Karen Be taught Trial: Witnesses Accused of Conspiracy Spoil Silence on Claims They're “Murderers”
5 key witnesses in Karen Be taught’s murder trial spoke out after she used to be acquitted of 2d-diploma murder charges within the 2022 death of her boyfriend John O’Keefe.
Key figures within the Karen Be taught retrial are talking out about the case.
Whereas the forty five-yr-frail used to be acquitted of 2d-diploma murder charges within the 2022 death of her boyfriend John O’Keefe, five of the prosecution’s witnesses—Jennifer McCabe, her husband Matt McCabe, her sister Nicole Albert, Nicole’s husband Brian Albert and Brian’s brother Chris Albert—explained that they’re nonetheless feeling the consequences of their involvement within the trial, severely from conspiracy theories which have surrounded the case.
“They’ve dehumanized us to the sense where we’re no longer exact other folks,” Chris mentioned in an interview with ABC Facts released June 20. “We’re almost cherish caricatures. We’re pawns.”
Right thru the trial, the defense argued that Be taught had been framed by local and verbalize regulation enforcement officers to quilt up a fight that occurred in Brian and Nicole’s home on Jan. 29, 2022. Because of this, Brian—a prominent police officer and colleague of O’Keefe’s—mentioned that he’d been known as a assassin “on a on day by day basis basis” by people of the final public, while his cohorts mentioned they faced the same scrutiny.
“Any one who’s touched this case has been known as a assassin one day,” Matt explained, while Jennifer added, “Any person that’s pals with us helps cop killers.”
In gentle of the backlash, Nicole cautioned others to weigh the execs and cons of being smitten by this kind of excessive-profile matter.
“Concentrate on exact lengthy and laborious ahead of you're a survey in a case,” she mentioned, “on fable of no one protects you and it's very, very sad.”
Nonetheless despite the hostility from some of their neighbors, Nicole’s brother-in-regulation mentioned he has no prefer to relocate.
“You fetch down, you fetch depressed,” he admitted. “Nonetheless that is the metropolis we grew up in. We didn't cease the rest injurious. All of us contributed to our metropolis, we love our metropolis. Why must nonetheless now we must run any place?”
Meanwhile, Karen Be taught—who used to be accused of drunkenly hitting O’Keefe with her vehicle and leaving him to die in a blizzard commence air of the Alberts’ home—also spoke out after the choice used to be handed down.
“I could well well no longer be standing right here without these unbelievable supporters who have supported me and my group,” she suggested gatherers commence air the court docket in Massachusetts. “The 2d ingredient I’ve to enlighten is that no one has fought more durable for justice of John O'Keefe than I even have.”
For extra crucial facets on the case, attend reading.
What Occurred to John O'Keefe?
Karen Be taught suggested authorities that she and Boston Police Officer John O’Keefe, her boyfriend of virtually two years, were out ingesting with pals at C.F. McCarthy’s bar in Canton, Mass., on the night of Jan. 28, 2022, after which they spent about an hour at Waterfall Bar & Grille all around the avenue. Be taught mentioned that she dropped O’Keefe off on the Canton home of Boston Police Det. Brian Albert rapidly after stupid night and went help to O’Keefe’s home.
Prosecutors, alternatively, alleged at Be taught’s Feb. 2, 2022, arraignment on manslaughter charges that there used to be proof indicated she hit O’Keefe with her vehicle ahead of using off and left him lying there in frigid climate conditions.
Be taught, a monetary analyst living in nearby Mansfield, maintained that she returned to Albert’s home the following morning after O’Keefe failed to return home and she or he couldn’t reach him on his phone. She known as about a other folks that were with her, Be taught mentioned, after they stumbled on him lying within the snow commence air the Albert predicament at 6 a.m.
The 46-yr-frail cop had bloody cuts on his correct arm, his eyes were swollen shut and his dresses were covered with blood and vomit, in step with prosecutors. He used to be transported to Boston’s Honest Samaritan Clinical institution, where he used to be pronounced useless later that morning.
A subsequent autopsy discovered that O’Keefe had suffered a couple of skull fractures, apart from as cuts to the help of his head and nose. The coroner within the spoil attributed his death to hypothermia and blunt power trauma.
Karen Be taught Arrested for Manslaughter in Dying of John O'Keefe
Be taught used to be arrested Feb. 1, 2022, and charged with manslaughter, leaving the scene of a motorized vehicle inflicting death and motorized vehicle homicide.
Investigators positioned her 2021 murky Lexus SUV parked at her of us’ home, prosecutors mentioned, and it had a shattered rear taillight and scratches on the rear bumper.
Be taught pleaded no longer responsible Feb. 2 and used to be released from custody after posting $50,000 bail.
Her attorney David Yannetti mentioned all the scheme in which thru her arraignment that a manslaughter imprint used to be “a astronomical reach” and denied any felony intent on his client’s allotment. “This used to be no longer some random stranger,” he mentioned, per NBC Boston. “This used to be my client’s boyfriend, someone whom she favored.”
In a assertion calling O’Keefe “a kind individual” who used to be “dedicated to his household,” the Boston Police Division mentioned that “the individual accountable for John’s death” had been arrested.
What Did Karen Be taught Dispute After Finding John O’Keefe Ineffective?
Prosecutors mentioned at her arraignment that surely one of many pals who went searching to search out O’Keefe with Be taught suggested police that her friend had known as her at 5 a.m. and mentioned, “John’s useless. I ponder if he’s useless. It’s snowing, he got hit by a plow.”
Canton firefighter Lt. Anthony Flematti later testified all the scheme in which thru Be taught’s trial that she suggested him on the scene, “'I hit him, I hit him. Oh my God, I hit him.’”
Firefighter Katie McLaughlin testified that Be taught “seemed very upset” and used to be “proper visibly distraught,” and that she also heard Be taught suppose, extra than once, “I hit him.”
Be taught maintained at trial, alternatively, that what she screamed at Flematti used to be, “Did I hit him? May possibly maybe well maybe I even have hit him?”
One other firefighter, Matthew Kelly, testified that he simplest remembered Be taught announcing, “He’s useless, he’s [expletive] useless.”
Karen Be taught Is Charged With John O'Keefe's Cancel
A large jury indicted Be taught on a imprint of 2d-diploma murder on June 9, 2022.
Norfolk County Assistant District Legal expert Adam Lally alleged all the scheme in which thru Be taught’s June 10 arraignment that she and O’Keefe “had been arguing for quite some time” ahead of he died and, weeks ahead of the night in ask, he had tried to fracture up with the defendant, and she or he refused to run away his home when asked. Lally mentioned Be taught drunkenly backed into O’Keefe with her Lexus and left him to die within the snow.
Be taught posted an additional $100,000 bail and later pleaded no longer responsible to murder.
Yannetti protested all the scheme in which thru the June 10 hearing that Be taught had performed CPR on O’Keefe in an are trying to revive him. Furthermore, the attorney alleged, the officer’s injuries were inconsistent with being hit by a vehicle.
“He’s got scratch marks all up and down his arm that are entirely unexplained,” Yannetti mentioned in court. “He’s got two murky eyes, seems to have a broken nose. There’s something else occurring right here.”
Defense Alleges That Karen Be taught Used to be Framed by Police in John O'Keefe Cancel
Right thru a Sept. 22, 2022, court look, Yannetti alleged that O’Keefe had been severely overwhelmed at Albert’s home and the detective inclined his connections inner the Canton Police Division and Massachusetts Sing Police to are trying to quilt up the truth by framing his client.
Yannetti emphasised that Brian Albert’s brother Kevin Albert used to be also a detective with the Canton PD, and that Massachusetts Sing Trooper Michael Proctor, who headed up the Be taught investigation, used to be a shut household friend. (Brian, who retired from the flexibility with an fracture in 2023, in step with a household spokesman, denied that there used to be any bodily altercation interesting O’Keefe at his home and his brother and Proctor have denied any wrongdoing referring to the investigation.)
Defense attorney Alan Jackson mentioned on NBC’s Dateline in July 2023 that he had “an harmless client, length.”
O’Keefe “walked into an ingredient of hostility in that home,” Jackson mentioned. “John O’Keefe got out of a vehicle, walked into the home, used to be sucker punched, fell, trouble himself, and then within the spoil his body used to be moved.”
Jackson, a frail L.A. prosecutor, and Be taught co-counsel Elizabeth Runt, every companions at Werksman Jackson & Quinn LLP, beforehand represented Kevin Spacey in a 2016 sexual assault case on Nantucket. The charges against the actor were within the spoil dropped.
District Legal expert Michael Morrissey Fires Support In opposition to Karen Be taught Defense Allegations
In a lengthy Aug. 25, 2023, video assertion, Norfolk District Legal expert Michael Morrissey denied that any fight occurred inner the Albert home on the night O’Keefe died. Eleven other folks had given statements announcing they didn’t look the officer enter the home, he mentioned, and “zero other folks” mentioned they saw run inner. Facts from O’Keefe’s phone that used to be discovered underneath his body, Morrissey mentioned, “presentations that his phone didn’t enter that home.”
Accusing any of the witnesses of murder used to be “snide,” the prosecutor added. Furthermore, he mentioned, Proctor had no opportunity to plant proof nor motive to full so. (Be taught has mentioned that she cracked her taillight pulling out of the storage to run belief O’Keefe, however alleged it used to be smashed simplest after her vehicle used to be in police custody.) Proctor didn’t have a “shut non-public relationship” with someone smitten by the investigation, Morrissey mentioned, and “every advice to the replacement is a lie.”
Prosecutor Lally argued against a defense circulation to assemble data of texts, calls and social media message between Proctor’s wife and Brian Albert’s sister-in-regulation Jennifer McCabe, surely one of many other folks with Be taught when O’Keefe’s body used to be discovered. Lally mentioned all the scheme in which thru a January 2024 court hearing, “As the Commonwealth understands it, Trooper Proctor has a sister, who has a friend, who has a sister, who has a husband, who has a brother, who has a wife, who has a sister who’s Jennifer McCabe.”
Prosecutors, Defense Conflict Over Google Search Timing in Karen Be taught Trial
On April 12, 2023, defense attorneys Yannetti and Jackson mentioned that newly recovered cell phone data from McCabe’s phone had supplied proof that “unequivocally exonerates Karen” on fable of it established that a bunch of different folks “were conscious that John used to be dying within the snow ahead of Karen even knew he used to be missing.”
McCabe Googled “Hos [sic] lengthy to die in chilly” at around 2:30 a.m., the defense alleged in an April 12 court circulation, per NBC Boston.
Prosecutors mentioned in a assertion on the time that it used to be yet to be decided whether or no longer the defense had “interpreted the uncooked data precisely,” noting they had “often” asked the defense to manufacture “any truly exculpatory proof to beef up their claims.”
McCabe testified all the scheme in which thru Be taught’s murder trial that the defendant asked her to Google how lengthy it took to die within the chilly after they stumbled on O’Keefe. She mentioned that she had researched something else at 2:27 a.m., then inclined the same commence tab to punch within the a bunch of search, and she or he denied deleting any search historical previous or numbers from her call log. “I never would have left John O'Keefe out within the chilly to die,” she mentioned, “on fable of he used to be my friend that I favored.”
The prosecution known as their very have digital forensics educated to the stand to help up their assertion that McCabe’s search used to be made at 6:23 a.m.
In a January 2025 court submitting, prosecutors regarded to have the defense’s data educated barred from testifying all over again on the retrial, writing that his “opinions” had been “debunked.” (The circulation used to be denied, clearing the educated to testify.)
Prosecutors Share DNA Proof From Karen Be taught's Automobile
On Feb. 22, 2024, prosecutors filed a memorandum detailing crime scene investigation results, including that O’Keefe’s DNA had been recovered from Be taught’s broken taillight and a dinky hair of his used to be stuck to the rear passenger facet of her Lexus.
“Through hint analysis and forensic checking out, the Massachusetts Sing Police Crime Laboratory discovered the victim's DNA uncover on the broken taillight and tiny items of crimson and sure apparent plastic positioned within the victim's clothing,” prosecutors wrote within the submitting, per NBC Boston. “Comparability checking out used to be performed, and the results uncover that the tiny items of crimson and sure plastic are in maintaining with the broken items of plastic from the defendant's rear taillight.”
At trial, the defense contended that the DNA proof used to be planted, in step with their overall argument that Be taught used to be framed, however that it also might well well've gotten on the vehicle one other system with the exception of it hitting O'Keefe.
“It used to be planted on the vehicle. I mean, it used to be,” Yannetti mentioned commence air court on June 14 after the prosecution's DNA consultants testified, per CBS Boston. “You know the ask is how did that magic hair continue to exist a 30-mile drive thru a blizzard?”
Prosecutors and regulation enforcement denied all accusations of planting or mishandling proof.
Federal Prosecutors Investigate the Investigators in Karen Be taught Cancel Case
Norfolk Superior Court docket Mediate Beverly Cannone postponed the commence of Be taught’s trial from March 12 to April 16, 2024, after federal prosecutors—who were investigating how the O’Keefe inquiry used to be performed in gentle of the defense’s quilt-up accusation—released 3,000 pages of documents referring to the case.
The defense argued in court Feb. 26 that the represent dump contained exculpatory proof, while the prosecution countered that most of the findings were in maintaining with prior testimony. (The federal probe concluded without any charges being filed against regulation enforcement, special prosecutor Hank Brennan mentioned all the scheme in which thru a March 4, 2025, motions hearing.)
In a separate circulation to have the case brushed off, the defense argued at a March 13, 2024, hearing that the prosecution deceived the huge jury that indicted Be taught since the panel had no data of the non-public ties amongst the investigators and witnesses.
“A majority of the witnesses who testified ahead of the huge jury” were known as on fable of they allegedly saw what came about to O’Keefe, the defense mentioned in court documents unsealed weeks later, per NBC Boston. Fairly, the submitting persevered, they were known as to testify to “a long way flung and beside the point ‘unhappy character’” to prejudice the panel against Be taught, “deceptive the huge jury, confusing the points and losing time.”
Assistant District Legal expert Lally fired help all the scheme in which thru the hearing that the defense used to be searching to play “three-card monte,” as in, “’Leer at this relationship, request at that relationship.’ The defense is obfuscating from the intensive proof. They don’t prefer you to request at that. They need you to request at who texted who when.”
Cannone denied the defense’s circulation March 26, paving the system for the trial to commence as scheduled.
Karen Be taught Goes on Trial for Cancel of John O'Keefe
In his April 29, 2024, opening assertion, Yannetti maintained that O’Keefe suffered lethal injuries from a beating and his client had been framed.
“You might well maybe learn that at that address, lived a well-identified and well-connected regulation enforcement household in Canton—the Alberts,” Yannetti mentioned. “For the reason that Alberts were intelligent, and on fable of they had shut connections to the investigators on this case, Karen Be taught used to be framed for a murder she didn’t commit.”
The prosecution countered that Be taught used to be a girl scorned and, after ingesting too much, she backed her vehicle into O’Keefe and drove off, leaving him to die.
The case ended with a hung jury and Cannone declared a mistrial on July 1.
Karen Be taught’s Defense Argues She Used to be Acquitted of John O'Keefe's Cancel in Present to Push aside Value
In a July 2024 circulation to have the murder case against Be taught brushed off, reviewed by E! Facts, the defense argued that double jeopardy utilized on fable of three jurors from the first trial had indicated to them “in no risky terms”—thru “unsolicited communications”—that they unanimously agreed she used to be no longer responsible of murder and leaving the scene or a non-public fracture or death, and resulting from this truth the settle will have asked for a partial verdict within the case.
The Massachusetts Supreme Court docket dominated in February 2025, alternatively, that “posttrial accounts of jurors’ private deliberations” that were “inconsistent with their public communications in court” might well well no longer screech the mistrial ruling or constitute an acquittal.
Karen Be taught Speaks Out About Her Cancel Case
Despite the incontrovertible truth that she felt “extremely violated,” she used to be “no longer backing down now,” Be taught, who didn’t grasp the stand all the scheme in which thru her trial, suggested Self-esteem Magnificent last August.
“As horrifying as a doable conviction is,” she mentioned, “I’ll run to detention center for something I didn’t cease ahead of I plea out. I’d no longer ever give them that derive.”
Whereas she fell for O’Keefe swiftly after he reached out to her on Facebook within the pandemic-plagued spring of 2020—16 years after they first met and dated for about a months—considerations started to chop up, Be taught mentioned. Right thru a Recent Twelve months’s day out to Aruba with a bunch of couples, she mentioned she saw caught him kissing one other lady. (The girl in ask denied this on the stand all the scheme in which thru Be taught’s trial.) And Be taught mentioned she had exchanged flirty texts with a federal agent O’Keefe knew, to help “emotionally validate” her on the time.
Nonetheless, Be taught mentioned, as of January 2022 they were dedicated to caring for his orphaned niece and nephew collectively (O’Keefe used to be the principle guardian of his unhurried sister’s teens, in maintaining alongside with his household) and didn’t must fracture up their dynamic.
When she and O’Keefe went to the Alberts’ home early on Jan. 29, 2022, after being invited there for extra drinks, O’Keefe mentioned he’d take a look at out the atmosphere inner ahead of they decided to end or no longer, Be taught suggested Self-esteem Magnificent. When he stopped responding to her texts, Be taught mentioned, she “got pissed” and assumed he used to be “screwing around” with an frail paramour who lived nearby. “I didn’t deem he used to be physically incapacitated,” she mentioned. Be taught mentioned she waited about 10 minutes ahead of using off, after which she despatched him extra texts and left exasperated voicemails.
Silent, Be taught questioned if she did hit O’Keefe with her vehicle, she suggested VF, and recalled telling her of us she would “pay [her] dues” if she had performed “the rest in any system.”
O’Keefe’s household suggested the journal on the time that they nonetheless believed she used to be accountable for his death.
“In disagreement to most other folks accused of murder and sued for wrongful death, Karen Be taught has embraced her big title in outsized ways,” mentioned the household, whose civil suit against Be taught has been stayed till her felony case is resolved. “This intensive media campaign to affect doable jurors compounds the O’Keefe household’s terrible loss while delaying and denying her accountability.”
Lead Investigator in Karen Be taught’s Case Is Fired
Massachusetts Sing Police Trooper Proctor admitted on the survey stand all the scheme in which thru Be taught’s first trial to the use of misogynistic language and making a bunch of disparaging remarks about Be taught in text messages to pals, household and fellow law enforcement officers, some of which the settle had him learn aloud in court. And basically basically based entirely on a text asking whether or no longer the owner of the home O’Keefe used to be discovered would also “fetch some s–t,” he answered, “Nope. Homeowner’s a Boston cop too.”
Proctor apologized on the stand, announcing “emotions got the greater of me.” Nonetheless, he mentioned, though his phrases were “unprofessional and regrettable,” they didn’t have an label on how he performed the investigation.
He used to be fired no longer as much as two weeks ahead of Be taught’s retrial used to be position to commence, in step with a March 19, 2025, verbalize police personnel suppose reviewed by E! Facts.
He had been suspended last July, with the Sing Police Affiliation President clarifying that Proctor used to be being disciplined for the language in his non-public texts, and no longer in connection with “salacious allegations of quilt-ups, collusion or conspiracies offered by the defense.”
Per his termination, Proctor’s household suggested NBC Facts in a assertion that the trial board’s decision “lacks precedent, and unfairly exploits and scapegoats surely one of their very have, a trooper with a 12-yr unblemished represent.” Proctor’s text messages proved he used to be “human—no longer injurious, no longer incompetent in his role as a homicide detective and under no circumstances unfit to proceed to be a Massachusetts Sing Trooper.
Karen Be taught’s Unfinished Yarn Is Told in Body within the Snow: The Trial of Karen Be taught
The five-allotment ID docuseries Body within the Snow: The Trial of Karen Be taught premiered March 17 ended with Be taught nonetheless in limbo after the mistrial.
“We needed to manufacture sure that we were 100 p.c as balanced as we might well very well be, on fable of we knew there used to be going to be one other trial,” director Terry Dunn Meurer suggested Self-esteem Magnificent of placing the finished product collectively.
“It’s a really divisive case and we wish to appreciate all americans’s notion,” Meurer mentioned. “Within the occasion you’re ‘Free Karen Be taught,’ big. Within the occasion you’re extra on the prosecution facet, ravishing. Nonetheless it completely’s been upsetting to look how vile this has been—the title-calling and the vitriol, the non-public assaults. The case has been tried on social media, and I deem that’s a disgrace. It’s a disservice to the justice system and to Karen.”
Be taught pushed help against any notion that she used to be taking advantage of her newfound big title online page online.
“Any person in my predicament who’s being falsely accused might well well be shouting from the rooftops,” Be taught suggested Self-esteem Magnificent last summer season. “Nonetheless while you happen to factor in for a 2d that someone has fought more durable to search out the truth about what came about to John and to mumble all americans about what came about to John more durable than me, you’re injurious.”
Karen Be taught Chanced on No longer Guilty of Cancel in 2025 Retrial
Be taught's retrial got underway on April 1, 2025.
And this time, the dramatic court cases concluded with the specified : On June 18, Be taught used to be discovered no longer responsible of 2d-diploma murder and motorized vehicle manslaughter while using underneath the affect and leaving the scene of a collision.
She used to be discovered responsible of operating a motorized vehicle underneath the affect of liquor and resulting from this truth sentenced to one yr's probation.
Source credit : eonline.com
