O’Keefe’s death. They said the tail light is the same material from Read’s SUV, and that the DNA matched O’Keefe’s. They also said broken tail light material was found on O’Keefe’s clothing.
March 12, 2024 – Read’s defense team said that a federal investigation into the case led to an FBI expert concluding that evidence does not support the theory that O’Keefe died after being hit by an SUV.
“The damage on the car was inconsistent with having made contact with John O’Keefe’s body. In other words, the car didn’t hit him, and he wasn’t hit by the car,” Jackson said. Prosecutors disagreed, accusing Read’s attorney of “defense by obfuscation.”
March 13, 2024 – In a brief statement, Massachusetts State Police said they have opened an internal investigation into “a potential violation of department policy” by Trooper Michael Proctor, who was the lead investigator in the case. Police did not say what prompted the investigation, but said he remains on full duty. Read’s defense attorneys said the federal investigation showed Proctor hid personal ties to people involved in the case. In a statement, Proctor’s attorney Michael DiStefano denied any wrongdoing.
“Trooper Proctor has been fully cooperative in responding to the investigations conducted by the US Attorney’s Office and the Massachusetts State Police Internal Affairs Unit,” DiStefano said. “To be clear, Trooper Proctor remains steadfast in the integrity of the work he performed investigating the death of Mr. John O’Keefe. To the extent that Trooper Proctor’s personal text messages are alluded to in court proceedings regarding Ms. Read, he respectfully submits that the objective investigative steps he and members of his unit took are in no way undermined by the content of the personal messages.”
Karen Read murder trial takes center stage
March 26, 2024 – Judge Cannone denied a defense motion to dismiss the case. Cannone said she was denying the motion due to “extensive evidence supporting the indictments.”
April 12, 2024 – During the final pretrial hearing in the case, Cannone heard 30 different motions on which she had to rule, listening to arguments from both sides on many of them.
Among them was an argument by Read’s attorneys that they should be able to make a third-party culprit defense during the trial. They say Brian Albert, Colin Albert, and Brian Higgins, all of whom were present at the party John O’Keefe was at the night he died, could have killed O’Keefe.
Prosecutor Lally called it a “fanciful story,” but told the judge “there’s actually no actual evidence.”
Jury selection begins
April 16, 2024 – Karen Read’s second-degree murder trial began with jury selection. A total of four jurors were added on the first day.
April 17, 2024 – Jury selection continued for a second day, with seven more jurors added.
April 17, 2024 – A third day of jury selection wrapped without a full jury seated. Two more jurors were added, but one from a previous day was excused, bringing the total number of jurors seated so far to 12.
April 24, 2024 – A jury was seated on the fifth day of jury selection over the course more than a week. The trial is scheduled to last 6-8 weeks once a jury is seated.
