Day 1: Karen Read Retrial
Defense violates the judge's order... AGAIN. Opening Statements are made. Medic Nuttall, as well as John O'Keefe's good friend, Kerry Roberts take the stand.
Holyyy smokes.
Today started off with some awkward intensity.
Courtroom Summary:
Before the jurors even entered the room, there was a discussion over the defense not following through with the judge’s order to hand over all communications they’ve had with ARCCA (the accident reconstruction experts) since early last year.
We learn that the defense had 99 text conversations with these experts, which the defense had represented as minimal. More concerning is that the context of those texts were not provided to the Commonwealth despite the court’s orders.
At the end of the day today, the judge continued this conversation and found that the defense is in violation, and to remedy that…
She has ordered a voir dire hearing for the 2 ARCCA experts this Friday. They are expected to bring those communications with them.
OPENING STATEMENTS:
I’m posting a short AI summary (checked by myself for accuracy) of the opening statements because I don’t want to put too much weight on them. The testimony and evidence is how the case is built, however, I do think it’s important to see some of the claims that the parties promise in their statements. If you’d like to watch them instead, the link is HERE.
Commonwealth played this video clip in their opening statement:
TESTIMONY-
WITNESS #1: Firefighter-Medic Timothy Nuttall.
DIRECT EXAMINATION:
When he arrived on scene the weather was cold, windy, and snowing.
Visibility was “not good”.
The sun had yet to come up, so it was still dark out.
Says when he arrived on scene he heard someone screaming, but couldn’t tell who it was at first.
He checked for signs of life on the male victim, John O’Keefe.
No breathing, no heartbeat found.
John O’Keefe was very cold to the touch. At first he considered the patient as deceased, but the lead paramedic that morning (Anthony Flemmatti) declared him as a “workable patient”. This is due to the signs of cold body temperature. In order to call a death, a body must be warmed to a certain temp because there’s a small chance of survivability.
Says when he was kneeling over the patient, he asked “Do you know him?” and Karen Read (Defendant) responded, “I hit him. I hit him. I hit him.”
She then wandered off, and he could not ask follow up questions because his responsibility of tending to the life-saving actions is the priority. He was trying to get oxygen and circulation going.
CROSS EXAMINATION:
Defense Attorney Alan Jackson points out that the medic once testified that he remembered Karen Read saying she hit him twice, not three times in a row. The medic said, he recollects it being three times very clearly.
Attorney Jackson then points out that the medic had testified last year that the victim was dressed appropriately for the cold weather, and was wearing a jacket. The medic says, yes, that’s what he recalled. (The victim was actually wearing a long-sleeved hoodie with a t-shirt underneath).
Defense showed a video clip of the emergency scene (from a police dash cam) and was trying to point out that the time the medic claims Karen Read said she hit him, she wasn’t standing near him in the clip. On redirect, the prosecutor points out that the video clip Jackson played was not the entire clip, and for some reason the timestamp was missing. The witness agrees.
Jackson gets back up to question the witness about the clip, and they battle back and forth over the sequence of events that happened. The witness kept reiterating that the short clip the defense showed is not the full clip.
Commonwealth played this clip of Karen during a media interview:
WITNESS #2: Kerry Roberts
DIRECT EXAMINATION:
Close friend of the victim, John O’Keefe. Helped him with the kids. Lived close by.
Kerry didn’t know Jen McCabe. Met her once, but that was it.
On the evening of 1/28/22, Kerry was celebrating her daughter’s friend’s birthday. They went to a bowling alley. She was not a part of the group who went out to the bars with Karen Read and John O’Keefe.
Her husband met up at a restaurant bar with John that evening at CF McCarthys.
The next morning at 5am, the phone rang and it was Karen. She screamed, “KERRY KERRY KERRY, John’s dead!” and then hung up.
Kerry is confused and half asleep. She doesn’t know Karen very well. She calls her back (thinks they may have played phone tag for a moment) but finally reach one another and Karen says she thinks John was hit by a snow plow. Karen told her she wasn’t supposed to stay the night at John’s, and he didn't come back to the kids. Karen says she drank a lot and can’t recall the night.
Kerry calls the police to see if they know of any accidents or injuries called in.
Kerry meets Jen and Karen at Jen’s house, and then they all drive to John’s to double check the house and see if he was there.
They get into Kerry’s vehicle and drive to 34 Fairview (Albert home). Along the way, Karen mentions the house that “Bella’s mom” lives at in the neighborhood of the Albert home. She mentions that the woman doesn’t like her. John once dated “Bella’s mom”.
As they reach the property of 34 Fairview, Karen yells, “THERE HE IS”. Jumps out of car and runs to the snow-covered lawn area. Kerry has no idea where she’s going and once Karen jumped out of the vehicle, Kerry turned to Jen and said “She’s crazy”.
Visibility was poor, but once Karen reached a mound of snow, Kerry could tell it was the shape of a body.
Court ended in the middle of Kerry’s testimony, and will continue tomorrow at 9am EST.
Thanks for doing this Tuesday. I can't imagine how hard it must be to keep up. Praying for justice-and restoring faith in humanity.