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Karen Read shuffles defense attorney lineup in wrongful death suit
Though acquitted of murder and manslaughter, Read still faces a wrongful death lawsuit from the family of her former boyfriend, John O'Keefe.
Karen Read is changing the lineup for her civil defense team as she prepares to fight a wrongful death lawsuit filed by the family of her former boyfriend, Boston Police Officer John O’Keefe.
In a series of court filings Friday, Melick & Porter attorneys William Keville, Christopher George, and Marissa Palladini withdrew from the Plymouth Superior Court case, offering no further explanation. The docket also showed a series of additions to Read’s defense team with Tang & Maravelis lawyers Michael William Bell, Thomas M. Tang, Sarah Anne Shipley, and Arthur Evan Maravelis.
More on Karen Read:
Earlier this year, Read, 45, was acquitted of killing O’Keefe after prosecutors alleged she drunkenly backed her SUV into her boyfriend while dropping him off at a house party in Canton in January 2022. In the end, the jury convicted her only of a drunk driving misdemeanor.
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While jurors found Read not guilty of murder and manslaughter, O’Keefe’s family remains unconvinced. Echoing prosecutors, they allege Read argued with O’Keefe before he died and struck him with her SUV in a drunken rage before leaving her boyfriend of two years to die in a blizzard.
For her part, Read has long maintained she was framed in a law enforcement conspiracy. She contends O’Keefe was mortally wounded after joining the party inside 34 Fairview Road, owned at the time by a fellow Boston police officer.
During a September hearing on the wrongful death suit, Read made the bombshell announcement that she plans to bring legal action against several witnesses and Massachusetts State Police investigators involved in her case. Sheehan Phinney attorney Damon Seligson, who’s leading Read’s civil defense, said the affirmative claims include allegations of conspiracy, civil rights violations, and negligent training, supervision, and retention of troopers.
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Joining Seligson on Read’s defense are two veterans from the criminal case: California-based attorneys Alan Jackson and Elizabeth Little. Rounding out the team are Caleb Mason — one of Jackson’s and Little’s partners — and two of Seligson’s Sheehan Phinney colleagues, Aaron Rosenberg and Charles Waters.
The civil case is due back in court Nov. 21.
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