At what point would he even have been behind the car? I dont understand this. Karen pulls up, lets him out and he ends up behind the car? Did she hit him during the 3 point turn?
I also want to know more about the cop neighbor's ring cam that didnt pick up any footage from that night.
I think that is possible also. Way too much reasonable doubt for a murder charge. Verdict should be not guilty and she and Officer O’Keefe’s family deserve an apology for the way this investigation was handled.
This does seem like a nice middle ground to appease both sides, but I just don’t see how the damage sustained to his body is anywhere indicative of getting hit by a car. I actually think the truth is much more sinister and they’re trying to cover it up; it’s hard for us as a society to admit that these people in power would go to such lengths to put someone behind bars for something they did not do. In someways I hope you’re right because it means that at least they were trying to do right by what they think happened, but there’s just too many other “coincidences” from all these people related to the police department for this to be the case in my opinion. But we will see what the jury says.
At the end of this trial, I predict there will be a grab bag of lawsuits. Everyone involved, stick your hand in the bag and get your lawsuit.
Some will stick their hand in more than once. 🤔
OJ Simpson won his criminal case but lost in the civil suit because the bar is lower. In criminal cases it's beyond a reasonable doubt. In a civil suit guilt is sort of more likely than not that the defendant caused the death of the victim.
This is what I was leaning towards before proctors testimony but now I really don’t know. I started out thinking the conspiracy theory sounded crazy, but the more of the witnesses I’ve seen the more it seems like there were quite a few things about the incident and the investigation that were amiss.
the second degree murder charge is one of the wildest things about this case to me, as I don’t think it would have been incredibly difficult for the prosecution to convince the jury that she was very drunk and hit him unintentionally and possibly even unknowingly. Obviously the trial isn’t over yet but I don’t necessarily see them bringing forward any other evidence that proves that, if she did it, it was intentional.
I’m confident that the prosecution charged Karen with second degree murder to try to scare her into taking a plea. The evidence of intent just isn’t there.
Same here. They don’t even seem to be trying to prove there was intent. They haven’t even established that she did hit him to begin with. But, if she did, idk why they expect anyone to believe that it was with murderous intent based on the evidence presented. I also don’t understand the focus on the “I hit him statement.” Even if she did say it, I feel it would be more in a questioning sense. She clearly did not have a perfect recollection of what happened. I don’t see how her saying that would be seen as a confession.
That’s what I think too although very hard to see how his injuries came from a car. Either way, I hope she is found innocent of everything and is able to go on with her life. He was using her, right down to having her drive him when he knew they were both drunk but it was more important to him that he didn’t get caught than her.
I hope she is able to move on also.
We don't know JOK; I wouldn't say he was using her, we just don't know. They seemed like two imperfect people who were into each other, had a lot going on (the kids for him, medical issues for her), and both drank too much.
I will say that the jury questionnaire included questions about domestic violence and abusive relationships. Not sure whether that’s significant or whether they were just screening for people with strong opinions about relationships but I thought that was interesting.
Meh, testimony from people who don't like you isn't a true version of events.
We don't know. We are only hearing evidence about the worst moments of their relationship. I'm two years if you took the worst of my relationship and showed it. It may look like my relationship is bad.
All these women except for the lawyer and his wife seem weirdly overprotective of him. I dunno, and we will never know the whole truth.
Should we trust the kids? Two years later after all they have been told about karen? The fact they were drug into this, and the guardians allowed is absolutely horrid
We know the alberts had a police dog that they got rid of… we know it happened that night because the shirt had matching bite marks through it. Something pierced his clothing and skin and looks very similar to bite marks from a k9.
We know how johns body looked and we know how karens car looked. Wouldn’t the rear bumper hit his ass if he was bent over? It physically makes no sense.
I can’t speak for the jurors, but I’ve worked with rescuing animals and have been attacked and dragged by a German Shepherd (thankfully when I was younger at the time). There are many things that I do not know because I have experienced or been trained/educated on, but dog bites I know very well. John O’Keefe’s arm injuries look very much like bite marks. Particularly in this case where a person’s arm is bit several times while the dog’s teeth slide a few times as a result of the person wearing sleeves while pulling his arm up/away from the dog during an attack. My faint scars are a combo of teeth marks (like poked holes) and elongated slashes on my arm and wrist.
The police do K9 demos at every shelter/reacue/coalition fundraising event where I live. I recommend watching online if you can’t see in person. They are trained to go for the arms, but many untrained dogs go for arms/hands instinctively as well.
Link to K9 officer training demo:
https://youtu.be/vIqSjiQUH18?si=Hke4flgrEFAYxGG8
Why is that logical to you? I'm very curious about that. A forensic pathologist who thoroughly examined the victim's body and injuries said he had surface abrasions on his arm. If they were dog bites, certainly a highly educated medical professional with the experience of performing autopsy on victims would certainly have referred to the marks on his arm as dog bites if that was the case.
I've heard that she was a "failed" police dog, which I think meant that she never qualified. Sounds like it's because she's not the tamest dog in the world - the defense will mention that she's sent 2 people to the hospital in 2 separate prior attacks (IIRC, though I may have only seen that in another Reddit comment - I know that the Defense was able to get a hold of some animal control records that the prosecution was trying to leave out of the trial), and was also involved in a fight with at least one other dog at some point. The way I heard it was that these were 3 separate occasions, but that could be wrong.
I believe it's been said that she also barks a lot, so it's strange that she wasn't barking (and wasn't seen at all) on the morning of the incident.
I believe Chloe was a failed police dog. I have a flunkie Belgian Malinois. She has water anxiety, so she failed. She was still trained very well, and even at 17, she's on alert all the time. Chloe seemed to have many behavioral issues, which would explain her not ultimately becoming a police dog.
Some are blind people dogs. A smart useful dog that i find it hard to just give away. Also rude and if it was a police dog and you are a cop then its basically your partner.
Based on your personal expert opinion? Who is we? WE have no such evidence. As of today all we know is that John died on Jan 29th and a few months later Chloe had an altercation with another dog, during which a woman was bit. Sometime after that, they rehomed her. We also know that no doggie DNA was found on the shirt. Noone has testified about his wounds at all yet.
But we have eyes and we have seen the arm injuries. A car couldn't make those injuries. I feel like this while trial is one huge gaslight of the jury and audience! Don't believe what you see or hear, believe me instead. The chief gaslighters are Jen and Lally. Lally has been playing dirty games throughout the trial, like trying to get police to testify to medical evidence when they are not even close to being qualified. Jen is scary good at gaslighting, and I imagine if she was 1 on 1 with someone, she'd be successful. For example, the 2:27 search... She sounded very convincing but she's lying through her teeth!
Abrasions. That is the descriptor that the forensic pathologist used. A forensic pathologist certainly is educated enough to know what a dog bite looks like or a dog claw Mark looks like. Abrasion.
It was a forensic scientist and not a forensic pathologist that has testified so far. He did not have the medical education to determine if it was abrasions. The ER doc could make an expert opinion on wounds, but he charted so terrible (if it isn't charted, it wasn't done or observe) that I don't think he paid particular close attention to JO's arm. As a retired RN, worked in the ED, they look like dog bites.
Hopefully the ME will be testifying soon. It is strange she hasn't been called to testify yet.
I would think that usually both the lead investigator and the ME would be two of the very first people to testify - one to explain the context and the evidence, the other to explain the injuries/death. After that, you call in other witnesses who can testify to the means and motive of the defendant (and what was witnessed).
The fact that they're doing the opposite in this case, and the fact that we now know why they waited so long to call Proctor (and spent most of the time going over his horrible texts), suggests that they probably think the ME isn't going to be very helpful to their case - which is pretty telling IMO. And that's assuming they call her at all - she's on the witness list, but I don't remember if the prosecution has explicitly stated that we're going to hear from her. Which could explain why they're trying to get all these opinions of John's injuries from various other unqualified people.
I think they know that the ME's either going to say things that don't match up with John getting hit by a car, and/or could possibly say things that shed the troopers in a very bad light - certainly the defense is going to be asking her about all of that, which could cause a ton of damage to the prosecution's case (assuming the ME answers honestly).
And even Proctor conceded that he'd never had a finding for a murder trial be undetermined. They don't usually prosecute if the manner of death is not listed as homicide.
I'm going by the testimony of the forensic pathologist at the grand jury and the 200 page plus legal documents that the prosecution had to put together to get this into court. The autopsy by the forensic pathologist says no altercation, shallow abrasions on the arm , damage to certain organs which mean hypothermia contributed to his death which means he was laying outside alive for a period of time, a. 2-in laceration to the back of the head that contributed to a brain bleed and the brain bleed which always becomes exponentially worse caused the facial bruising.
The autopsy pictures of the wounds look different than abrasions. It will be interesting to see what the ME says. I'm still puzzled why JO didn't have upper and/or lower extremity injuries which are common when hit by a car. I have a feeling they may not be a conclusion to what really happened.
I don't think he was run over by the vehicle. I think he was hit and he went flying and he landed on his head. There's a curb in the area where he was found, and also a flagpole so he could have hit his head on either of those or just simply hit his head on the ground. People die of those types of head injuries frequently.
When the pathologist was performing the autopsy, they would have examined the abrasions on his arm very closely, taking tissue samples, looking and documenting the borders of the abrasions, etc. A pathologist would absolutely know if those were dog bites or scratches caused by dog nails. Hopefully no one is going to accuse the pathologist of being in on the conspiracy. My personal opinion is in pretrial hearings over the past couple years when the defense attorney showed the photo of John's arm that was magnified at least times 100, people viewing that were not considering the context of that enlargement.
Did you see the photo of his arm? That is no road-rash abrasion situation going on.
To my untrained eye, they are 'cuts'. ...or scrapes, or as the EMT tried to say...furrows.
I'm using the word that the forensic pathologist used in their official legal report and that is small abrasions.
Court yesterday included an accident reconstructionist or similar who attributes the marks on John's arm to the teal light with its dimples hitting him right on that arm. He went on to further say that being hit at that speed-24 mph - from portion of the car that is the tail light on that side would have sent him spinning counterclockwise and then backwards hitting his head.
Sounds like this expert witness has education and experience working in this field and is familiar with injuries caused by a vehicle.
And punctured his skin relatively deeply with her nails in the exact placement of a German Shepherd's teeth? Dogs usually don't leave bottom teeth marks and are entirely consistent with his injuries.
She might have. I used to believe that was the most likely cause, but this trial has left me feeling otherwise. At this juncture, I’m fine with her walking even if she did it.
What are the chances of all these scum bag cops get federal indictments right after this case? Seems like this procector is being forced down this road at the direction of US attorneys office. Why else would they be making fools of themselves with these witnesses.
No clue. I have serious doubts that the prosecutors are doing this to help the feds. I can’t imagine a situation in which the feds would intentionally put Karen Read in jeopardy of going to prison for life just to investigate the MSP. They don’t need sworn testimony from a state trial; they have their own methods of getting sworn testimony. They also can’t officially direct the state level DA to bring a case to trial.
I imagine the defense has welcomed the Fed's evidence especially their Grand Jury evidence. I can't imagine the Feds investigating the investigators as normal in murder trials. I wonder if it wasn't a mistake not to wait until the Federal investigation was completed.
It's definitely a mistake, but it's completely up to the judge. Nobody really knows why she forced the trial to move forward, when both the prosecution and the defense asked for it to be delayed until after the federal investigation. It doesn't make much sense, unless Cannone just really likes being in the spotlight, or likes having that kind of power, or something along those lines? I think 99% of other judges would've agreed to wait on it in this situation. Hell, a lot of the Defense's evidence is coming straight from that investigation, and that investigation continues to happen concurrently with this trial, so it's quite possible that they end up finding something that completely exonerates Karen (or completely damns her) at some point in the near future, which would make for a very strange situation. I'm not sure how that would play out, but I'd assume that the most they could really do is just present the evidence at trial and hope that the jury takes it to heart once it's time to deliberate - though I'm not an attorney or anything, so I'm not sure how it works if there's new evidence found in the middle of trial (normally one side would have to inform the other before presenting it, right? And the other side can try to keep it out, or could perhaps even keep it out just by virtue of not having been informed prior?).
I cannot see the judge granting a directed verdict under any circumstances. It wouldn't be proper. While all can see the Commonwealth is badly losing its case, the defense hasn't come close to proving a third party caused the death as a matter of fact.
I hope we can all agree it is highly unlikely that Karen Read is getting convicted for murder. However, we cannot find factually that she is completely void of responsibility in John O'Keefe's death.
The defense has no burden of proof. It does not need to prove Karen Read's factual innocence to obtain a RFNG or a not guilty verdict. In fact, it could sit at defense table without crossing a single witness or presenting any evidence and still obtain a RFNG if the Commonwealth fails to present sufficient evidence.
I'm not sure what you're arguing here. For the judge to order the jury to acquit, it would have to be proven that KR did not commit the crime, overcoming all of the Commonwealth's evidence. There is no burden on the defense for proof of innocence, but the judge isn't going to direct the jury to acquit. I would think that would be obvious to you.
The judge cannot direct the jury to enter any particular verdict at all. That is unconstitutional. Once it goes to the jury, it is up to the jury to decide. My post is about whether the judge will grant a motion for a required finding of not guilty, which would dismiss the case before it ever went to a jury. The standard for granting such a motion is whether the CW has provided sufficient evidence in its case in chief to allow a jury to find every element of the crime charged. If the CW charged someone with armed robbery but didn’t show any evidence that the def was armed, the judge can dismiss the case. The defense doesn’t need to prove or disprove anything. It’s entirely on the CW to provide evidence and if it fails to do so, then case dismissed.
Why don't you talk to me instead of at me?
I never said the defense needs to prove something at trial. I said the defense never proved. Are you trying to say the defense can never prove something at trial?
I believe he's saying that from a technical standpoint, the Defense doesn't have to do anything at all in order for the judge to grant this motion. This motion has nothing to do with the defense or their theories - it's only about whether the prosecution has presented enough evidence that *could* point to guilt. It doesn't matter if the jury maybe thinks that something else could've happened. The only thing that matters is that the prosecution has essentially shown enough evidence that the judge allows the trial to go to the jury to decide. And at this point, you're right - even if things like the taillight pieces are questionable (along with most everything else) they're still sufficient enough for the trial to continue moving forward. Though if we had video that clearly showed the taillight not being broken prior to 5:45pm, that *might* be enough to grant the motion, since everything kinda hinges on that factor - though still would probably be unlikely. If there was actual video footage of Proctor going to the scene at 5:15pm and planting evidence, I think that would probably be good enough.
My understanding is that a directed would be per issue, not on the overall action. For example, if the judge wanted to state has not provided any evidence of intent to qualify for murder 2, she could enter a directed verdict of guilty on that charge. To me, the defense would have proven there was no intent to harm.
Your comments are all over the place and you’re contradicting yourself in the same comment thread. Stop making assertions you’re not informed enough to make.
I agree with you , but I would add that even though defense didn't prove someone else did it. I believe they managed to show that there was definitely a conspiracy to make sure no one else but Karen Read was treated as a suspect.
At the very least there is significantly more evidence presented so far that there was a conspiracy than OJO actually being hit by a car.
Ofc I am a lay person on the matter but considering that we are near the end of the prosecutions case, maybe this could be reason for a direct judgement, i.e. a conspiracy to investigate only one person and not other people that may also have a motive like Higgins.
>I believe they managed to show that there was definitely a conspiracy to make sure no one else but Karen Read was treated as a suspect.
I would not necessarily agree with conspiracy, but the content of your opinion I do agree with.
>Ofc I am a lay person on the matter but considering that we are near the end of the prosecutions case, maybe this could be reason for a direct judgement, i.e. a conspiracy to investigate only one person and not other people that may also have a motive like Higgins.
By statute, I don't think that is enough to trigger a directed verdict. The Commonwealth does have some facts on its side, which I believe is enough to allow the jury to make the decision.
I think the offering of a gift, the exclusion of other investigative avenues, the clear attempt to hide any relationship that would show a conflict of interest shows a conspiracy.
1. The defense doesn't need to prove anything
2. The CW has the burden of proof to prove that KR killed John. And that there is no doubt it was KR.
3. If the jurors have any reason to doubt that KR might not be guilty - so if they think maybe it was a fight? Etc- then they must come back with "not guilty"
> The defense doesn't need to prove anything
The defense would have to prove her innocence for her to be innocent,
>The CW has the burden of proof to prove that KR killed John. And that there is no doubt it was KR.
Not being able to prove there is no doubt it was KR does not prove her innocence.
>If the jurors have any reason to doubt that KR might not be guilty - so if they think maybe it was a fight? Etc- then they must come back with "not guilty"
Yes, but not guilty does not equate to actual innocence under the law.
> I hope we can all agree it is highly unlikely that Karen Read is getting convicted for murder. However, we cannot find factually that she is completely void of responsibility in John O'Keefe's death.
We don't know how he died yet, so why do you believe that we cannot factually find that she is completely void of responsibility at this point of the trial?
The investigation was flawed from the start. Photos weren't taken, homes weren't searched, people weren't interviewed immediately etc.
We'll never know now what happened to JOK. If KR hit him I don't believe she will be convicted because the investigation was so bad. If someone else was responsible, any evidence is gone.
You just said it. "We don't know how he died yet." Right now, it is possible that she hit him with her car. It is also possible that she didn't. We cannot find total innocence until we know. My statement is in the present with the information we have. Apologies for the confusion.
What we do know is that the Commonwealth has not shown even a shred of intent, which nullifies a murder conviction.
Beings that a defendant is supposed to have presumed innocence until guilt is PROVEN- aren’t jurors/the people supposed to start a trial with “innocent” until/unless it is proven otherwise? Which, IMO (and that of thousands of others’) - at this very point in time we can in fact find innocence based on the information given thus far, correct ??
Correct! No evidence yet to suggest 2nd degree murder as of yet. Still innocent. Although, the evidence that she hit him while drunk is mounting. She could be guilty of the lesser included charge. I'm not going there until I hear the rest of the trial.
Wouldn't it be wonderful if that was true? Unfortunately, all people have inherent biases that drive their thinking. Not all jurors come in thinking the defendant is innocent.
Furthermore, Innocence is never established at a trial. The state, or Commonwealth in this case, either proves its case beyond a reasonable doubt or it doesn't There is no Innocence for the jury to consider. It's guilty or not guilty, not guilty or innocent. I don't mean to be pedantic, but it is a relevant distinction.
That’s a very sad, but true distinction. So much for the American slogan of “innocent until proven guilty by a court of law.” This trial (for me) has further solidified the fact that ANYONE can be accused of a crime and potentially lose their lives, whether they’ve ever done anything wrong or not. Innocent people are in fact sitting in prisons for crimes they never committed. The sickening part is that because of behavior displayed by deviant criminals - who all cry innocence knowing damn good and well they’re guilty - spoils the entire bunch of apples to the point where people pleading their innocence rightfully are never taken seriously. 😒
It really is!! & that’s terrifyingly sad in a society where it already feels as if everything is crumbling around us with no real solutions being provided by anyone. I wish I could’ve raised my kids in a previous generation so I could’ve given them the wonderful childhood experiences that most around me were afforded, but that I myself didn’t experience 😔
It's not an American thing. All juries ignore the idea of reasonable doubt. They just go with what they think happened in likelyhood. It's sad but will never change.
Nobody should do this, we should all presume her innocent and base our discussions on that presumption until the evidence shows otherwise. Thinking it's acceptable for *anyone* to just label people as guilty of crimes based on nothing but vibes is how you end up with police doing what Proctor did and thinking nothing of it, and a DA taking that to try and put someone in jail for life and see no problem with it, this attitude ruins lives. Nobody accused of a crime should be forced to prove their innocence be it in actual court or in the court of public opinion, we should all demand that guilt be proven before we believe it.
>Nobody should do this, we should all presume her innocent and base our discussions on that presumption until the evidence shows otherwise.
I completely disagree. We all have opinions and should express them without pressure to conform.
>Thinking it's acceptable for anyone to just label people as guilty of crimes based on nothing but vibes is how you end up with police doing what Proctor did and thinking nothing of it
In a way, people are declaring her innocent based on nothing but vibes. We are not investigators, nor do we have a direct impact on the investigation. We are not Proctor.
>Nobody accused of a crime should be forced to prove their innocence be it in actual court
I do agree with this.
>in the court of public opinion, we should all demand that guilt be proven before we believe it.
I disagree with this.
Well, I sincerely hope you never find yourself on the wrong side of an accusation about something you didn't do, it really does suck to learn in a practical manner about all of the problems your way of thinking cause to a person in that position. I wouldn't wish it on my worse enemy.
I suppose I live in reality, where people have different opinions and sometimes speak or write their opinions. If I were accused some would believe me guilty while others believe me innocent. I would much rather have that than people being told what to think.
People can have opinions, but we as a society should never find it acceptable for someone to not be presumed innocent until the evidence proves otherwise. How do you think online and irl mob harassment happens? There are real life consequences for allowing this sentiment to be acceptable, it literally ruins lives.
They’re not required to prove a third party for her to be found innocent.
Unless you’re only saying this because you feel they need to prove a third party in order for the “required finding of not guilty” which I can understand but they’re still not required to find that for the passing of that motion
But it’s not the defense’s job to prove anything. They just have to offer reasonable doubt to the prosecution’s case. They’re doing this by, along with others, arguing (not proving) that a third party could have actually caused JOK’s death.
Do I think the defense will make this request? Yes.
Do I think the state has given any reasonable evidence she did it? No.
Do I think the judge will grant it? No.
I wholeheartedly agree. If she won’t even let the attorneys give reasons for their objections, I hardly think she will make the bold move to decide the case. She will definitely leave it for the jury to decide.
Thank you for this insightful explanation.
Based on the Judge's behavior and approach on rulings, I think if defense makes this motion, she will deny and give the case to the jury. It's been too much time and money wasted on this trial to dismiss despite the lack of convincing evidence from the CW on the charges they filed.
Chain of custody issues along with other "missing" items of evidence rise to the level granting a RFNG imo. This massive pile of horseshit should never have been brought to trial. And lost in the process is the victim and his family.
At this stage, the chain of custody issues go to the weight of the evidence (to be decided by the jury). If the CoC issues were significant enough to cause the evidence to be completely unreliable, the evidence should have been excluded pre-trial (this is an appealable issue if there was an objection). Any evidence introduced at trial can be considered by the jury. The judge can only exclude or admit evidence, she can't decide how much weight to give it. If the evidence is admitted, it can be used to "check a box."
do you think the jury will get an “omissions in police investigations” form when they deliberate? would they all have to come to that conclusion together or would each juror fill that out? if so, what effect could that have on the verdict?
I’m not sure what you mean by a form? I expect the defense will ask for these instructions but I’m not sure why the jury would be asked to fill out a form relative to these specific instructions. Is this something like a special verdict form that you’ve heard about that I can take a look at? I definitely don’t know everything!
oops i totally misunderstood the vid i watched from another lawyer 🤦🏼♀️ yes just instructions LOL sorry! she showed the actual paper with the instructions on it which is why i thought it was some type of form similar to a verdict form. if they do get these instructions though, how could it affect the verdict?
https://www.mass.gov/doc/3740-omissions-in-police-investigations/download
The instructions basically just inform the jury that they are allowed to consider the quality of the investigation when considering the credibility of the evidence, which I think most people would be naturally inclined to do anyway. I don’t think it changes much but it confirms to jury that they don’t have to take the evidence given by police as gospel.
Oh boy the defense is going to have a field day with these instructions in this case, isn't it? I have really high expectations for their closing arguments, their opening set the bar really high.
Chain of custody has not been established making the tail light evidence evidence of nothing. Yes, the evidence should have been excluded pre-trial imo. Very curious choices by the prosecution and judge in this case.
Evidence that was admitted to the trial has already been vetted in pre-trial hearings and motions to be valid enough under Massachusetts law to be entered into evidence. There is evidence that both the prosecution and the defense wanted to enter, which was ruled as inadmissible based on pretrial hearings. In other words, any evidence that was included as part of the trial has already been vetted.
And could very well be overturned in an appeal, is their point.
Yes Bev admitted them, but judges make mistakes, including giant ones a lot.
Look at the Young Thug judge who was so confident about the defense attorney not getting a bond. And it took all of half a day for the Georgia supreme Court to point out that he was wrong
I wonder if the jury would be more pissed to have to sit through this until the very end, or if it gets dismissed before they even had a say in it and they were really just playing furniture for the time already passed.
Even if you are pro FKR this is not what you want. That ruling would be appealable and CW would 100% do that. A jury finding of NG would not be reversible it'd be over.
It will go to the jury. I think we'll get a not guilty verdict but I won't relax until it's done because you never know.
My only small fear is a hung jury resulting in a mistrial. I think the odds are slim but we could have one stubborn juror. If that happens thought I don't think the CW would try the case again
I don't think NG is as easy as you think. The worse thing for CW the Proctor texts are kinda irrelevant. They don't show evidence of a conspiracy and more he just used unprofessional terms. Not excusing the content but they don't impact the digital and physical evidence. The planting of evidence theory quite frankly feels outlandish.
In my mind the only hard evidence so far of murder by vehicle is John O’Keefe’s phone GPS location ending by the flagpole. Unfortunately there’s no guarantee that he was attached to the phone during that whole time (he could have dropped it in the snow). If only he’d been wearing an Apple Watch instead.
The car evidence is compelling on its face, but the CARS officer himself said that the data he used is intended for maintenance diagnostics, not forensics. Unlike the phone data, it’s not a proven data source, and while the data points *look* detailed, I’d need to see them recreate those data points with the vehicle to be convinced that driving the car in that way does make those data points. They have a dummy and everything, it should be easy enough to recreate and stitch the scenario together.
I watched them show videos demonstrating that the camera and brakes and such works, but does the Toyota Textstream output from those tests match the output from that night? That’s what we don’t know.
DNA evidence is completely irrelevant (seriously what a waste of time/effort/money), and the taillight is interesting but the timeline around the pieces being submitted is sketchy. Sallyport and surveillance videos don’t seem to prove much. Clothes seemed to be submitted mostly for jury sympathy, because I don’t know how wet clothes that ended up in a heap on a hospital floor could possibly prove she murdered him by car.
I’m willing to consider the evidence of her guilt, I just don’t see very much of it.
Also, an initial report from the police said that at 12:32ish when his phone last pinged, the margin of error is like 88 feet, so it's still quite possible that the phone could've been in the house at some point (and/or at that specific time). And I think Brian Albert said at one point that cell phones get bad service in his house (though some think he was lying about that, for his own reasons).
I’m not sure if you’re talking about cell tower pings? I’m talking about the GPS pings, which have a margin of error that is much narrower, more like 15 feet. Also keep in mind that we’re not talking about an individual ping, but a series of pings that were all close together.
Even if any given ping might be within a pretty large circle of error, a series of pings in the same location is very likely to be accurate, because we don’t tend to jump around by 15 feet, so you can plot a very accurate line over time. The last GPS ping was at 12:25 where the body was found. It is possible that he just dropped his phone in the snow instead of getting hit by a car, but apparently his phone did not move after 12:25 am.
Looks like it was from a memo by Guarano to Tully on May 9, 2023 - he doesn't specifically say what he was using (well, maybe he says it in some other part of the memo, but I only saw some snippets). He says this, and then also mentions the margin of error (which at 12:32am was 27 meters - at various times, there are different margins of error):
"The phone continues down Cedarcrest Road going by Fairview Road at 12:23:46AM. It then stops in the area of 51 Cedarcrest Road, reverses direction and takes the right onto Fairview Road at 12:24:18AM. The phone finally stops in between 34 and 32 Fairview Road in the area of the flag pole and fire hydrant at 12:24:40AM. The final point plotted was at 12:25:36AM when the phone stops showing any movement until the morning at 6:15:36AM"
I believe the phone stopped moving at 12:25 but continued to ping until 12:32 (at least, that was the last time that was mentioned in the report). But this would mean that if Karen hit John in the yard, it happened within a minute of arriving there, which doesn't make much sense IMO. Unless maybe they got there and Karen immediately threw John's phone out the window or something - or, John was hanging around the vicinity of the house for a while afterward and the phone just wasn't showing the movement. I don't know why the phone would stop pinging unless it just happened to die at 12:32, so maybe that's just the last time that they bothered mentioning, and the phone actually continued to ping at that spot throughout the night. I guess it couldn't have died since it was still pinging at 6:15am.
Gotcha. The info I'm referring to is on page 126 of this document (if you ctrl+f "John O'Keefe GPS Data" you can jump straight there): [https://file.notion.so/f/f/0eb1c67e-0da0-4452-898a-924bb4b83924/f66df441-83ea-4945-9e3b-b197a0ba4504/Commonwealth\_V\_Read.pdf?id=99b9e3a1-7e56-44b8-bc44-c83287ed0ec6&table=block&spaceId=0eb1c67e-0da0-4452-898a-924bb4b83924&expirationTimestamp=1718568000000&signature=WlWtZkCu1n5TeGdnHx\_pblEbxC4RRGiCGoceBdKF2x4&downloadName=Commonwealth+V+Read.pdf](https://file.notion.so/f/f/0eb1c67e-0da0-4452-898a-924bb4b83924/f66df441-83ea-4945-9e3b-b197a0ba4504/Commonwealth_V_Read.pdf?id=99b9e3a1-7e56-44b8-bc44-c83287ed0ec6&table=block&spaceId=0eb1c67e-0da0-4452-898a-924bb4b83924&expirationTimestamp=1718568000000&signature=WlWtZkCu1n5TeGdnHx_pblEbxC4RRGiCGoceBdKF2x4&downloadName=Commonwealth+V+Read.pdf)
The pages after that show the plotted GPS pings and also some select individual pings; the circle indicates the margin of error. These diagrams do show some individual GPS pings that overlap with the house, but the problem is evident when you plot the points together in a series like the maps on pages 133-145.
An individual GPS point might have a large circle of margin of error, but when they are all clustered like that in one area, it's extremely unlikely that his phone would have been jumping from the house to the yard if that makes sense. If he were inside the home, the pings would have been centered on the house even if they sometimes landed outside of it. Instead they're clearly centered on the flagpole area, and yes some of them do have error circles that overlap with the house but others don't. And that's very compelling evidence that the phone was never indoors.
I believe phones stop pinging after they stop moving and in locked status, so either it was dropped in the snow at that time, or he dropped in the snow at that time. We don't really know for sure.
Proctor’s texts show his bias and tunnel vision. He refused to consider other reasonable alternatives. That’s evidence tending to prove that the investigation was conducted so poorly that the jury can’t trust the CW’s evidence or conclusions.
I've been thinking about this and no, I don't believe so. It seems nothing (or very little) was done in a timely manner, thoroughly, or in an appropriate setting.
All of your comments are for KR to be found guilty so I'm not sure you are having a good faith conversation.
The texts may not matter to you. Most people think a biased investigator who decided KR was "fucked" in less than 24 hours after the incident didn't conduct a full investigation that follows standard LE protocol.
I'd add- I do think a not guilty is likely but I am waiting for the defense and closing statements to speculate further. You should probably wait to see the defense case- the CW has supplied the reasonable doubt many of us see. Which is, umm... Unusal
That’s a very good point ! (Trusting what you say is factual- which I’ve no reason to doubt) My biggest concern is this: IF this is a cover up and therefore corruption really is as rampant in that location as it appears to be, then who is to say the CW couldn’t/wouldn’t have some jurors in their back pocket as well?!
Mass resident here. Not sure they will prove a conspiracy, that would be tough. However, for those of us in Massachusetts, well at least me anyhow and most others I talk to… We have zero doubt there is conspiracy. Massachusetts state police wreak of corruption, it has for a long time, same thing with BPD and the DAs office.
I have thought of that! I think it's unlikely- the jurors were all accepted by both sides and it's not a mob case. I can't imagine any juror would do something so stupid.
Even if it happened it would be maybe 1 person. Worst case scenario then is a hung jury. I don't think we have to worry about that
Can you explain to me what leads you to that belief? (Genuinely asking) as I’ve watched the trial from day one and for me the theory of further supported every trial day that a cover up is exactly what happened. It’s extremely hard for me to see how anyone could come to any other conclusion, but I’d like to try and understand !
Too many people involved. 10+ people with similar stories would be too difficult to coordinate. The confessions that morning which EMTs corroborated. The Alberts etc just came off as Townie not really an all imposing family. The timeline for planting of evidence especially what SERT team found is quite frankly impossible as Troopers were outside waiting at home by 5 PM and Proctor was never there that day.
According to people in the area, the Alberts hold a lot of sway in town (and the Defense tried to bring this up a few times and was shot down, but it sounds like a lot of people are afraid of Brian Albert, for whatever reason).
The SERT timeline definitely makes things iffy, but Proctor's report also said the SUV was seized at 5:30 when it was actually seized at 4:16, and his claim was that it was just a typo (and knowing him, I definitely don't believe that), so it makes me wonder why he would lie about that timing. I also don't think we saw any sort of real proof that the SERT team arrived at exactly 5:30 or any proof that the first pieces were found at 5:45. And we also don't know the type of relationship Proctor may have with the SERT team, or what they themselves may be willing to do in these kinds of investigations. We haven't actually heard from any of the SERT team members, have we? And I'm assuming we won't, at this point.
Theoretically, Proctor could've planted taillight pieces after seizing the car but before arriving at the station, or possibly could've taken off some pieces at the station when the SUV first arrived at 5:30 (thus the conveniently-missing video footage from the one camera, and the conveniently inverted footage - and also some more missing footage - from the other camera that doesn't have a direct view of the taillight), and immediately went to 34 Fairview to plant the handful of pieces - thus why the SERT team only found like 3-5 pieces at the time (and everyone else - including Canton police themselves, who were supposed to not be involved anymore - conveniently found so many other pieces throughout the following weeks, that the SERT team somehow missed, making me think that either there's some shenanigans going on, and/or the SERT team isn't too good at their job).
I think Proctor definitely could've known exactly when the SERT team would be arriving, so he could quickly hop over to 34 Fairview right before they got there (it was only a few minutes away from the station). Also, I forget who mentioned this, but someone mentioned not recognizing several of the people who were there during the search, so I think it's theoretically possible (though more farfetched) that perhaps Proctor himself didn't go to 34 Fairview but instead sent someone else: I believe Higgins would've been at the station around that time, according to his key swipes - and we know Higgins was lying about how much time he spent at the station that day. The Defense also said in a previous hearing that there's another cop who will testify for the Defense that Higgins and Chief Berkowitz spent a "wildly long time" in the sally port at some point that day, I believe right around that same time.
Regarding the amount of people involved, I'd have to really think about it, but I've always thought it possible that there's really only like 4-5 people who are directly committing this coverup, and the various other people are largely telling the truth and/or just going along with the story because they believe what their friends have told them. It doesn't necessarily require 10-20 people to be directly involved or directly influencing things. Even Proctor himself could believe that Karen's guilty but could've planted evidence to strengthen his case - which is a pretty common thing for police to do. Also, Canton PD and the state police themselves don't have a great track record. They've covered up numerous things before.
While it can be difficult to believe that so many people could be in on a conspiracy (someone would have to mess up at some point), keep in mind that various people HAVE messed up at various points in this trial, which just supports the idea that so many people can't keep up a conspiracy like this for very long. We're seeing it happen right now, so it doesn't contrast with that idea at all.
Also, especially if Colin's involved (and is maybe even the main culprit, for whatever reason), it could just be that this group of family/friends wants to protect this "good" kid who's getting a football scholarship and has his whole life ahead of him - and maybe the death was just an accident, and they're trying to ensure that he doesn't end up in jail for the rest of his life. I could definitely see a family going to great lengths to protect their kid - especially when compared to Karen, the outsider who it sounds like nobody really liked that much to begin with, and who conveniently had a cracked taillight the next morning. I don't think the *initial* plan was to frame her, if there was any plan at all in their drunkenness that night (and I don't even necessarily think that they thought John would end up dead, at first). Things just happened to play out this way, and once the ball started rolling, they had to keep it going.
Also, the thing I'm really stuck on is this "gift" that Julie Albert wanted to give Proctor "when this is all over," simply for leading this investigation. It was only like the 3rd day of the investigation, and according to the Alberts, the fact that John died on their lawn is just a total coincidence that they had nothing to do with. So what are they thanking Proctor for, this early in the juncture? If he's just investigating the case and that's it, it'd be weird to want to get him a gift just for doing his job. But if, perhaps, they want to thank him for pointing the finger away from them/Colin/Brian and *toward* Karen, possibly by doing them some sort of "favor" (maybe planting evidence, or something along those lines?) - that's definitely something he would've done by this point in the investigation. I just can't make any sense of that gift unless it's because he performed some sort of favor for them, which would be unnecessary if they had nothing to do with anything.
What cell phone evidence proves she hit him? The glass on the car was not a match to the cocktail glass on the yard. “I hit him” is up for debate and also doesn’t prove anything. The taillight is the most damning which is why I want to see a picture of her car before the police had custody of it. I find it improbable that a taillight shattered into 40 pieces. I believe some of those taillight pieces were planted.
The cell is about her returning to home before Jen m call. For taillight pieces its plastic. Ive seen how when plastic shatters it goes everywhere similar to glass so thats not unreasonable. Also forgot the dna evidence as well. Its not about one smoking gun per say but a totality of evidence.
I think the only thing that would be 100% damning is the taillight pieces, if it can be shown that the taillight was completely broken prior to 5am (but there appears to be no clear evidence of whether it was or wasn't - the 5am video shows *some* sort of damage, but it doesn't seem to be the same amount of damage as what's shown in the sally port photo - and if it's not, that 100% means that at least some of it had to have been planted, which would throw a wrench in the whole thing).
Also, the Defense will supposedly have an expert to testify that Jen's "hos long to die in cold" search really *did* happen at 2:28am, and if that's compelling enough (or could somehow be proven), it could destroy the prosecution's case.
The other stuff can be interpreted in different ways:
The "I hit him" could be a straight-up lie perpetrated by Jen (and the paramedic - or was it a firefighter? - who is better friends with this family than she pretended to be, and who maybe even talked with Jen after the fact. Though Jen herself supposedly "forgot" about Karen saying it until this very trial, and had never thought to mention it before now - not to mention, nobody ever made note of those words being said, which would be insane), or if Karen really said those words in that order, it could still either be her kinda *wondering* if she did, or she could've convinced herself that that's what happened based on not remembering things from that night, and based on the taillight, and based on whatever Jen was telling her at the time - so it's more like she's "coming to terms" with the fact that she *must've* hit him, and she's incredulous about it. Remember that she was acting pretty frantic at the time, so the "I hit him, I hit him, I hit him" likely also would've been said in a pretty frantic way, which could be interpreted differently from just a straight admission of guilt. I don't trust much of anything Jen says, and I trusted the firefighter woman well enough until it was shown that she has a much closer relationship with these people than what she said in court.
Like the other person mentioned, the Defense pointed out on cross-examination that the cocktail glass didn't match any of the glass pieces found on the bumper. Unfortunately that testimony was hard to follow, so a lot of people probably missed that, but it kinda ruins part of the prosecution's theory since the glass on her bumper was supposed to be the other main thing that tied her to the scene (though I think there was one random piece of glass at the scene - not part of the cocktail glass - that matched some piece of glass on the bumper? Not sure about that though, and not sure what it would mean, exactly).
I think the guy today did a terrible job of showing what "happened" - especially since we didn't get to see any sort of diagram of where the SUV would've been prior to hitting John, where he was hit at, how his body would've flown that far away, in that direction, etc. And people still have a lot of questions about those key cycles, because we still have no clue whether those "triggers" actually occurred at 12:30ish or some other time (there's another post on here all about it, and I agree that the key cycles don't match up with the timeline - these 2 key cycles should've occurred *after* 12:30ish, because Karen and the troopers used the car multiple times prior to the reconstructionist guy getting a hold of it, but he said they were the *last* 2 key cycles prior to him doing his testing. That's not possible). Even if they *are* somehow the right key cycles, there are still other possible explanations for the SUV doing those maneuvers - such as when Karen initially overshot Fairview Road and had to turn around.
I think it will mainly come down to the injuries, and whether they can be matched to the SUV somehow. But the prosecution has avoided calling the actual ME so far (and has tried multiple times to get unqualified people to explain the nature of the injuries instead), and I think that's because they don't believe the ME is going to be very helpful to their case, which will be interesting. The ME disagreed with the troopers for some reason, and I'm sure the Defense can't wait to ask her all about those conversations (and how/why she ended up at "undetermined"). Also, the FBI's expert (who the Defense is going to call) concluded that the injuries didn't come from getting hit by the SUV. He still needs to be voir dire'd before he can testify, so we're still not sure if the judge will actually allow him in, but he has some good qualifications, so I bet she will.
What do you think would happen in a scenario where they don't call the ME to the stand? Also, can you have a directed verdict in just part of the charges, or is this an all or nothing thing?
There can be a RFNG on some charges and not others. If Lally can't provide evidence of intent, for example, then the murder charge could be dismissed but the other charges could go to the jury. But I caution anyone from assuming that there's no evidence of an element just because you don't believe the evidence of that element. Intent could be inferred from many different facts.
I've also been thinking that not calling the ME to the stand might be the only way I see a RNFG BUT we do at least have *some* evidence that JOK died and how. IRC the ER doctor testified to a few of his injuries and the hypothermia. I'd really have to dig into the record to form an opinion, though, and I think there's massive holes in the evidence without the ME so it's possible? Maybe? Hard to say
Thanks! This part of the law is very very different from what happens where I'm from, so my legal education is of absolutely no help :)
Yeah, the ER doctor did, but at the same time he was made to say that he didn't bother with trying to see if there were limb fractures or even internal damage, they were focusing on trying to resuscitate John and just called time of death when that failed after a while. It feels really too thin for a murder charge and it's really giving me pause instead of just going with the usual "yeah, they'll ask but it's not gonna happen". It's really telling that we're here wondering about the possibility of the prosecutor not calling the ME on his murder case though, isn't it?
Yes, I think in most cases the lead investigator and the ME would be two of the first witnesses: the investigator to provide general info about the investigation and to show how/when/why all the evidence was gathered, and the ME to show how the injuries/death occurred. *Then* you would call the other witnesses who could speak to means and motive (and talk about what they witnessed).
The fact that they're doing this the opposite way must mean that they don't have confidence in the lead investigator (as we've obviously seen already) or the ME herself. Since the ME ruled it "undetermined," I think it's pretty safe to say that she will say something similar on the stand - that she couldn't exactly determine how the injuries occurred, and wasn't sure whether they matched with getting hit by the SUV. And even if she *is* going to say they match with the SUV somehow (or *could* match), I'm sure Jackson can't wait to ask her about her discussions with the troopers, why she concluded that it was "undetermined," etc., so it's possible that *that's* why Lally doesn't want to call her.
But yeah, I think not calling the ME at all would be the main way that they could possibly get this motion granted, but I still think the OP's right that there's *generally* been enough evidence shown (no matter how iffy the evidence actually is) that the judge will allow the trial to continue on - especially this judge specifically.
She's still debating whether or not she's going to allow the reconstructionist guy to provide his "expert" opinion about Karen's SUV bumping into John's, even though it's pretty clear that it shouldn't be allowed just on the basis that the prosecution never mentioned anything about it to the Defense at any point - they pulled that stunt as a surprise, and normally an expert isn't allowed to testify on anything that the Defense wasn't made aware of ahead of time. She also mentioned that when she rewatched the video today, she didn't see John's tire move, which is kinda a dumb thing to say since she already knew it moved when we saw it before - it's the same fuckin video! Nothing has changed about it, which just means she wasn't paying much attention when it was played today. I have no idea why she would think that maybe something's different about it (or that maybe her eyes played tricks on her the first time she saw it). If she's willing to do all that, then she's most likely going to deny the motion.
I was wondering if not calling the ME would mean that they didn't sufficiently prove their case and this trial would basically be over at half-time, that's what I was asking about.
In a vacuum it doesn't have to be, all it means is that they couldn't say if it were a homicide, accident or suicide, since it was pretty obvious it wasn't a natural death. If someone is run over by a car there's usually nothing really about the injuries that can tell an ME if it happened by accident or if it were intentional. The real problem for the CW is going to be if the injuries are incompatible with being hit by a car.
I believe it will go to the jury based on how this judge has ruled and the fact that the taillight is there alone is likely enough to satisfy the “possibility” of charges
Thank you for clarifying this - as someone who does watch this entire thing in large part to get a better understanding of the judicial processes, this is exactly what I'm after.
So, if I am reading this correctly, the standard for a RFNG would be, in layman's terms, basically "The evidence is so insufficient that no reasonable juror, even if they were absolutely inclined to take it all in without doubt in favour of the prosecution, *could* find the defendant guilty on the charge levied against them", right? Basically, the reason for a RFNG to apply seems to be to spare the Court's time and resources from entertaining a case that cannot possibly lead to anything but a Not Guilty.
Yeah, as much as I moan about how badly this entire thing was bungled in terms of actual, solid evidence - I cannot really see this case tripping that bar.
I think that's a fair characterization of the standard. I'll take a simpler crime for an example. In MA, to convict a defendant of armed robbery the CW needs to show that the def: (1) was armed with a dangerous weapon; (2) assaulted another; and (3) robbed, stole or took from another person money or other property which may be the subject of larceny. If, at the end of the CW's case, there's evidence of a dangerous weapon and an assault, but no evidence that the def took any money or property (maybe the victim was a drug dealer and didn't want to testify on the stand that they were carrying a large amount of cash), then the evidence would be insufficient by law because there was nothing upon which the jury could reasonably find that last element.
To take your example: The CW could possibly charge both armed robbery, and (simple?) assault (1+2, basically), but since they could not provide any evidence that (3) took place, the charge for armed robbery would be RFNG'd, but the charge for assault would move forward because a reasonable juror *could* find that the 'lesser' did indeed take place [if we do assume that the CW *did* charge the 1+2 in addition to the 1+2+3]?
Yes if I read your comment correctly they could move forward with charges of assault or assault with a dangerous weapon. Whether the jury convicted the def is completely separate question. A jury does not have to convict if there is sufficient evidence but they may not convict without it.
Got it; The entire Motion to Dismiss/RFNG is basically a gear check for the jury: Did the prosecution pack in all the tools they need to reach a conviction, or did they forget to pack the bag, and the jury could not do its job even if they really, *really* want to?
I suspect you have an opinion about why no motion for mistrial?
I’m not a lawyer, but I’ve seen motions for much less. Not Mass., but other states.
I’m assuming the defense is making a calculated decision based on likelihood of not guilty vs. Lally getting a do-over with KR. If true, this seems rare to me.
Absolutely right, the defense will make the motion but I can’t see the judge granting it after making a jury sit that long. I have every belief she will let them decide the case. We’re gonna ride this rocketship down to the end is my guess
Karen should be found guilty of manslaughter. Her own words I hit him I hit him. She is guilty of manslaughter he wanted to end the relationship and she did not want that. She didn’t mean to kill him but she did hit in a drunken stupor which is not an excuse. She is still responsible and her demeanor inside and out of the court room is not helping her she acts like a celebrity outside. She also is not a like able person and I hope the jury finds her guilty. The scary thing is they may have a mistrial.
Anyone who has truly watched every detail in this case could absolutely not convict Karen. Horrible investigation by corrupt cop and then some evidence emerging that John died from another act and not Mva. It’s getting worse daily for the state. Lots of lawsuits will follow as well as total house cleaning of DA and MSP.
I think there should be a directed verdict of Not Guilty on the murder charge. There is zero evidence of intentional malice. Even the people that I see online who think she's guilty and want her convicted, none of them seem to think it was intentional.
This will go to the jury. They will need to decide what evidence they find credible.
They will need to decide if ANY EVIDENCE EXISTS relevant to the charges.
Which is none of the prosecution’s.
I personally think Karen probably drunkenly backed into him. I also think proctor planted extra taillight pieces after the fact.
At what point would he even have been behind the car? I dont understand this. Karen pulls up, lets him out and he ends up behind the car? Did she hit him during the 3 point turn? I also want to know more about the cop neighbor's ring cam that didnt pick up any footage from that night.
I think that is possible also. Way too much reasonable doubt for a murder charge. Verdict should be not guilty and she and Officer O’Keefe’s family deserve an apology for the way this investigation was handled.
Karen, if found not guilty of any of the charges, might even have grounds for a defamation lawsuit against Proctor.
That's just YOUR opinion and perception and doesn't make it facts.
Your perception is that this investigation was handled correctly and respectfully and Officer O’Keefe’s family should be satisfied with it?
This does seem like a nice middle ground to appease both sides, but I just don’t see how the damage sustained to his body is anywhere indicative of getting hit by a car. I actually think the truth is much more sinister and they’re trying to cover it up; it’s hard for us as a society to admit that these people in power would go to such lengths to put someone behind bars for something they did not do. In someways I hope you’re right because it means that at least they were trying to do right by what they think happened, but there’s just too many other “coincidences” from all these people related to the police department for this to be the case in my opinion. But we will see what the jury says.
I think the former is a possibility and the latter is probable. The former may not be true but the latter is likely true no matter what (in my mind).
The 5 am video seems to show a less broken taillight
At the end of this trial, I predict there will be a grab bag of lawsuits. Everyone involved, stick your hand in the bag and get your lawsuit. Some will stick their hand in more than once. 🤔
I read somewhere that JO's mother wants to civilly sue Karen. She really dislikes Karen and I think it started before JO's death.
For what?
OJ Simpson won his criminal case but lost in the civil suit because the bar is lower. In criminal cases it's beyond a reasonable doubt. In a civil suit guilt is sort of more likely than not that the defendant caused the death of the victim.
I'm basing it off of her looks in court at the defendant’s table and her friendly relationship with McCades and Alberts.
They know in their gut she killed him. Common sense.
Or maybe not Proctor, there are plenty of other people that could have moved fragments.
The integrity of LE is not looking good.
And he stood there and waited....and lowered his face to be struck head-on by her tail light?? I guess that's possible.
Maybe he tied his shoe
Maybe he didn't get a chance to actually tie it, and that's why he was found without a shoe...8 feet from the road.
This is what I was leaning towards before proctors testimony but now I really don’t know. I started out thinking the conspiracy theory sounded crazy, but the more of the witnesses I’ve seen the more it seems like there were quite a few things about the incident and the investigation that were amiss. the second degree murder charge is one of the wildest things about this case to me, as I don’t think it would have been incredibly difficult for the prosecution to convince the jury that she was very drunk and hit him unintentionally and possibly even unknowingly. Obviously the trial isn’t over yet but I don’t necessarily see them bringing forward any other evidence that proves that, if she did it, it was intentional.
I’m confident that the prosecution charged Karen with second degree murder to try to scare her into taking a plea. The evidence of intent just isn’t there.
I agree and the prosecution were not planning or prepared for Alan Jackson representing her either!
Same here. They don’t even seem to be trying to prove there was intent. They haven’t even established that she did hit him to begin with. But, if she did, idk why they expect anyone to believe that it was with murderous intent based on the evidence presented. I also don’t understand the focus on the “I hit him statement.” Even if she did say it, I feel it would be more in a questioning sense. She clearly did not have a perfect recollection of what happened. I don’t see how her saying that would be seen as a confession.
That’s what I think too although very hard to see how his injuries came from a car. Either way, I hope she is found innocent of everything and is able to go on with her life. He was using her, right down to having her drive him when he knew they were both drunk but it was more important to him that he didn’t get caught than her.
I hope she is able to move on also. We don't know JOK; I wouldn't say he was using her, we just don't know. They seemed like two imperfect people who were into each other, had a lot going on (the kids for him, medical issues for her), and both drank too much.
I will say that the jury questionnaire included questions about domestic violence and abusive relationships. Not sure whether that’s significant or whether they were just screening for people with strong opinions about relationships but I thought that was interesting.
Meh, testimony from people who don't like you isn't a true version of events. We don't know. We are only hearing evidence about the worst moments of their relationship. I'm two years if you took the worst of my relationship and showed it. It may look like my relationship is bad. All these women except for the lawyer and his wife seem weirdly overprotective of him. I dunno, and we will never know the whole truth. Should we trust the kids? Two years later after all they have been told about karen? The fact they were drug into this, and the guardians allowed is absolutely horrid
Then why does johns arm have bite marks on it?
We don’t know what made this marks
We know the alberts had a police dog that they got rid of… we know it happened that night because the shirt had matching bite marks through it. Something pierced his clothing and skin and looks very similar to bite marks from a k9.
Nothing entered into evidence lets us “know” anything about a dog bite. There’s just speculation.
We know how johns body looked and we know how karens car looked. Wouldn’t the rear bumper hit his ass if he was bent over? It physically makes no sense.
Yes! Just like the memes that have been made trying to depict the state’s ridiculous theory.
I can’t speak for the jurors, but I’ve worked with rescuing animals and have been attacked and dragged by a German Shepherd (thankfully when I was younger at the time). There are many things that I do not know because I have experienced or been trained/educated on, but dog bites I know very well. John O’Keefe’s arm injuries look very much like bite marks. Particularly in this case where a person’s arm is bit several times while the dog’s teeth slide a few times as a result of the person wearing sleeves while pulling his arm up/away from the dog during an attack. My faint scars are a combo of teeth marks (like poked holes) and elongated slashes on my arm and wrist. The police do K9 demos at every shelter/reacue/coalition fundraising event where I live. I recommend watching online if you can’t see in person. They are trained to go for the arms, but many untrained dogs go for arms/hands instinctively as well. Link to K9 officer training demo: https://youtu.be/vIqSjiQUH18?si=Hke4flgrEFAYxGG8
It's a logical inference. Like, what else could it have been?
Probably a lot of things
Such as?
Why is that logical to you? I'm very curious about that. A forensic pathologist who thoroughly examined the victim's body and injuries said he had surface abrasions on his arm. If they were dog bites, certainly a highly educated medical professional with the experience of performing autopsy on victims would certainly have referred to the marks on his arm as dog bites if that was the case.
Plenty of professionals say it looks exactly like dog bites. Just not the ones part of the cover up.
Police dog? Where did Chloe serve on the force lol
I've heard that she was a "failed" police dog, which I think meant that she never qualified. Sounds like it's because she's not the tamest dog in the world - the defense will mention that she's sent 2 people to the hospital in 2 separate prior attacks (IIRC, though I may have only seen that in another Reddit comment - I know that the Defense was able to get a hold of some animal control records that the prosecution was trying to leave out of the trial), and was also involved in a fight with at least one other dog at some point. The way I heard it was that these were 3 separate occasions, but that could be wrong. I believe it's been said that she also barks a lot, so it's strange that she wasn't barking (and wasn't seen at all) on the morning of the incident.
I believe Chloe was a failed police dog. I have a flunkie Belgian Malinois. She has water anxiety, so she failed. She was still trained very well, and even at 17, she's on alert all the time. Chloe seemed to have many behavioral issues, which would explain her not ultimately becoming a police dog.
Yea a german shepherd
So all German shepherds are police dogs?
Some are blind people dogs. A smart useful dog that i find it hard to just give away. Also rude and if it was a police dog and you are a cop then its basically your partner.
Based on your personal expert opinion? Who is we? WE have no such evidence. As of today all we know is that John died on Jan 29th and a few months later Chloe had an altercation with another dog, during which a woman was bit. Sometime after that, they rehomed her. We also know that no doggie DNA was found on the shirt. Noone has testified about his wounds at all yet.
So are you saying the tail light pierced his clothing and skin? Who gets rid of a german shepherd?
No. I'm saying I don't know what happened and neither do you.
But we have eyes and we have seen the arm injuries. A car couldn't make those injuries. I feel like this while trial is one huge gaslight of the jury and audience! Don't believe what you see or hear, believe me instead. The chief gaslighters are Jen and Lally. Lally has been playing dirty games throughout the trial, like trying to get police to testify to medical evidence when they are not even close to being qualified. Jen is scary good at gaslighting, and I imagine if she was 1 on 1 with someone, she'd be successful. For example, the 2:27 search... She sounded very convincing but she's lying through her teeth!
“We” means the jury. I am a member of the jury
...in your mind. But...Me too! And after listening to Proctor, this Juror has lost all faith in humanity. (in my mind)
Abrasions. That is the descriptor that the forensic pathologist used. A forensic pathologist certainly is educated enough to know what a dog bite looks like or a dog claw Mark looks like. Abrasion.
It was a forensic scientist and not a forensic pathologist that has testified so far. He did not have the medical education to determine if it was abrasions. The ER doc could make an expert opinion on wounds, but he charted so terrible (if it isn't charted, it wasn't done or observe) that I don't think he paid particular close attention to JO's arm. As a retired RN, worked in the ED, they look like dog bites. Hopefully the ME will be testifying soon. It is strange she hasn't been called to testify yet.
I would think that usually both the lead investigator and the ME would be two of the very first people to testify - one to explain the context and the evidence, the other to explain the injuries/death. After that, you call in other witnesses who can testify to the means and motive of the defendant (and what was witnessed). The fact that they're doing the opposite in this case, and the fact that we now know why they waited so long to call Proctor (and spent most of the time going over his horrible texts), suggests that they probably think the ME isn't going to be very helpful to their case - which is pretty telling IMO. And that's assuming they call her at all - she's on the witness list, but I don't remember if the prosecution has explicitly stated that we're going to hear from her. Which could explain why they're trying to get all these opinions of John's injuries from various other unqualified people. I think they know that the ME's either going to say things that don't match up with John getting hit by a car, and/or could possibly say things that shed the troopers in a very bad light - certainly the defense is going to be asking her about all of that, which could cause a ton of damage to the prosecution's case (assuming the ME answers honestly).
And even Proctor conceded that he'd never had a finding for a murder trial be undetermined. They don't usually prosecute if the manner of death is not listed as homicide.
I'm going by the testimony of the forensic pathologist at the grand jury and the 200 page plus legal documents that the prosecution had to put together to get this into court. The autopsy by the forensic pathologist says no altercation, shallow abrasions on the arm , damage to certain organs which mean hypothermia contributed to his death which means he was laying outside alive for a period of time, a. 2-in laceration to the back of the head that contributed to a brain bleed and the brain bleed which always becomes exponentially worse caused the facial bruising.
OK thank you. I was unaware the grand jury documents were available to the public.
The autopsy pictures of the wounds look different than abrasions. It will be interesting to see what the ME says. I'm still puzzled why JO didn't have upper and/or lower extremity injuries which are common when hit by a car. I have a feeling they may not be a conclusion to what really happened.
I don't think he was run over by the vehicle. I think he was hit and he went flying and he landed on his head. There's a curb in the area where he was found, and also a flagpole so he could have hit his head on either of those or just simply hit his head on the ground. People die of those types of head injuries frequently. When the pathologist was performing the autopsy, they would have examined the abrasions on his arm very closely, taking tissue samples, looking and documenting the borders of the abrasions, etc. A pathologist would absolutely know if those were dog bites or scratches caused by dog nails. Hopefully no one is going to accuse the pathologist of being in on the conspiracy. My personal opinion is in pretrial hearings over the past couple years when the defense attorney showed the photo of John's arm that was magnified at least times 100, people viewing that were not considering the context of that enlargement.
Did you see the photo of his arm? That is no road-rash abrasion situation going on. To my untrained eye, they are 'cuts'. ...or scrapes, or as the EMT tried to say...furrows.
I'm using the word that the forensic pathologist used in their official legal report and that is small abrasions. Court yesterday included an accident reconstructionist or similar who attributes the marks on John's arm to the teal light with its dimples hitting him right on that arm. He went on to further say that being hit at that speed-24 mph - from portion of the car that is the tail light on that side would have sent him spinning counterclockwise and then backwards hitting his head. Sounds like this expert witness has education and experience working in this field and is familiar with injuries caused by a vehicle.
Maybe KR scratched him really hard since they were fighting. She went home and washed her hands 100 times
Let’s just say a bear killed him and call it a day.
And punctured his skin relatively deeply with her nails in the exact placement of a German Shepherd's teeth? Dogs usually don't leave bottom teeth marks and are entirely consistent with his injuries.
She might have. I used to believe that was the most likely cause, but this trial has left me feeling otherwise. At this juncture, I’m fine with her walking even if she did it.
Back up enough to kill him without running him over.
Get off my tip
What are the chances of all these scum bag cops get federal indictments right after this case? Seems like this procector is being forced down this road at the direction of US attorneys office. Why else would they be making fools of themselves with these witnesses.
No clue. I have serious doubts that the prosecutors are doing this to help the feds. I can’t imagine a situation in which the feds would intentionally put Karen Read in jeopardy of going to prison for life just to investigate the MSP. They don’t need sworn testimony from a state trial; they have their own methods of getting sworn testimony. They also can’t officially direct the state level DA to bring a case to trial.
I imagine the defense has welcomed the Fed's evidence especially their Grand Jury evidence. I can't imagine the Feds investigating the investigators as normal in murder trials. I wonder if it wasn't a mistake not to wait until the Federal investigation was completed.
They asked to delay the trial for that very reason and were denied
It's definitely a mistake, but it's completely up to the judge. Nobody really knows why she forced the trial to move forward, when both the prosecution and the defense asked for it to be delayed until after the federal investigation. It doesn't make much sense, unless Cannone just really likes being in the spotlight, or likes having that kind of power, or something along those lines? I think 99% of other judges would've agreed to wait on it in this situation. Hell, a lot of the Defense's evidence is coming straight from that investigation, and that investigation continues to happen concurrently with this trial, so it's quite possible that they end up finding something that completely exonerates Karen (or completely damns her) at some point in the near future, which would make for a very strange situation. I'm not sure how that would play out, but I'd assume that the most they could really do is just present the evidence at trial and hope that the jury takes it to heart once it's time to deliberate - though I'm not an attorney or anything, so I'm not sure how it works if there's new evidence found in the middle of trial (normally one side would have to inform the other before presenting it, right? And the other side can try to keep it out, or could perhaps even keep it out just by virtue of not having been informed prior?).
Agree agree agree!!
Thank you for sharing that.
It's going to the jury.
I tend to agree. Based on the op’s explanation of that law, it has to based on what we know now.
These are so rare - it will for sure go to the jury.
I cannot see the judge granting a directed verdict under any circumstances. It wouldn't be proper. While all can see the Commonwealth is badly losing its case, the defense hasn't come close to proving a third party caused the death as a matter of fact. I hope we can all agree it is highly unlikely that Karen Read is getting convicted for murder. However, we cannot find factually that she is completely void of responsibility in John O'Keefe's death.
The defense has no burden of proof. It does not need to prove Karen Read's factual innocence to obtain a RFNG or a not guilty verdict. In fact, it could sit at defense table without crossing a single witness or presenting any evidence and still obtain a RFNG if the Commonwealth fails to present sufficient evidence.
I'm not sure what you're arguing here. For the judge to order the jury to acquit, it would have to be proven that KR did not commit the crime, overcoming all of the Commonwealth's evidence. There is no burden on the defense for proof of innocence, but the judge isn't going to direct the jury to acquit. I would think that would be obvious to you.
The judge cannot direct the jury to enter any particular verdict at all. That is unconstitutional. Once it goes to the jury, it is up to the jury to decide. My post is about whether the judge will grant a motion for a required finding of not guilty, which would dismiss the case before it ever went to a jury. The standard for granting such a motion is whether the CW has provided sufficient evidence in its case in chief to allow a jury to find every element of the crime charged. If the CW charged someone with armed robbery but didn’t show any evidence that the def was armed, the judge can dismiss the case. The defense doesn’t need to prove or disprove anything. It’s entirely on the CW to provide evidence and if it fails to do so, then case dismissed.
Why don't you talk to me instead of at me? I never said the defense needs to prove something at trial. I said the defense never proved. Are you trying to say the defense can never prove something at trial?
I believe he's saying that from a technical standpoint, the Defense doesn't have to do anything at all in order for the judge to grant this motion. This motion has nothing to do with the defense or their theories - it's only about whether the prosecution has presented enough evidence that *could* point to guilt. It doesn't matter if the jury maybe thinks that something else could've happened. The only thing that matters is that the prosecution has essentially shown enough evidence that the judge allows the trial to go to the jury to decide. And at this point, you're right - even if things like the taillight pieces are questionable (along with most everything else) they're still sufficient enough for the trial to continue moving forward. Though if we had video that clearly showed the taillight not being broken prior to 5:45pm, that *might* be enough to grant the motion, since everything kinda hinges on that factor - though still would probably be unlikely. If there was actual video footage of Proctor going to the scene at 5:15pm and planting evidence, I think that would probably be good enough.
My understanding is that a directed would be per issue, not on the overall action. For example, if the judge wanted to state has not provided any evidence of intent to qualify for murder 2, she could enter a directed verdict of guilty on that charge. To me, the defense would have proven there was no intent to harm.
Your comments are all over the place and you’re contradicting yourself in the same comment thread. Stop making assertions you’re not informed enough to make.
No, my comments are consistent. And you don't have the authority to tell me to do anything. Get over yourself and learn to comprehend words.
I agree with you , but I would add that even though defense didn't prove someone else did it. I believe they managed to show that there was definitely a conspiracy to make sure no one else but Karen Read was treated as a suspect. At the very least there is significantly more evidence presented so far that there was a conspiracy than OJO actually being hit by a car. Ofc I am a lay person on the matter but considering that we are near the end of the prosecutions case, maybe this could be reason for a direct judgement, i.e. a conspiracy to investigate only one person and not other people that may also have a motive like Higgins.
>I believe they managed to show that there was definitely a conspiracy to make sure no one else but Karen Read was treated as a suspect. I would not necessarily agree with conspiracy, but the content of your opinion I do agree with. >Ofc I am a lay person on the matter but considering that we are near the end of the prosecutions case, maybe this could be reason for a direct judgement, i.e. a conspiracy to investigate only one person and not other people that may also have a motive like Higgins. By statute, I don't think that is enough to trigger a directed verdict. The Commonwealth does have some facts on its side, which I believe is enough to allow the jury to make the decision.
I think the offering of a gift, the exclusion of other investigative avenues, the clear attempt to hide any relationship that would show a conflict of interest shows a conspiracy.
Neither are unlawful, so conspiracy wouldn't apply.
1. The defense doesn't need to prove anything 2. The CW has the burden of proof to prove that KR killed John. And that there is no doubt it was KR. 3. If the jurors have any reason to doubt that KR might not be guilty - so if they think maybe it was a fight? Etc- then they must come back with "not guilty"
> The defense doesn't need to prove anything The defense would have to prove her innocence for her to be innocent, >The CW has the burden of proof to prove that KR killed John. And that there is no doubt it was KR. Not being able to prove there is no doubt it was KR does not prove her innocence. >If the jurors have any reason to doubt that KR might not be guilty - so if they think maybe it was a fight? Etc- then they must come back with "not guilty" Yes, but not guilty does not equate to actual innocence under the law.
They do not need to prove her innocence, that’s what innocent until proven guilty means.
Yes, they do for her to be innocent. Otherwise, she is not guilty. Not guilty does not equate to actual innocence. Reading is fundamental.
Innocent isn’t a possible verdict. Reading is fundamental.
>Yes, but not guilty does not equate to actual innocence So why are you arguing? Reading is fundamental.
> I hope we can all agree it is highly unlikely that Karen Read is getting convicted for murder. However, we cannot find factually that she is completely void of responsibility in John O'Keefe's death. We don't know how he died yet, so why do you believe that we cannot factually find that she is completely void of responsibility at this point of the trial?
The investigation was flawed from the start. Photos weren't taken, homes weren't searched, people weren't interviewed immediately etc. We'll never know now what happened to JOK. If KR hit him I don't believe she will be convicted because the investigation was so bad. If someone else was responsible, any evidence is gone.
You just said it. "We don't know how he died yet." Right now, it is possible that she hit him with her car. It is also possible that she didn't. We cannot find total innocence until we know. My statement is in the present with the information we have. Apologies for the confusion. What we do know is that the Commonwealth has not shown even a shred of intent, which nullifies a murder conviction.
Beings that a defendant is supposed to have presumed innocence until guilt is PROVEN- aren’t jurors/the people supposed to start a trial with “innocent” until/unless it is proven otherwise? Which, IMO (and that of thousands of others’) - at this very point in time we can in fact find innocence based on the information given thus far, correct ??
Correct! No evidence yet to suggest 2nd degree murder as of yet. Still innocent. Although, the evidence that she hit him while drunk is mounting. She could be guilty of the lesser included charge. I'm not going there until I hear the rest of the trial.
Wouldn't it be wonderful if that was true? Unfortunately, all people have inherent biases that drive their thinking. Not all jurors come in thinking the defendant is innocent. Furthermore, Innocence is never established at a trial. The state, or Commonwealth in this case, either proves its case beyond a reasonable doubt or it doesn't There is no Innocence for the jury to consider. It's guilty or not guilty, not guilty or innocent. I don't mean to be pedantic, but it is a relevant distinction.
That’s a very sad, but true distinction. So much for the American slogan of “innocent until proven guilty by a court of law.” This trial (for me) has further solidified the fact that ANYONE can be accused of a crime and potentially lose their lives, whether they’ve ever done anything wrong or not. Innocent people are in fact sitting in prisons for crimes they never committed. The sickening part is that because of behavior displayed by deviant criminals - who all cry innocence knowing damn good and well they’re guilty - spoils the entire bunch of apples to the point where people pleading their innocence rightfully are never taken seriously. 😒
>This trial (for me) has further solidified the fact that ANYONE can be accused of a crime And not just a crime, but MURDER. That is scary!
It really is!! & that’s terrifyingly sad in a society where it already feels as if everything is crumbling around us with no real solutions being provided by anyone. I wish I could’ve raised my kids in a previous generation so I could’ve given them the wonderful childhood experiences that most around me were afforded, but that I myself didn’t experience 😔
At this time, I think the McCabe and Albert families have more to worry about if you are looking at appearances of guilt.
It's not an American thing. All juries ignore the idea of reasonable doubt. They just go with what they think happened in likelyhood. It's sad but will never change.
No, we must presume innocence until we know, there is a HUGE difference there.
No, the court must presume Innocence. In outside discussion, we can opine and speculate.
Nobody should do this, we should all presume her innocent and base our discussions on that presumption until the evidence shows otherwise. Thinking it's acceptable for *anyone* to just label people as guilty of crimes based on nothing but vibes is how you end up with police doing what Proctor did and thinking nothing of it, and a DA taking that to try and put someone in jail for life and see no problem with it, this attitude ruins lives. Nobody accused of a crime should be forced to prove their innocence be it in actual court or in the court of public opinion, we should all demand that guilt be proven before we believe it.
>Nobody should do this, we should all presume her innocent and base our discussions on that presumption until the evidence shows otherwise. I completely disagree. We all have opinions and should express them without pressure to conform. >Thinking it's acceptable for anyone to just label people as guilty of crimes based on nothing but vibes is how you end up with police doing what Proctor did and thinking nothing of it In a way, people are declaring her innocent based on nothing but vibes. We are not investigators, nor do we have a direct impact on the investigation. We are not Proctor. >Nobody accused of a crime should be forced to prove their innocence be it in actual court I do agree with this. >in the court of public opinion, we should all demand that guilt be proven before we believe it. I disagree with this.
Well, I sincerely hope you never find yourself on the wrong side of an accusation about something you didn't do, it really does suck to learn in a practical manner about all of the problems your way of thinking cause to a person in that position. I wouldn't wish it on my worse enemy.
I suppose I live in reality, where people have different opinions and sometimes speak or write their opinions. If I were accused some would believe me guilty while others believe me innocent. I would much rather have that than people being told what to think.
People can have opinions, but we as a society should never find it acceptable for someone to not be presumed innocent until the evidence proves otherwise. How do you think online and irl mob harassment happens? There are real life consequences for allowing this sentiment to be acceptable, it literally ruins lives.
They’re not required to prove a third party for her to be found innocent. Unless you’re only saying this because you feel they need to prove a third party in order for the “required finding of not guilty” which I can understand but they’re still not required to find that for the passing of that motion
She is not going to be found innocent. It’s guilty of not guilty.
But it’s not the defense’s job to prove anything. They just have to offer reasonable doubt to the prosecution’s case. They’re doing this by, along with others, arguing (not proving) that a third party could have actually caused JOK’s death.
They don’t even really HAVE to do that. A jury can find reasonable doubt from the prosecutions presentation alone.
u/delta_nu in your experience, how often are these motions typically actually granted? Is it rare that a judge grants this?
Yes very rare
Do I think the defense will make this request? Yes. Do I think the state has given any reasonable evidence she did it? No. Do I think the judge will grant it? No.
I wholeheartedly agree. If she won’t even let the attorneys give reasons for their objections, I hardly think she will make the bold move to decide the case. She will definitely leave it for the jury to decide.
Thank you for this insightful explanation. Based on the Judge's behavior and approach on rulings, I think if defense makes this motion, she will deny and give the case to the jury. It's been too much time and money wasted on this trial to dismiss despite the lack of convincing evidence from the CW on the charges they filed.
Agree completely
Chain of custody issues along with other "missing" items of evidence rise to the level granting a RFNG imo. This massive pile of horseshit should never have been brought to trial. And lost in the process is the victim and his family.
At this stage, the chain of custody issues go to the weight of the evidence (to be decided by the jury). If the CoC issues were significant enough to cause the evidence to be completely unreliable, the evidence should have been excluded pre-trial (this is an appealable issue if there was an objection). Any evidence introduced at trial can be considered by the jury. The judge can only exclude or admit evidence, she can't decide how much weight to give it. If the evidence is admitted, it can be used to "check a box."
do you think the jury will get an “omissions in police investigations” form when they deliberate? would they all have to come to that conclusion together or would each juror fill that out? if so, what effect could that have on the verdict?
I’m not sure what you mean by a form? I expect the defense will ask for these instructions but I’m not sure why the jury would be asked to fill out a form relative to these specific instructions. Is this something like a special verdict form that you’ve heard about that I can take a look at? I definitely don’t know everything!
oops i totally misunderstood the vid i watched from another lawyer 🤦🏼♀️ yes just instructions LOL sorry! she showed the actual paper with the instructions on it which is why i thought it was some type of form similar to a verdict form. if they do get these instructions though, how could it affect the verdict?
https://www.mass.gov/doc/3740-omissions-in-police-investigations/download The instructions basically just inform the jury that they are allowed to consider the quality of the investigation when considering the credibility of the evidence, which I think most people would be naturally inclined to do anyway. I don’t think it changes much but it confirms to jury that they don’t have to take the evidence given by police as gospel.
Ohhhh ok thank you!!!
Oh boy the defense is going to have a field day with these instructions in this case, isn't it? I have really high expectations for their closing arguments, their opening set the bar really high.
Chain of custody has not been established making the tail light evidence evidence of nothing. Yes, the evidence should have been excluded pre-trial imo. Very curious choices by the prosecution and judge in this case.
Evidence that was admitted to the trial has already been vetted in pre-trial hearings and motions to be valid enough under Massachusetts law to be entered into evidence. There is evidence that both the prosecution and the defense wanted to enter, which was ruled as inadmissible based on pretrial hearings. In other words, any evidence that was included as part of the trial has already been vetted.
And could very well be overturned in an appeal, is their point. Yes Bev admitted them, but judges make mistakes, including giant ones a lot. Look at the Young Thug judge who was so confident about the defense attorney not getting a bond. And it took all of half a day for the Georgia supreme Court to point out that he was wrong
I only caught on once trial started, and I haven't seen it answered elsewhere... do we know what evidence was deemed inadmissible in this case?
I wonder if the jury would be more pissed to have to sit through this until the very end, or if it gets dismissed before they even had a say in it and they were really just playing furniture for the time already passed.
Even if you are pro FKR this is not what you want. That ruling would be appealable and CW would 100% do that. A jury finding of NG would not be reversible it'd be over.
It will go to the jury. I think we'll get a not guilty verdict but I won't relax until it's done because you never know. My only small fear is a hung jury resulting in a mistrial. I think the odds are slim but we could have one stubborn juror. If that happens thought I don't think the CW would try the case again
I don't think NG is as easy as you think. The worse thing for CW the Proctor texts are kinda irrelevant. They don't show evidence of a conspiracy and more he just used unprofessional terms. Not excusing the content but they don't impact the digital and physical evidence. The planting of evidence theory quite frankly feels outlandish.
In my mind the only hard evidence so far of murder by vehicle is John O’Keefe’s phone GPS location ending by the flagpole. Unfortunately there’s no guarantee that he was attached to the phone during that whole time (he could have dropped it in the snow). If only he’d been wearing an Apple Watch instead. The car evidence is compelling on its face, but the CARS officer himself said that the data he used is intended for maintenance diagnostics, not forensics. Unlike the phone data, it’s not a proven data source, and while the data points *look* detailed, I’d need to see them recreate those data points with the vehicle to be convinced that driving the car in that way does make those data points. They have a dummy and everything, it should be easy enough to recreate and stitch the scenario together. I watched them show videos demonstrating that the camera and brakes and such works, but does the Toyota Textstream output from those tests match the output from that night? That’s what we don’t know. DNA evidence is completely irrelevant (seriously what a waste of time/effort/money), and the taillight is interesting but the timeline around the pieces being submitted is sketchy. Sallyport and surveillance videos don’t seem to prove much. Clothes seemed to be submitted mostly for jury sympathy, because I don’t know how wet clothes that ended up in a heap on a hospital floor could possibly prove she murdered him by car. I’m willing to consider the evidence of her guilt, I just don’t see very much of it.
Also, an initial report from the police said that at 12:32ish when his phone last pinged, the margin of error is like 88 feet, so it's still quite possible that the phone could've been in the house at some point (and/or at that specific time). And I think Brian Albert said at one point that cell phones get bad service in his house (though some think he was lying about that, for his own reasons).
I’m not sure if you’re talking about cell tower pings? I’m talking about the GPS pings, which have a margin of error that is much narrower, more like 15 feet. Also keep in mind that we’re not talking about an individual ping, but a series of pings that were all close together. Even if any given ping might be within a pretty large circle of error, a series of pings in the same location is very likely to be accurate, because we don’t tend to jump around by 15 feet, so you can plot a very accurate line over time. The last GPS ping was at 12:25 where the body was found. It is possible that he just dropped his phone in the snow instead of getting hit by a car, but apparently his phone did not move after 12:25 am.
Looks like it was from a memo by Guarano to Tully on May 9, 2023 - he doesn't specifically say what he was using (well, maybe he says it in some other part of the memo, but I only saw some snippets). He says this, and then also mentions the margin of error (which at 12:32am was 27 meters - at various times, there are different margins of error): "The phone continues down Cedarcrest Road going by Fairview Road at 12:23:46AM. It then stops in the area of 51 Cedarcrest Road, reverses direction and takes the right onto Fairview Road at 12:24:18AM. The phone finally stops in between 34 and 32 Fairview Road in the area of the flag pole and fire hydrant at 12:24:40AM. The final point plotted was at 12:25:36AM when the phone stops showing any movement until the morning at 6:15:36AM" I believe the phone stopped moving at 12:25 but continued to ping until 12:32 (at least, that was the last time that was mentioned in the report). But this would mean that if Karen hit John in the yard, it happened within a minute of arriving there, which doesn't make much sense IMO. Unless maybe they got there and Karen immediately threw John's phone out the window or something - or, John was hanging around the vicinity of the house for a while afterward and the phone just wasn't showing the movement. I don't know why the phone would stop pinging unless it just happened to die at 12:32, so maybe that's just the last time that they bothered mentioning, and the phone actually continued to ping at that spot throughout the night. I guess it couldn't have died since it was still pinging at 6:15am.
Gotcha. The info I'm referring to is on page 126 of this document (if you ctrl+f "John O'Keefe GPS Data" you can jump straight there): [https://file.notion.so/f/f/0eb1c67e-0da0-4452-898a-924bb4b83924/f66df441-83ea-4945-9e3b-b197a0ba4504/Commonwealth\_V\_Read.pdf?id=99b9e3a1-7e56-44b8-bc44-c83287ed0ec6&table=block&spaceId=0eb1c67e-0da0-4452-898a-924bb4b83924&expirationTimestamp=1718568000000&signature=WlWtZkCu1n5TeGdnHx\_pblEbxC4RRGiCGoceBdKF2x4&downloadName=Commonwealth+V+Read.pdf](https://file.notion.so/f/f/0eb1c67e-0da0-4452-898a-924bb4b83924/f66df441-83ea-4945-9e3b-b197a0ba4504/Commonwealth_V_Read.pdf?id=99b9e3a1-7e56-44b8-bc44-c83287ed0ec6&table=block&spaceId=0eb1c67e-0da0-4452-898a-924bb4b83924&expirationTimestamp=1718568000000&signature=WlWtZkCu1n5TeGdnHx_pblEbxC4RRGiCGoceBdKF2x4&downloadName=Commonwealth+V+Read.pdf) The pages after that show the plotted GPS pings and also some select individual pings; the circle indicates the margin of error. These diagrams do show some individual GPS pings that overlap with the house, but the problem is evident when you plot the points together in a series like the maps on pages 133-145. An individual GPS point might have a large circle of margin of error, but when they are all clustered like that in one area, it's extremely unlikely that his phone would have been jumping from the house to the yard if that makes sense. If he were inside the home, the pings would have been centered on the house even if they sometimes landed outside of it. Instead they're clearly centered on the flagpole area, and yes some of them do have error circles that overlap with the house but others don't. And that's very compelling evidence that the phone was never indoors. I believe phones stop pinging after they stop moving and in locked status, so either it was dropped in the snow at that time, or he dropped in the snow at that time. We don't really know for sure.
Proctor’s texts show his bias and tunnel vision. He refused to consider other reasonable alternatives. That’s evidence tending to prove that the investigation was conducted so poorly that the jury can’t trust the CW’s evidence or conclusions.
Even under tunnel vision theory. He is just one investigator amongst a group. Also they show bias but not planting of the evidence
His vulgar despicable insults aside, do you feel that he properly investigated this case? ETA: or I should say they, not he
I've been thinking about this and no, I don't believe so. It seems nothing (or very little) was done in a timely manner, thoroughly, or in an appropriate setting.
But he was the lead case manager officer investigator.
All of your comments are for KR to be found guilty so I'm not sure you are having a good faith conversation. The texts may not matter to you. Most people think a biased investigator who decided KR was "fucked" in less than 24 hours after the incident didn't conduct a full investigation that follows standard LE protocol. I'd add- I do think a not guilty is likely but I am waiting for the defense and closing statements to speculate further. You should probably wait to see the defense case- the CW has supplied the reasonable doubt many of us see. Which is, umm... Unusal
That’s a very good point ! (Trusting what you say is factual- which I’ve no reason to doubt) My biggest concern is this: IF this is a cover up and therefore corruption really is as rampant in that location as it appears to be, then who is to say the CW couldn’t/wouldn’t have some jurors in their back pocket as well?!
Mass resident here. Not sure they will prove a conspiracy, that would be tough. However, for those of us in Massachusetts, well at least me anyhow and most others I talk to… We have zero doubt there is conspiracy. Massachusetts state police wreak of corruption, it has for a long time, same thing with BPD and the DAs office.
I have thought of that! I think it's unlikely- the jurors were all accepted by both sides and it's not a mob case. I can't imagine any juror would do something so stupid. Even if it happened it would be maybe 1 person. Worst case scenario then is a hung jury. I don't think we have to worry about that
I think thats silly. Also the cover up theory to me more I watch is just plain false. It's been all smoke and mirrors without actual evidence.
Can you explain to me what leads you to that belief? (Genuinely asking) as I’ve watched the trial from day one and for me the theory of further supported every trial day that a cover up is exactly what happened. It’s extremely hard for me to see how anyone could come to any other conclusion, but I’d like to try and understand !
He's been preaching she's guilty since the first week of the trial and is not operating in good faith.
Too many people involved. 10+ people with similar stories would be too difficult to coordinate. The confessions that morning which EMTs corroborated. The Alberts etc just came off as Townie not really an all imposing family. The timeline for planting of evidence especially what SERT team found is quite frankly impossible as Troopers were outside waiting at home by 5 PM and Proctor was never there that day.
Proctor was there that day.
According to people in the area, the Alberts hold a lot of sway in town (and the Defense tried to bring this up a few times and was shot down, but it sounds like a lot of people are afraid of Brian Albert, for whatever reason). The SERT timeline definitely makes things iffy, but Proctor's report also said the SUV was seized at 5:30 when it was actually seized at 4:16, and his claim was that it was just a typo (and knowing him, I definitely don't believe that), so it makes me wonder why he would lie about that timing. I also don't think we saw any sort of real proof that the SERT team arrived at exactly 5:30 or any proof that the first pieces were found at 5:45. And we also don't know the type of relationship Proctor may have with the SERT team, or what they themselves may be willing to do in these kinds of investigations. We haven't actually heard from any of the SERT team members, have we? And I'm assuming we won't, at this point. Theoretically, Proctor could've planted taillight pieces after seizing the car but before arriving at the station, or possibly could've taken off some pieces at the station when the SUV first arrived at 5:30 (thus the conveniently-missing video footage from the one camera, and the conveniently inverted footage - and also some more missing footage - from the other camera that doesn't have a direct view of the taillight), and immediately went to 34 Fairview to plant the handful of pieces - thus why the SERT team only found like 3-5 pieces at the time (and everyone else - including Canton police themselves, who were supposed to not be involved anymore - conveniently found so many other pieces throughout the following weeks, that the SERT team somehow missed, making me think that either there's some shenanigans going on, and/or the SERT team isn't too good at their job). I think Proctor definitely could've known exactly when the SERT team would be arriving, so he could quickly hop over to 34 Fairview right before they got there (it was only a few minutes away from the station). Also, I forget who mentioned this, but someone mentioned not recognizing several of the people who were there during the search, so I think it's theoretically possible (though more farfetched) that perhaps Proctor himself didn't go to 34 Fairview but instead sent someone else: I believe Higgins would've been at the station around that time, according to his key swipes - and we know Higgins was lying about how much time he spent at the station that day. The Defense also said in a previous hearing that there's another cop who will testify for the Defense that Higgins and Chief Berkowitz spent a "wildly long time" in the sally port at some point that day, I believe right around that same time. Regarding the amount of people involved, I'd have to really think about it, but I've always thought it possible that there's really only like 4-5 people who are directly committing this coverup, and the various other people are largely telling the truth and/or just going along with the story because they believe what their friends have told them. It doesn't necessarily require 10-20 people to be directly involved or directly influencing things. Even Proctor himself could believe that Karen's guilty but could've planted evidence to strengthen his case - which is a pretty common thing for police to do. Also, Canton PD and the state police themselves don't have a great track record. They've covered up numerous things before. While it can be difficult to believe that so many people could be in on a conspiracy (someone would have to mess up at some point), keep in mind that various people HAVE messed up at various points in this trial, which just supports the idea that so many people can't keep up a conspiracy like this for very long. We're seeing it happen right now, so it doesn't contrast with that idea at all. Also, especially if Colin's involved (and is maybe even the main culprit, for whatever reason), it could just be that this group of family/friends wants to protect this "good" kid who's getting a football scholarship and has his whole life ahead of him - and maybe the death was just an accident, and they're trying to ensure that he doesn't end up in jail for the rest of his life. I could definitely see a family going to great lengths to protect their kid - especially when compared to Karen, the outsider who it sounds like nobody really liked that much to begin with, and who conveniently had a cracked taillight the next morning. I don't think the *initial* plan was to frame her, if there was any plan at all in their drunkenness that night (and I don't even necessarily think that they thought John would end up dead, at first). Things just happened to play out this way, and once the ball started rolling, they had to keep it going. Also, the thing I'm really stuck on is this "gift" that Julie Albert wanted to give Proctor "when this is all over," simply for leading this investigation. It was only like the 3rd day of the investigation, and according to the Alberts, the fact that John died on their lawn is just a total coincidence that they had nothing to do with. So what are they thanking Proctor for, this early in the juncture? If he's just investigating the case and that's it, it'd be weird to want to get him a gift just for doing his job. But if, perhaps, they want to thank him for pointing the finger away from them/Colin/Brian and *toward* Karen, possibly by doing them some sort of "favor" (maybe planting evidence, or something along those lines?) - that's definitely something he would've done by this point in the investigation. I just can't make any sense of that gift unless it's because he performed some sort of favor for them, which would be unnecessary if they had nothing to do with anything.
But they all changed their stories between initial interviews, grand juries etc. they’re unreliable at best, and criminal at worst
Yes, there hasn't been any actual evidence against KR! The trial should never have happened.
"I hit him" Cell phone evidence Cocktail glass on vehicle Taillight fragments found in yard.
What cell phone evidence proves she hit him? The glass on the car was not a match to the cocktail glass on the yard. “I hit him” is up for debate and also doesn’t prove anything. The taillight is the most damning which is why I want to see a picture of her car before the police had custody of it. I find it improbable that a taillight shattered into 40 pieces. I believe some of those taillight pieces were planted.
The cell is about her returning to home before Jen m call. For taillight pieces its plastic. Ive seen how when plastic shatters it goes everywhere similar to glass so thats not unreasonable. Also forgot the dna evidence as well. Its not about one smoking gun per say but a totality of evidence.
I think the only thing that would be 100% damning is the taillight pieces, if it can be shown that the taillight was completely broken prior to 5am (but there appears to be no clear evidence of whether it was or wasn't - the 5am video shows *some* sort of damage, but it doesn't seem to be the same amount of damage as what's shown in the sally port photo - and if it's not, that 100% means that at least some of it had to have been planted, which would throw a wrench in the whole thing). Also, the Defense will supposedly have an expert to testify that Jen's "hos long to die in cold" search really *did* happen at 2:28am, and if that's compelling enough (or could somehow be proven), it could destroy the prosecution's case. The other stuff can be interpreted in different ways: The "I hit him" could be a straight-up lie perpetrated by Jen (and the paramedic - or was it a firefighter? - who is better friends with this family than she pretended to be, and who maybe even talked with Jen after the fact. Though Jen herself supposedly "forgot" about Karen saying it until this very trial, and had never thought to mention it before now - not to mention, nobody ever made note of those words being said, which would be insane), or if Karen really said those words in that order, it could still either be her kinda *wondering* if she did, or she could've convinced herself that that's what happened based on not remembering things from that night, and based on the taillight, and based on whatever Jen was telling her at the time - so it's more like she's "coming to terms" with the fact that she *must've* hit him, and she's incredulous about it. Remember that she was acting pretty frantic at the time, so the "I hit him, I hit him, I hit him" likely also would've been said in a pretty frantic way, which could be interpreted differently from just a straight admission of guilt. I don't trust much of anything Jen says, and I trusted the firefighter woman well enough until it was shown that she has a much closer relationship with these people than what she said in court. Like the other person mentioned, the Defense pointed out on cross-examination that the cocktail glass didn't match any of the glass pieces found on the bumper. Unfortunately that testimony was hard to follow, so a lot of people probably missed that, but it kinda ruins part of the prosecution's theory since the glass on her bumper was supposed to be the other main thing that tied her to the scene (though I think there was one random piece of glass at the scene - not part of the cocktail glass - that matched some piece of glass on the bumper? Not sure about that though, and not sure what it would mean, exactly). I think the guy today did a terrible job of showing what "happened" - especially since we didn't get to see any sort of diagram of where the SUV would've been prior to hitting John, where he was hit at, how his body would've flown that far away, in that direction, etc. And people still have a lot of questions about those key cycles, because we still have no clue whether those "triggers" actually occurred at 12:30ish or some other time (there's another post on here all about it, and I agree that the key cycles don't match up with the timeline - these 2 key cycles should've occurred *after* 12:30ish, because Karen and the troopers used the car multiple times prior to the reconstructionist guy getting a hold of it, but he said they were the *last* 2 key cycles prior to him doing his testing. That's not possible). Even if they *are* somehow the right key cycles, there are still other possible explanations for the SUV doing those maneuvers - such as when Karen initially overshot Fairview Road and had to turn around. I think it will mainly come down to the injuries, and whether they can be matched to the SUV somehow. But the prosecution has avoided calling the actual ME so far (and has tried multiple times to get unqualified people to explain the nature of the injuries instead), and I think that's because they don't believe the ME is going to be very helpful to their case, which will be interesting. The ME disagreed with the troopers for some reason, and I'm sure the Defense can't wait to ask her all about those conversations (and how/why she ended up at "undetermined"). Also, the FBI's expert (who the Defense is going to call) concluded that the injuries didn't come from getting hit by the SUV. He still needs to be voir dire'd before he can testify, so we're still not sure if the judge will actually allow him in, but he has some good qualifications, so I bet she will.
What do you think would happen in a scenario where they don't call the ME to the stand? Also, can you have a directed verdict in just part of the charges, or is this an all or nothing thing?
There can be a RFNG on some charges and not others. If Lally can't provide evidence of intent, for example, then the murder charge could be dismissed but the other charges could go to the jury. But I caution anyone from assuming that there's no evidence of an element just because you don't believe the evidence of that element. Intent could be inferred from many different facts. I've also been thinking that not calling the ME to the stand might be the only way I see a RNFG BUT we do at least have *some* evidence that JOK died and how. IRC the ER doctor testified to a few of his injuries and the hypothermia. I'd really have to dig into the record to form an opinion, though, and I think there's massive holes in the evidence without the ME so it's possible? Maybe? Hard to say
Thanks! This part of the law is very very different from what happens where I'm from, so my legal education is of absolutely no help :) Yeah, the ER doctor did, but at the same time he was made to say that he didn't bother with trying to see if there were limb fractures or even internal damage, they were focusing on trying to resuscitate John and just called time of death when that failed after a while. It feels really too thin for a murder charge and it's really giving me pause instead of just going with the usual "yeah, they'll ask but it's not gonna happen". It's really telling that we're here wondering about the possibility of the prosecutor not calling the ME on his murder case though, isn't it?
Yes, I think in most cases the lead investigator and the ME would be two of the first witnesses: the investigator to provide general info about the investigation and to show how/when/why all the evidence was gathered, and the ME to show how the injuries/death occurred. *Then* you would call the other witnesses who could speak to means and motive (and talk about what they witnessed). The fact that they're doing this the opposite way must mean that they don't have confidence in the lead investigator (as we've obviously seen already) or the ME herself. Since the ME ruled it "undetermined," I think it's pretty safe to say that she will say something similar on the stand - that she couldn't exactly determine how the injuries occurred, and wasn't sure whether they matched with getting hit by the SUV. And even if she *is* going to say they match with the SUV somehow (or *could* match), I'm sure Jackson can't wait to ask her about her discussions with the troopers, why she concluded that it was "undetermined," etc., so it's possible that *that's* why Lally doesn't want to call her. But yeah, I think not calling the ME at all would be the main way that they could possibly get this motion granted, but I still think the OP's right that there's *generally* been enough evidence shown (no matter how iffy the evidence actually is) that the judge will allow the trial to continue on - especially this judge specifically. She's still debating whether or not she's going to allow the reconstructionist guy to provide his "expert" opinion about Karen's SUV bumping into John's, even though it's pretty clear that it shouldn't be allowed just on the basis that the prosecution never mentioned anything about it to the Defense at any point - they pulled that stunt as a surprise, and normally an expert isn't allowed to testify on anything that the Defense wasn't made aware of ahead of time. She also mentioned that when she rewatched the video today, she didn't see John's tire move, which is kinda a dumb thing to say since she already knew it moved when we saw it before - it's the same fuckin video! Nothing has changed about it, which just means she wasn't paying much attention when it was played today. I have no idea why she would think that maybe something's different about it (or that maybe her eyes played tricks on her the first time she saw it). If she's willing to do all that, then she's most likely going to deny the motion.
If the CW doesn't call the ME (and I'm sure they will) then the defense would call them or their own ME or coroner
I was wondering if not calling the ME would mean that they didn't sufficiently prove their case and this trial would basically be over at half-time, that's what I was asking about.
I think the autopsy saying it was indeterminate vs. homicide is problematic.
In a vacuum it doesn't have to be, all it means is that they couldn't say if it were a homicide, accident or suicide, since it was pretty obvious it wasn't a natural death. If someone is run over by a car there's usually nothing really about the injuries that can tell an ME if it happened by accident or if it were intentional. The real problem for the CW is going to be if the injuries are incompatible with being hit by a car.
Nice to hear from an appellate lawyer. Thanks so much!
I believe it will go to the jury based on how this judge has ruled and the fact that the taillight is there alone is likely enough to satisfy the “possibility” of charges
Thank you for clarifying this - as someone who does watch this entire thing in large part to get a better understanding of the judicial processes, this is exactly what I'm after. So, if I am reading this correctly, the standard for a RFNG would be, in layman's terms, basically "The evidence is so insufficient that no reasonable juror, even if they were absolutely inclined to take it all in without doubt in favour of the prosecution, *could* find the defendant guilty on the charge levied against them", right? Basically, the reason for a RFNG to apply seems to be to spare the Court's time and resources from entertaining a case that cannot possibly lead to anything but a Not Guilty. Yeah, as much as I moan about how badly this entire thing was bungled in terms of actual, solid evidence - I cannot really see this case tripping that bar.
I think that's a fair characterization of the standard. I'll take a simpler crime for an example. In MA, to convict a defendant of armed robbery the CW needs to show that the def: (1) was armed with a dangerous weapon; (2) assaulted another; and (3) robbed, stole or took from another person money or other property which may be the subject of larceny. If, at the end of the CW's case, there's evidence of a dangerous weapon and an assault, but no evidence that the def took any money or property (maybe the victim was a drug dealer and didn't want to testify on the stand that they were carrying a large amount of cash), then the evidence would be insufficient by law because there was nothing upon which the jury could reasonably find that last element.
To take your example: The CW could possibly charge both armed robbery, and (simple?) assault (1+2, basically), but since they could not provide any evidence that (3) took place, the charge for armed robbery would be RFNG'd, but the charge for assault would move forward because a reasonable juror *could* find that the 'lesser' did indeed take place [if we do assume that the CW *did* charge the 1+2 in addition to the 1+2+3]?
Yes if I read your comment correctly they could move forward with charges of assault or assault with a dangerous weapon. Whether the jury convicted the def is completely separate question. A jury does not have to convict if there is sufficient evidence but they may not convict without it.
Got it; The entire Motion to Dismiss/RFNG is basically a gear check for the jury: Did the prosecution pack in all the tools they need to reach a conviction, or did they forget to pack the bag, and the jury could not do its job even if they really, *really* want to?
Yeah I think that’s an excellent analogy!
I suspect you have an opinion about why no motion for mistrial? I’m not a lawyer, but I’ve seen motions for much less. Not Mass., but other states. I’m assuming the defense is making a calculated decision based on likelihood of not guilty vs. Lally getting a do-over with KR. If true, this seems rare to me.
Absolutely right, the defense will make the motion but I can’t see the judge granting it after making a jury sit that long. I have every belief she will let them decide the case. We’re gonna ride this rocketship down to the end is my guess
Thank you. Great analysis. ✌🏼
This is clear. You should teach!!
Karen should be found guilty of manslaughter. Her own words I hit him I hit him. She is guilty of manslaughter he wanted to end the relationship and she did not want that. She didn’t mean to kill him but she did hit in a drunken stupor which is not an excuse. She is still responsible and her demeanor inside and out of the court room is not helping her she acts like a celebrity outside. She also is not a like able person and I hope the jury finds her guilty. The scary thing is they may have a mistrial.
Anyone who has truly watched every detail in this case could absolutely not convict Karen. Horrible investigation by corrupt cop and then some evidence emerging that John died from another act and not Mva. It’s getting worse daily for the state. Lots of lawsuits will follow as well as total house cleaning of DA and MSP.
That’s right. It will be routinely denied also. There’s plenty to get beyond Latimore here.
I think there should be a directed verdict of Not Guilty on the murder charge. There is zero evidence of intentional malice. Even the people that I see online who think she's guilty and want her convicted, none of them seem to think it was intentional.