NOT GUILTY MA - Professor Karen Read, 43, charged with murdering police officer boyfriend John O'Keefe by hitting him with car, Canton, 14 Apr 2023 #38 Retrial

[Dawookie]

The FBI doesn't make a habit of telling anyone what they are or aren't working on. Hank said the investigation was closed but the only official I can find confirming this is Helena Rafferty, Canton Police chief who announced her early retirement shortly thereafter.

I'd given up hope on the Birchmore case and figured the cop who murdered her in Canton the year before John O'Keefe was killed would get away with it. Again because of an intentionally shoddy Canton and State PD investigation. But the Feds got him, albeit over 3.5 years later.

So I'm not convinced the FBI is actually finished here.

That's what makes his comments weird to me. I have friends in LE who have worked on federal task forces involving the FBI and they've said the same thing.

I'd have to agree about not being convinced that they are finished. It would actually shock me if they were considering how many of the same people were involved with both cases plus all of the questionable stuff that's gone on in this case. I guess now it's just a waiting game to see if they actually are finished or are making an air tight case like they are known to do and it will all come out in the hopefully near future.

 

[HarmonyE.]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1936417718929850633

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Just pointing out that this is the state police union, not the state police. The head of the state police struck a somewhat different chord.

 

[MerlinFalcon]

Just pointing out that this is the state police union, not the state police. The head of the state police struck a somewhat different chord.

For sure. But still very inappropriate. Too many people/organizations that shouldn’t be talking keep doing so.

 

[geevee]

Just pointing out that this is the state police union, not the state police. The head of the state police struck a somewhat different chord.

"Careers have been lost..." who besides Proctor has lost their job over this?

 

[turaj]

seriously I just finished the Karen Read documentary on Max and I’m shocked at how much these middle-aged people drink and party. I’m 43 and can’t even imagine the hangovers. How do they have time for all that? They all gave me serious swinger vibes, just MOO.

yes and all with school age children and employed. It just seems to be the culture out there.

 

[HarmonyE.]

For sure. But still very inappropriate. Too many people/organizations that shouldn’t be talking keep doing so.

They are actively trying to get Michael Proctor rehired right now on appeal. It's an exceptionally powerful union and I doubt they are worried about what the rest of us think.

 

[HarmonyE.]

"Careers have been lost..." who besides Proctor has lost their job over this?

I think Tully was reassigned and possibly demoted? We know creepy Bukhenik only lost a few vacation days.

 

[mzmarymac]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1936417718929850633

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OMG the NERVE!!!!!

 

[Mmcgirl13]

Hello everyone! Long-time lurker, first-time poster here. I was vaguely aware of this case while the second trial was being conducted but didn't really do a deep dive into the details until the verdict was announced...and was just absolutely floored. I'm sure I've only scratched the surface of the insanity that is this case, but what I have seen just absolutely boggles my mind and infuriates me.

* Why did they decide to let him die? Why not say he was out of control & attacked? BH defended himself & O'Keefe fell? His blood alcohol would back up that scenario. There were plenty of people there who would happily tell whatever version of the story was needed. Was BA and/or BH worried about lawsuits? Pension security? Had too much time passed to explain why they hadn’t called EMS?

I personally believe more than just alcohol was involved moooo

I have wondered this a lot too and it wouldn't surprise me in the least given how comfortable all these people (including police officers) seem to be with driving drunk. It seems very possible to me that there may have been other substances involved back at the house and that may have made the Alberts and others anxious to not have any first responders enter the home, even if John O'Keefe's injury had been entirely accidental. I believe I read that one of the Alberts' children had friends over to celebrate a birthday as well? I don't know their children's ages but I wonder if any of them/the guests were under the age of 21 at the time and if there may have been underage drinking going on. If so, that could be another reason to not want EMT's or other first responders in the house.

seriously I just finished the Karen Read documentary on Max and I’m shocked at how much these middle-aged people drink and party. I’m 43 and can’t even imagine the hangovers. How do they have time for all that? They all gave me serious swinger vibes, just MOO.

I grew up in a neighborhood that seems to me to be very similar to Canton, suburb of a big city with a big police department, community with lots of police officers, firefighters, etc. and with a lot of the same community dynamics, everyone knows everyone, families are connected through multiple generations, stuff like that. There is a LOT of alcohol consumption as well, to a similar degree as among the people we saw in this case. People party hard well into their 40's, 50's and 60's, and often do it socially with their teenage children and their friends (because again, most of their friends parents are their own friends as well, and probably have been since THEY were kids), I've even seen it among my own relatives, some of whom are first responders themselves. I think the reason this case felt so close to home for me is because I could easily see it happening in my old neighborhood as well, if the circumstances were right. I can also see how easy it was for a lot of this community to blame Karen, whether they knew more about John's death than they admitted or not. She was to some extent an "outsider" in that first responder community and hadn't been around as long as the rest of them. Like others have said, if a conspiracy did exist it didn't actually need to involve very many people at all, only a close-knit community that would give their neighbors the benefit of the doubt over someone relatively unknown to them, and be willing to ignore the inconsistences that are so glaring to the rest of us.

All JMO of course.

 

[Knitpicker]

Hi Knitpicker! I see you on the Dan Markel posts a lot. Can’t wait for DA trial, can you?

So you know about my view of this case, I’m not pro Karen, I’m pro evidence. The evidence did not support her guilt. In fact, the evidence supported her innocence. If you haven’t already, you ought to really dig into the wild impossible evidence, and the strangely missing evidence of this case. Since you’re familiar with the Markel case, it’s like someone deleted the evidence of the perps and inserted evidence to frame Wendi’s boyfriend, or something like that. It’s THAT outrageous.

So you believe a middle of the night conspiracy happened and the Alberts/McCabes devised a scheme to frame Karen? Bc thats the only way KR gets off.

If Jen McCabe was in on it, why would she ever agree to drive with Karen to the Albert house?

 

[Knitpicker]

So you believe a middle of the night conspiracy happened and the Alberts/McCabes devised a scheme to frame Karen? Bc thats the only way KR gets off.

My guess is she didn't even know the address and probably didn't know how to get back .. the reason she called Jen in the morning.

You mean you expected her to go bang on the door instead of helping John? I don't see the logic in that, sorry. Now Jen... she could have done that once EMTs were there, but she was too busy talking to everyone.

All IMO

If Jen was in on it, why would she ever drive to the house with KR?

 

[Spectrix]

So you believe a middle of the night conspiracy happened and the Alberts/McCabes devised a scheme to frame Karen? Bc thats the only way KR gets off.

If Jen McCabe was in on it, why would she ever agree to drive with Karen to the Albert house?

Oh Please. Karen Read was found not guilty because she clearly didn't hit John. Whatever happened to him isn't her concern anymore. The Police should have investigated it in the first place.

 

[MerlinFalcon]

The drinking, for me as a 60+ year old boggles my mind. I drank a LOT into my 30s but then it just didn’t apppeal to me. I still have a glass of wine with dinner at times but the culture of overconsumption is one I want nothing to do with. I have a few friends who drink a lot and it’s funny because they’re always complaining about being broke. I wonder how many of these people are in debt because of their habits and I wonder about their health. All that drinking takes a toll. Then you throw in the mental health issues that come with covering up a huge lie. I keep expecting someone to crack, like Allie, Nicole or Kelly Devers. Allie started crying in the first trial after blurting that John was at the house. Nicole looks like a wreck.

And as much as I dislike Kelly Devers, think about what happened to her. She was innocently doing her job, saw what she saw, told the powers that be that she saw Higgins and her boss in the Sallyport for a wildly long time. Got called into the Commissioner’s office as a young cop where she was told she didn’t see what she said she saw. Now she’s in a position where her superiors want her to lie about what she said. Her career is never going to be the same because she’s always going to be the woman with a false memory and bad attitude on the stand. She must feel so much pressure. Can she keep it up?

 

[Maat99]

The big question I have for the Pro Karen camp is…if she went back looking for John, and she thought he went inside the house, why didnt she just go to the front door -bang on it and ask the Alberts? Or…after she “immediately” found the mound of snow that she knew was him….why didnt she THEn start slamming on the door? Or what didn’t Jen call the Alberts?

Maybe it’s just me, but if I found a loved one dead on a front lawn, all of my attention would be on him. I would call 911. I definitely wouldn’t start knocking on doors in an attempt to get to the bottom of things. The very idea sounds bizarre to me. Jmo.

 

[mzmarymac]

The drinking, for me as a 60+ year old boggles my mind. I drank a LOT into my 30s but then it just didn’t apppeal to me. I still have a glass of wine with dinner at times but the culture of overconsumption is one I want nothing to do with. I have a few friends who drink a lot and it’s funny because they’re always complaining about being broke. I wonder how many of these people are in debt because of their habits and I wonder about their health. All that drinking takes a toll. Then you throw in the mental health issues that come with covering up a huge lie. I keep expecting someone to crack, like Allie, Nicole or Kelly Devers. Allie started crying in the first trial after blurting that John was at the house. Nicole looks like a wreck.

And as much as I dislike Kelly Devers, think about what happened to her. She was innocently doing her job, saw what she saw, told the powers that be that she saw Higgins and her boss in the Sallyport for a wildly long time. Got called into the Commissioner’s office as a young cop where she was told she didn’t see what she said she saw. Now she’s in a position where her superiors want her to lie about what she said. Her career is never going to be the same because she’s always going to be the woman with a false memory and bad attitude on the stand. She must feel so much pressure. Can she keep it up?

There is no excuse for a police officer to act like a petulant teenager on the witness stand.

 

[HarmonyE.]

So you believe a middle of the night conspiracy happened and the Alberts/McCabes devised a scheme to frame Karen? Bc thats the only way KR gets off.

If Jen McCabe was in on it, why would she ever agree to drive with Karen to the Albert house?

No one devised a scheme to frame Karen that night and I don't know anyone who thinks that's what happened.

JO wasn't hit by a car. But he was - at some point before daylight - put out on the lawn to make it appear a passing motor vehicle struck him. They'd have been happy to pin it on poor Lucky. (And I think he knows that now.)

They didn't know Read had a cracked taillight. Cracked just a little while before when she'd hit John's car. Must have seemed a god send to them at the time, not knowing it was all caught on video.

Read contacted Jen that morning because she'd dropped John off at Jen's sister's house the night before at Jen's invite. She didn't know the Alberts personally and only had Jen's number. What happened at that party??? Where was John?? Jen called her sister Nicole (they both deny this call, but it's confirmed in the phone records) to warn her that Karen wanted to go to Fairview, as Jen had told Karen that John never came into the house despite the fact that Karen dropped him off there. Jen tried to control the situation by agreeing to get Kerry and go to Fairview. After suggesting they try other places first.

Had Karen not turned up with a cracked taillight, I see no chance of her being directly framed. Or charged for that matter.

 

[Knitpicker]

after immediately finding JO I don't doubt "slamming on the door" was the farthest thing from her mind. JMOO

If that is where KR left him (In the house), wouldn’t she have called Jen to call the Alberts to see if he was there rather than drive right to the body?

 

[turaj]

If Jen was in on it, why would she ever drive to the house with KR?

I can't stand Jen...but I don't think she was in on anything but as the night went along did what she could to protect the rest. I don't think the night's events were planned to kill JOK...but drinking and personalities got involved and too many in LE so they knew right away how to cover up whatever happened in that house or garage.

 

[HarmonyE.]

If that is where KR left him (In the house), wouldn’t she have called Jen to call the Alberts to see if he was there rather than drive right to the body?

See my post above. She left John at the party. She had Jen's number and not the Alberts'. Are you saying you wouldn't have called Jen under the same circumstances? If not, why not?

 

[mzmarymac]

I'd like to tell a short story. A friend of my son's mom died in a car crash when she was a young girl of about 11 or 12. Her mother's family had a LOT of questions because the crash was odd and the father was driving the car. Even though they pushed it, there was never enough evidence to bring charges against her dad. She and her brother were then raised by their father and kept away from her mom's side of the family. Her father was a successful doctor and they had a good life. She never once doubted her father's innocence.

Then, several years later, her father was arrested and charged with the murder of his girlfriend. He apparently stabbed the woman multiple times (I think over 20?) but claimed self-defense. This girl and her brother and her and the rest of the dad's side of the family continued to be 100% confident in his innocence. She did everything she could to stand by him and defend him, and would have continued to do so, but he died of Covid. Now, she and her brother are in a legal battle with the woman's children.

Now, all that said, I will say this. This girl is a very smart, kind, loving person and very accomplished herself. Her brother is literally a genius and also incredibly accomplished and works as a rocket scientist or something like that. Incredible kids. Yet, they could not see what is painfully obvious to so many others looking from the outside in. Her father definitely killed this woman and I am not at all doubtful that he killed his wife as well.

Ignorance is bliss? I don't know. All I know is that it is incredible when people are are closer to a situation can have all of their views slanted in favor of one side or the other, even some of the smartest people you might know. I have no idea how this happens, but it does. No one wants to believe someone they love could be a killer, especially a killer of someone else they love. Just look at the case of Barry Morphew. His daughters have stood by him as well. Now he's been arrested for his wife's murder again.

As for what it means in this case, I don't know. But I do know firsthand that people who are close to a situation are biased, even if they don't realize it or admit it.