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Attorneys prep for closings in Karen Read retrial

Flint McColgan, Boston Herald on

Published in News & Features

DEDHAM, Mass. — Karen Read trial attorneys had a brief conference without the jury Thursday to finalize plans ahead of closing arguments Friday.

The day began with defense attorney David Yannetti renewing a motion for a “required finding of not guilty” now that testimony is over. The defense made the same request after the prosecution rested.

“At that juncture, your honor, the Commonwealth had produced no witnesses to testify that John O’Keefe’s injuries were consistent with having been hit with a motor vehicle. And if he was not hit by a motor vehicle then none of these three indictments may stand,” Yannetti said Thursday.

Read, 45, of Mansfield, faces charges of second-degree murder, manslaughter while operating a motor vehicle under the influence, and leaving the scene of a collision causing death. She’s accused of slamming her Lexus LX570 SUV into O’Keefe, her boyfriend and a Boston cop, and leaving him to freeze and die on a Canton front lawn on Jan. 29, 2022.

Yannetti said that the prosecution was further “weakened by an airtight defense” case: “Nearly every witness … has destroyed the Commonwealth’s theory of the case.”

Judge Beverly J. Cannone ultimately denied the motion, but the exchange, including a response from presecutor Adam Lally, served as a preview of closing arguments.

Yannetti summarized the shared opinion of defense experts — pathologists Dr. Marie Russell and Dr. Elizabeth Laposata, and engineers Daniel Wolfe and Andrew Rentschler — that the physical evidence simply does not support a vehicle strike.

“If there’s no collision, there’s no case,” Yannetti said.

In response, Lally said the defense had been taken up by its own hype.

He said Yannetti’s argument “grossly exaggerates the strength of the defense witnesses and their case. The bias and advocacy exhibited by those witnesses from that witness stand do not amount to credible witness testimony that undermined the Commonwealth’s case in any way, shape or form.”

Lally added that the defense witness’ testimony was inconsistent, citing how the pathologists described wounds to O’Keefe’s arms as dog or animal bites while the engineers called them “abrasions.”

 

Curative instruction

Defense attorney Robert Alessi asked that Cannone provide specific instructions to help further rectify what prosecutor Hank Brennan did while cross-examining Wolfe last week, which was to ask about holes to the back of O’Keefe’s sweatshirt which were in fact made by a state criminologist during analysis.

Alessi said they could be asking for much more than just some clarity in jury instruction — as he had asked for a mistrial at the time — but he was being “measured” in his request. Lally countered that the defense already got a curative instruction after the mistake and “to accentuate it further in the final charge to the jury is simply improper.”

Cannone did not rule on the request.

Third-party killer

The judge ruled that the defense may not directly argue that someone else killed O’Keefe. However, under what’s known as a “Bowden” defense, they are allowed to point out alleged “inadequacy” in the police investigation — including failing to investigate other possible suspects.

Next up

Attorneys are to be in court by 8:30 a.m. to ensure closing arguments begin by 9 a.m. After the defense and then the prosecution make their presentations the jurors will begin deliberations, which will last until after 5 p.m. before they are sent home for the day. Deliberations would then continue on Monday.

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