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Karen Read gets political with donation to Norfolk DA candidate
Read recently donated to Adam Deitch, a former federal prosecutor who investigated Norfolk County authorities over their handling of her case.
Karen Read and two of her attorneys have thrown their support behind one of the candidates angling to replace Michael Morrissey, the Norfolk County district attorney who prosecuted Read for murder.
Read and members of her defense team recently donated to Democrat Adam Deitch, a former federal prosecutor who investigated Norfolk County authorities over their handling of the controversial case.
Campaign finance records indicate Read chipped in $1,000, as did her father, William Read, and attorneys Alan Jackson and David Yannetti. Jackson and Yannetti helmed the high-powered defense team that won Read’s acquittal on murder and manslaughter charges last spring.
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The donations from Read and her team were first reported by MASSterList.
More on Karen Read:
The 45-year-old had been accused of drunkenly backing her SUV into her boyfriend, Boston Police Officer John O’Keefe, in 2022 while dropping him off at a house party in Canton. But Read’s team had another theory: that O’Keefe was beaten inside the home, attacked by the family’s dog, and dumped outside in the snow. Read, they claimed, had been framed in a vast law enforcement conspiracy.
While Read was acquitted of all but a drunk driving misdemeanor, the case had wide-reaching implications: several law enforcement officers linked to the case faced scrutiny or discipline, and Deitch’s federal probe put prosecutors and investigators alike under the microscope. Morrissey, who has faced mounting pushback over Read’s prosecution and the Sandra Birchmore death investigation, hasn’t said whether he plans to run for reelection.
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Deitch is one of four candidates running for Morrissey’s seat, competing against public defense attorney Jim Barakat and former Suffolk County prosecutors Djuna Perkins and Craig MacLellan. His latest campaign finance records show backing from several former colleagues in the U.S. Attorney’s Office, as well as former U.S. Attorney Andrew Lelling, a Trump appointee.
Yannetti’s wife also donated to Deitch, as did three of Jackson’s colleagues: Read trial alum Evan Wolk and Werksman Jackson & Quinn partners Mark Werksman and Caleb Mason.
Read still faces a wrongful death lawsuit from O’Keefe’s family, and she’s separately suing several investigators and witnesses she claims conspired to frame her for murder.
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