Karen Read case to be featured on ‘Dateline’

The national spotlight is on Karen A. Read — the Mansfield woman charged with killing her Boston police officer boyfriend — as NBC’s “Dateline” prepares to air an exclusive interview with the woman at the center of the contentious and eyebrow-raising case.  

Prosecutors allege that Read struck John O’Keefe with her car while dropping him off at a fellow Boston police officer’s home in Canton early on Jan. 29, 2022, following a night of drinking. She has pleaded not guilty to charges of second-degree murder, motor vehicle manslaughter while driving under the influence, and leaving the scene of a collision causing injury and death.

NBC’s “Today” show shared a clip from Read’s interview with Dennis Murphy on Monday, dubbing the case the “Taillight Murder” after the broken taillight on Read’s car and the matching pieces of red plastic investigators say they found near O’Keefe’s body.

The clip includes security video from earlier in the night, which appears to show Read and O’Keefe embracing at a bar.

“We were happy, having fun, laughing. Just very normal,” Read said of that night, adding that she didn’t feel she had been overserved alcohol.

Read and O’Keefe were later invited to the home of a fellow Boston police officer, Brian Albert, whom the couple didn’t know well, Murphy said.

“What happened next is disputed,” the “Dateline” reporter explained. “Karen says they pulled up to the house and she waited in her SUV while John went to check things out. She says she watched him go to the door, put his head inside. Then, nothing.”

Read said she texted and called O’Keefe after he got out of her car, but got no response. She left the area and went home to sleep, but went searching for O’Keefe after she awoke and realized he still hadn’t returned.

She discovered O’Keefe’s body in the snow outside Albert’s Canton home around 6 a.m. on Jan. 29.

“His eyes were swollen shut,” Read recalled. “He had blood dripping out of his nose.”

Watch the “Dateline” clip on Karen Read’s case:

After discovering O’Keefe’s body, Read allegedly told a paramedic at the scene, “I hit him, I hit him, I hit him.” 

Prosecutors have pointed to those statements as further evidence of her guilt, but Read asserted in the “Dateline” interview that she was asking whether she could have hit O’Keefe. 

“I have an innocent client, period,” Alan Jackson, one of her attorneys, said in the clip. 

Read’s lawyers have argued that O’Keefe’s injuries indicate he was beaten, suggesting a conspiracy among the homeowners and other after-party guests to frame Read for the death. 

“John walked into an element of hostility in that house,” Jackson said. “John O’Keefe got out of a car, walked into the house, was sucker-punched, fell, hurt himself, and then ultimately, his body was moved.”

Read’s case will be covered in an upcoming episode of “Dateline,” though the network did not give a specific airdate.

In the meantime, Read is due back in court at 2 p.m. on Tuesday for a pre-trial hearing. She has been out on bail since her arraignment in 2022.

Abby Patkin

Staff Writer

Abby Patkin is a general assignment news reporter whose work touches on public transit, crime, health, and everything in between.

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