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Judge agrees to postpone Karen Read’s retrial
Prosecutors and defense attorneys both requested the delay, arguing a later trial date would make for speedier proceedings.
Karen Read’s second murder trial has been postponed after Judge Beverly Cannone allowed a joint request from prosecutors and defense attorneys to delay the highly anticipated retrial.
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The lawyers had asked to push the start date back from Jan. 27 to April 1, with special prosecutor Hank Brennan arguing that doing so would allow for a speedier trial.
“Although it does delay the case if you allow this motion, I think it will make for a shorter, more effective, efficient trial, and I think it will be, importantly, more fair to the parties involved,” Brennan told Cannone during a hearing last month. He also said the delay would allow him to reduce the prosecution’s witness list “substantially.”
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In Monday’s ruling, Cannone asked the prosecution and defense to propose a scheduling order for her to consider when Read returns to court Thursday.
Read, 44, is charged with killing her boyfriend, Boston Police Officer John O’Keefe, following a night of bar-hopping in Canton on Jan. 29, 2022. Prosecutors allege Read was driving drunk and deliberately backed her SUV into O’Keefe while dropping him off at a house party. He was found unresponsive in the snow hours later.
Read’s lawyers maintain she was a “convenient outsider” framed in a law enforcement coverup, instead suggesting O’Keefe was severely beaten and possibly attacked by the homeowner’s dog after walking into the party.
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Her first trial ended with a hung jury July 1, and she’s appealed to the Supreme Judicial Court in a bid to drop two of her charges ahead of next year’s retrial.
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