The retrial of Karen Read, the Massachusetts woman accused of killing her Boston police officer boyfriend John O’Keefe in a snowstorm, has taken a dramatic turn as her legal team adds a former juror-turned-lawyer to its roster. With jury selection underway, Court TV and YouTube live streams are drawing tens of thousands of viewers daily, captivated by the defense’s explosive claims of a police cover-up.
Prosecutors allege Read struck O’Keefe with her SUV after a night of drinking, leaving him to die in freezing temperatures. Her defense, led by high-profile Los Angeles attorneys Alan Jackson and Elizabeth Little, counters that O’Keefe was fatally assaulted inside a fellow officer’s home and framed through planted evidence. The case’s first trial ended in a mistrial last year after jurors deadlocked.
Adding to the spectacle, alternate juror Victoria George—who sat through the initial trial—has joined Read’s legal team, a move legal experts call unprecedented. The defense maintains Read is a “convenient outsider” targeted to shield law enforcement, while prosecutors dismiss the theory as a “fanciful story”8. With live coverage intensifying public scrutiny, the trial’s outcome could hinge on whether jurors accept the defense’s narrative of conspiracy or the state’s argument of drunken recklessness.
