Attorneys for a Massachusetts woman about to go on trial for the second time for the death of her boyfriend in 2022 have filed a federal lawsuit seeking to stop the new trial on the basis of double jeopardy.
Karen Read’s first trial last summer ended in a hung jury when jurors reported they could not come to a verdict on all three charges against her, as CrimeOnline reported. But afterward, some jurors came forward and said they had unanimously agreed on not guilty verdicts on two of the charges — second degree murder and leaving the scene of a collision resulting in death. They said they had been confused about the court’s instructions.
But Judge Beverly Cannone declined to poll the jury a declared a mistrial. The second trial is set to begin in April, and just last week, the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts agreed with her ruling, allowing the retrial to go forward.
The defense team filed their suit with US District Court in Boston on Tuesday, saying that not eliminating those two charges violates constitutional rights barring double jeopardy, or being tried for the same crime twice, Boston 25 reported.
Read is accused of hitting her boyfriend, Boston police officer John O’Keefe, and leaving him to die in the snow after a night of drinking. Read and her attorneys claim she was framed by O’Keefe’s police officer friends and that he was actually killed inside the home of one of them and then dragged outside.
The jury in the first trial was deadlocked on a charge of manslaughter while operating a vehicle under the influence.
News of the lawsuit came on the same day that Cannone abruptly recessed a pretrial motions hearing after saying the prosecution had presented new information that “may have profound effects on the defense and defense counsel.”
Special prosecutor Hank Brennan gave Cannone information on Tuesday that defense attorneys had communicated with accident reconstruction experts about their testimony prior to the first trial. Brennan is seeking to bar the experts from testifying in the retrial.
