On January 29, 2022, Woman from Massachusetts Karen Read she went to a bar with her boyfriend, Boston Police Officer John O'Keefe, dropping him off at the home of fellow officer Brian Albert shortly after midnight. Six hours later, O'Keefe's body was found outside in the snow, starting what has become one of the most divisive murder trials in Massachusetts history — and the current fixation of the true crime community on TikTok.
After O'Keefe's body was discovered, Read, 44, was charged with second-degree murder, manslaughter while operating under the influence of alcohol and leaving the scene of injury and death. He pleaded not guilty to all charges. Prosecutors said they believe Read drunkenly received her boyfriend that night and then left the scene and his body to go home.
Read's trial began on April 16 in Dedham, Superior Court of Massachusetts Norfolk and is now on its fifth day of jury deliberations. Both the testimony and the attorney's arguments focused primarily on the six hours after O'Keefe got out of Read's car and the defense's belief that a “third party” was responsible for O'Keefe's death — likely the police officers. inside the party. On TikTok, where true crime has an active, growing and sometimes downright harmful community, Read's case and ongoing trial have become a staple for dissection and commentary — garnering thousands of videos with millions of views in the past week.
According to court documents and trial testimony, Read and O'Keefe's relationship took an unpleasant turn, with numerous text messages and voicemails that indicated strain. According NBC Boston, text messages released to the court revealed the couple had been fighting the day before O'Keefe's death. “I'm tired of always arguing and fighting,” read one message from O'Keefe. “If you tell me you're interested in someone else, you won't hear from me again. You can have all the space in the world,” read a later response from Read.
But around 4:23 A.M. on January 29, O'Keefe's niece made a call at Albert's house, telling his sister-in-law, Jennifer McCabe, that Reed had called her worried because O'Keefe hadn't come home and she couldn't remember much because she was too drunk when she left him. When the three met up to look for him, they discovered O'Keefe's body in the snow and called first responders. But the converging accounts began soon after O'Keefe was found. According to officers' testimony, Reed said “I hit him” repeatedly while crying to EMTs, but her defense argued she made the statement as a question, saying “Did I hit him?” On February 2, 2022, Read was arrested.
While the length of the trial and the sheer volume of evidence have made deliberation difficult for the jury, the details surrounding Read's case have drawn more viewers online. The prosecution says Reed ran into him, breaking her taillight, leaving his DNA on her car and littering the ground with broken pieces of glass that were later found. The defense agrees that O'Keefe's DNA was on the vehicle, but claims an independent federal investigation shows damage to the car is “inconsistent” with the theory that Read hit O'Keefe.
An autopsy ruled O'Keefe's cause of death was blunt force trauma to the head and hypothermia, with no “obvious” signs of a struggle. Read's defense disputed that claim, saying the injuries to O'Keefe's hands suggested he was beaten inside the home, bitten by a dog and then thrown outside to freeze. stream-today-day-16-jennifer-mccabe/” target=”_blank”>reports CBS News that the Google search “hos (sic) wants to die in the cold”, was done on McCabe's phone. During the trial, McCabe testified that she did the search at Read's request after O'Keefe's body was found around 6:23 a.m., while the defense showed evidence that said the search was done hours earlier, at 2:27 am McCabe claims the timestamp shows a search at 2am. for using a tab opened at 2am to do the search.
While the intricate details of Read's case may be difficult to parse, what is easy to explain is why people watch in the first place. Jeffrey Lin, a professor of criminology at the University of Denver, previously said Rolling rock that the fascination with true crime often stems from a psychological pull to control things that feel out of control and play into a heroic narrative that crime dramas have popularized. “We have this strong desire to help and be heroic, and yet we have no opportunity to do so. Most of us cannot become high-level researchers [for the FBI] but we can go into TikTok and search [Brian Laundrie’s] van,” Lin said. “This is just the fulfillment of the fantasy that has been presented to us for decades.”
As of Monday afternoon, jurors in Read's trial told Norfolk County Superior Court Judge Beverly Cannone for a second time that he could not come in a decision. “Despite our commitment to the task at hand, we are deeply divided by fundamental differences in our views and state of mind,” said a memo sent to the judge. “The divergence of our views is not rooted in a lack of understanding or effort, but in deeply held beliefs that each of us carries, ultimately leading to a point where consensus is unattainable.” Jurors have been asked to deliberate once more – but if they fail to reach a unanimous verdict, it could be declared a mistrial. If convicted, Redd faces up to life in prison.
from our partners at https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-features/karen-read-murder-trial-tiktok-charges-1235050976/
