Dateline NBC - The Night of the Nor'easter

Episode Date: October 22, 2024

Andrea Canning reports on the latest developments in the high-profile murder trial of Karen Read, who is accused of killing her boyfriend, Boston police officer John O’Keefe, by reversing her car into him after a night out.

Tonight on Dateline... I looked on at my phone, and in a matter of seconds, I look up, and he's not there. My friend's boyfriend did not come home last night. John's body was found in the morning. He was one in a million. The officer identifies himself as a detective with the Massachusetts State Police.

I said, Dad, I need an attorney. The video shows nine drinks being consumed by the defendant. Witnesses said that they heard Karen say I hit him. Totally false. Maybe somebody else had a motive. There's just too many things here that don't add up. Conspiracies do exist. If you believe the conspiracy, you'd have to think that all of these people are complete sociopaths. You either think she was framed,

or you think John O'Keefe was a victim of Karen Reed being drunk and hitting him. Shame on you! I've never heard of a criminal case where the victim's family is harassed on their way to court. No matter what we have to deal with, justice for Johnny. I felt like I was living in a nightmare. What the hell happened? How did the night end up like this? A Boston police officer left to die in the snow.

Was he killed by his lover or his friends? I'm Lester Holt, and this is Date Line. Here's Andrea Canning with The Night of the Nor'easter. It was just after 4 a.m., snowing hard. John O'Keefe still wasn't home. Nobody's heard from him. I haven't heard from him, and it's bad weather. Had the worst happened? You're just sitting there thinking, is this real life?

Was she to blame? I felt like I was living in a nightmare. His death, a mystery. Her case, a cause. Free Carrie! As all eyes focused on the spectacle outside of Massachusetts courthouse. Shame on you! And the bitter battle within.

You don't ever, ever look the other way. The stakes are as high as they get for Karen Reed. As high as they get. Don't stop! The victims' family victimized. We would have to walk through these people screaming at us. The memory of the man who died almost lost in the war of words. There isn't anybody that knew Johnny O'Keefe that doesn't feel his loss.

Sure, that's fine. We began covering this case a year and a half ago. That's when my colleague, Dennis Murphy, sat down with Karen Reed. The story she told of one awful night in January 2022 launched a drama that endures. A nor'easter was blowing into town. Karen met her boyfriend, Boston police officer John O'Keefe, for drinks at a bar in the suburb of Canton. That's Karen greeting John on security video.

And John got up, offered a seat to me, and I said, I'm gonna stand, so John stood with me, and we were happy, having fun, laughing, very normal. So there comes a point where you're out of that place, huh? Yeah, we left after about 90 minutes. They cross the street to the waterfall bar and grill. There they are walking in joining some acquaintances. And one of them was a Boston cop, another cop, Federal Bureau, alcohol, tobacco and firearms. We walk in and it's, oh hey over here over here, how's it going?

And you walk around and you say hi to everyone. The vibes, as we used to say in the old days, were good? The vibes were good, yes. Yeah, the vibes were good. What time of night is it, would you guess, at this point? We get there at about 10.45. And you're there for how long, do you think? Till midnight, just after midnight, till it closed.

John and Karen were invited to a small party by Jen McCabe, a friend of John's who'd been at the bar with them. There's John, leaving with a drink in his hand. The party was at Jen's sister and brother-in-law's house. They'd also been at the bar. Her brother-in-law was a more senior Boston police officer who ironically, you know, lived in Canton his whole life, two and a half miles from John's house,

and yet we never socialized with him. And his name is what? His name is Brian Albert. And he worked with John? He worked on the job, but they didn't really cross paths, I don't think professionally. So it's closing hours and you're on your way to?

Yeah, we're going to Brian Albert's house. Brian Albert. Yeah, which I'd never been to. You're driving? I'm driving. What are you driving? What's your vehicle? I have a Lexus LX, which is the full size SUV.

That's the monster truck, right? Yes, yep. How were you doing with drink at that point? Yeah, I'd had several. You probably- But I felt fine. I mean, I felt like I had had a couple drinks, but I- You didn't say, I'm legless here.

This is... No, I didn't feel impaired. The Albert house was about two miles from the bar. So you get to this address, huh? We get to the house. It didn't look like it was busting at the seams with people, and there was maybe one or two cars in the driveway, and I'm still on the street, and I have the passenger side facing the driveway and he said John can you just run in there and like you know can we make sure we're

we're welcome here and it's somewhere we want to be he said yeah I'll be right back and he got out of the car goes to the front door of the house yes did you see him go in the house yeah I saw him approach the front door and put his hand on the door. In your memory he's going towards a friend's house. How far do you see him go? I see him go to the door and start to cross the threshold and I'm thinking, all right, let me look at my phone.

I know sooner or later... You don't see the door open, you don't see him greeted and going in. I see him open the door and put his head inside. And I'm like, all right, he's going to yell to me, or he's going to come out and get me. And I looked down at my phone, and in a matter of seconds, I look up, and he's not there. And then I waited for him to reemerge, which I assumed was going to be in moments,

or that he'd yell to me from the front door, okay? It's good, come on in. Yeah, come on in. But that never happened. He didn't come back. And it pissed me off. Because one, I didn't really want to be there. Two, I had to go to the bathroom.

But where is he? Yeah. It's 12.30. And I'm waiting here in the snow, in the darkness. I don't know these people well. And what did you,, to have a beer? Why aren't you signaling to me? So I, soon thereafter, within Dennis probably

two full minutes, I start calling him. Are you getting ticked at him? Yeah, I am ticked at him at this time, yeah. So what happens next? I left. You're in your car, will you say I'm out of here? No, I kind of, slow rolled it off the street.

And I'm hoping that as I slowly edge my way down the street, he's going to say, wait, Karen, where are you going? Okay, so there you are. You're headed home. Yeah, I went home. I was home within probably seven minutes. Home was John's place. And what did you do? I laid on the couch inside the front door.

And I just called him. I called him just over 50 times. 50 times? Yep. Yep. And they were just going to voicemail. It's getting very early in the morning at this point. Yeah, I fell asleep. When I woke up after four, I knew something was wrong.

Where in the world was John O'Keefe? I didn't know what the hell happened. How did the night end up like this? A monster storm had rolled into Canton, Massachusetts, and Karen Reed's boyfriend, John O'Keefe, was missing. She says she dropped him off at a party, and now in the early morning hours he wasn't home, and he wasn't answering her calls. Karen picks up her story with Dennis Murphy. I've never been more frightened and it's it's blustery, it's blowing snow outside and I called John's closest friends in the area

and most people weren't answering their phones. But at 4.53 a.m., Jen McCabe answered hers. Jen had invited the couple to the party at her brother-in-law, Brian Albert's, place. They'd all gone there after the bar. And I said, Jen, where is John? And she said, I don't know. What's going on? I said, he didn't come home. And she said, let me hang up with you and call my sister. This is Brian Albert's wife,

the homeowner of the property where I last saw John. So Jen is answering that phone call. She's not in the house where the party had taken place. No, Jen says she's home. And she calls me back in a few minutes. And she says, I talked to Nicole. She said, you guys never came in. She said what?

She said, you guys never came in. Your John what? She said, you guys never came in. Your John never came in the door? Yep. So you're hearing the Twilight Zone music at this point? Yeah. What the hell happened? Was there somebody else involved? Did somebody else go pick him up?

Another buddy? So she said, why don't you come get me and we'll go searching for him. In the meantime, I called another friend of John's and she picked up and I said her name's Carrie. I said, Carrie, you know, and I'm not saying it this calmly, but I don't know where John is and I can't find him and I'm worried. And she hung up with me and started calling around. She called the police. My name is Carrie. I'm calling because my friend's boyfriend did not come home last around. She called the police.

I think she might have called a couple hospitals. And I started feeling like I... He had to have gotten hit by a car or by a snow plow. And he had no coat. He never wore a coat. Just after 5 a.m., Karen drove to Jen's house and picked her up. Together, they went back to John's to make sure he wasn't there. That's the two of them on Ring Video and Carrie Roberts joining them. Carrie! But John wasn't there.

So the women got into Carrie's car with Karen in the back seat and drove to the party house. 6 a.m., blizzard conditions. In the dark, they crept toward the house. Karen was the first to spot John. And we turn a corner, and I see him immediately. I see his body immediately. It was wind-swept lawn, and there was just a heat. And this is on the front lawn of the after-party house?

Yep. On the perimeter, it's on the front lawn of the Alberts, but it's very close to their neighbors. There's a cluster of trees, and he's in there. That's him. It didn't look like John. I mean, I couldn't see his face or his hair, but I knew it was him.

I knew it was something that didn't belong on that lawn. I mean, he's a big guy. 6'2", 220. Do you run out of the vehicle and start screaming? I said, there he is. I said, he's a big guy, 6'2", 220. Do you run out of the vehicle and start screaming? I said, there he is. I said, he's right there. And Kerry goes, where? And Jen says, I don't see him.

She goes, Karen, you're hysterical. I said, he's right there. And they don't, now we're going slow. It's bad weather, but she doesn't, Kerry doesn't stop the car. So I jump out, out of the passenger side and I fell on the street and I ran over to him and his eyes were swollen shut.

He had blood dripping out of his nose. Was he alive? He seemed like he could be. I'm only out there for a minute or two and then Kerry runs over. And then Kerry and I take turns between mouth toto-mouth resuscitation and chest compressions.

911, what's your emergency? Jen McCabe called 911. I need someone to come immediately. What's going on? There's a guy unresponsive in the snow. And maybe within 15 minutes, I don't know who arrived first, a ladder truck or a, I'm not sure, but they were there pretty, in pretty short order. — This dashcam video from one of the first responders' vehicles

shows Karen running back and forth, clearly agitated. John was rushed to the hospital. — I actually texted my father and I said, I think John's dead. And texted my father and I said, I think John's dead. And he called me and I said, Dad, I don't want to be alive. Like, I don't want to live. And I didn't know what the hell happened.

How did the night end up like this? Karen was also taken to the hospital that morning. And I am put under a psychiatric watch, just two vestibules down from where they're working on John's body. And then eventually just before noon, my father comes into the room that I'm in. And I said, Dad, how is he? And he said, he's gone. John's gone, Karen.

And I just collapsed on the floor. A 16-year veteran of the Boston Police Department dead, his family reeling, and asking one question that would unravel into countless others. Why? Thinking about Johnny is no longer here. You know, how does this happen? In the days, weeks, and months that followed,

everyone had questions, starting with her. Could I have done something that knocked him out? And his drunkenness and in the cold didn't come to again. What would you say to Karen Reed? I just wish you would admit what you did. The evidence shows that this was a huge cover-up. You either think she was framed or you think that John O'Keefe was a victim of Karen Reed being drunken hitting him.

She has put my family through hell to save herself. We now know the name of the Boston police officer whose body was found outside. The awful news was spreading that winter morning in 2022. Police officer John O'Keefe was dead. Investigators may find out how one of their own died. Johnny, to his family and friends, only 46 years old. His body discovered lying in front of another officer's house. It made no sense. We didn't know if he had passed out in the snow.

And at that point, we didn't know if he had, you know, passed out in the snow. And, you know, at that point, we didn't know what had happened. Beth is part of John's extended family. She didn't want her last name used. It's like that's not possible. It's not. It was unfathomable. I couldn't even think that this could potentially be happening. How did you hear about John's death? I got a call from Johnny's brother. He told me, said, we lost Johnny. I kind of knew, I knew what he meant, but I didn't really know what he meant, you know, I didn't want to

know what he meant. Tom Hubbard and John had been best friends since first grade. You obviously thought very highly of John, I mean, being friends with him for that long. Yeah, so he was just a great guy and, you know, a great friend when we were six. He was a great friend when we were 46. You also say that he really connected people. He kept everyone together. Yes, he would text me, you around all the time, you know, go have a beer, go get something to eat. He would text me, you around all the time, go have a beer, go get something to eat. And I think it's very easy as you get older

that people don't kind of take those, but he always, always did. John always knew what he wanted to do with his life. I don't remember a time where he didn't want to be a police officer. He was set on, he wanted to be a police officer. That's all he cared about. And a big part of being a police officer,

of course, is helping people. Yeah, the way he operated his life was he always kind of put other people first. When tragedy struck, that's exactly what John did. In 2013, his 39-year-old sister, Kristin, learned she had brain cancer. Kristen was diagnosed in May of 2013 and passed away Veterans Day of 2013. Oh my goodness, so fast. So fast.

It was just a few months and Johnny spent a lot of time at the hospital with her. Two months later, another death. This one almost incomprehensible. Kristen's husband had a heart attack. How does your family deal with that? Two deaths so close together. It was a lot. It was a lot. And just the shock of the two of them passing so quickly, both under 40. And then it was, you know, after the shock wore off, it was... — The children. — The children. What are we going to do?

— The young couple left behind a six-year-old girl and a boy, almost three. So John stepped up. He took a desk job at the police department and moved from Boston into his sister's house in Canton to raise his niece and nephew. Why did it go to the Bachelor police officer who'd never been a parent? He was very, he was pretty insistent.

It's the beginning of like a TV drama, right? Exactly. The Bachelor takes in the kids. Yes. Yep. A life juggling work and kids. They called him JJ. The last is a little sticky. Yes. Yup. A life juggling work and kids. They called him JJ. The last one's a little sticky.

Yeah. So then we take marshmallow, right? He was up for anything. Maybe we can use those. Oh, okay. TikTok challenges, silly dances, and Ninja Warrior gyms. He was the fun uncle. You know, he was always making jokes and trying to make the time really fun for them.

In 2020, when the pandemic struck, John reconnected with an old girlfriend, Karen. They'd briefly dated in their 20s. This time it felt right. I found him to be a very different person, but in a very interesting way. There was more depth there after what he had been through. Karen had been through her own challenges, including a diagnosis of MS. Like John, she'd never married.

She worked as an equity analyst and taught college courses in finance as an adjunct professor. At John's house, she was the fun bonus parent. We had theme nights, so we'd have like a fiesta night. We had a formal night where we all dressed up and ate at the dining room table with the fancy china. How did the kids take to Karen? They, you know, they liked her. They liked her a lot.

But all that ended on a cold January morning. John's family went to the hospital and identified his body. Karen was there too under a psychiatric watch. She was screaming down the hallway, you know, is he dead? Is he dead? Screaming. Screaming. Erratic to the point that they sectioned her, you know, because she was threatening to harm herself. The O'Keeffe's left went to John's house to tell the kids,

by then 14 and 11. And then Karen arrived. That's her on the Ring video. She'd been released from the hospital into her parents' care and wanted to see the children. I wasn't there, but I do know that she had sat with the kids for, you know, for a short time and then she and her father went upstairs to the bedroom, gathered a bunch of her belongings and then Karen walked out the door with her father and her brother.

So she just left. She just left. Never said goodbye. And at that point, it had been almost two years that she had been in their lives. What did the kids think as she just disappears? So the kids, again, the kids at that point were so lost. The whole family was.

They couldn't figure out how John ended up dead on a lawn. And Karen seemed to be acting strangely. Beth's sister Erin later told investigators about a troubling call she'd had with Karen after Karen left the O'Keeffe home. And what Karen said to her was, we'll probably never see each other again. And, you know, Erin said to her, what do you mean, we're friends? And, you know, she didn't really have an answer to that.

So it started to feel like something had happened. But what? The Massachusetts State Police opened an investigation, and they began to develop an unsettling theory that Karen was to blame for John's death. So what's that like as that's sinking in? The only word that can come to mind is just complete shock. You're just sitting there thinking, is this real life?

The meeting with the O'Keeffe's took place only hours after John had been declared dead. Karen remembers it differently than the family. She'd been alarmed by the mood at the house. I felt some tension with John's mother. She seemed to be keeping her distance and it felt uncomfortable. She wasn't really addressing me and she did not seem to want the kids near me. Karen says that's why she left and went straight to her parents' house.

Later that afternoon, the lead investigator, Massachusetts State Trooper Michael Proctor, arrived with a colleague to question her. I wasn't asked about what happened at that house. Nothing about where did he go, did he enter in, how did I come to find him, who did I call. It was how much did I have to drink and could you have done a three-point turn?

And before they left, they took my phone and they asked for my car keys. The troopers took her SUV and Karen called a lawyer, Boston attorney David Yannetti. She sounded young to me. My first thought was, this is a teenager. I'm going to have to talk to the parents. But then as she started to tell me the situation she was in,

I was thinking that, you know, she's probably going to need some help. He was right. Two days later, 7.30 p.m., police swarmed Karen's house. There was a good eight to ten cops. They went all around my house, shining lights in, and started banging on the doors, and then they all just flooded my house. She was charged with John's death, three crimes, manslaughter, negligent motor vehicle

homicide, and leaving the scene of an accident resulting in death. Karen spent the night in jail. The nightmare had begun. Nathan Reed is Karen's brother. Someone was going to pay a cost for John losing his life. And so was I surprised that there were charges? No, I wasn't surprised. The next morning, minutes before her arraignment,

Karen met her lawyer in person for the first time. And David had one copy of the charging documents and he held them through the bars and we read them together. And there are a few things in there that stood out right away to me that worried me. At the arraignment, prosecutor Adam Lally laid out a damning case. The prosecutor said troopers noticed something when they impounded Karen's SUV.

The rear right passenger side tail light was shattered, pieces missing from the red and clear areas. And at the scene, investigators found plastic tail light pieces on the lawn where John's body was discovered. Also consistent with the broken tail pieces on the lawn where John's body was discovered. Also consistent with the broken tail lights on the Lexus SUV. The state's theory of the case was simple. John and Karen arrived at the party house following a night of heavy drinking.

John got out of the car. She backed into him, then drove off, leaving John lying there, badly injured. Approximately six bloodied lacerations varying in length on his right arm. The cuts extending from his forearm to his bicep. Both of the victim's eyes were swollen shut and black and blue. Approximately two inch lacerations to the back of his head. Initial reports indicated John died from blunt force trauma to the back of the head and hypothermia. Karen pleaded not guilty and was released on bail. Karen, was this an accident?

Former Massachusetts prosecutor, Katherine Loftus, followed the story but wasn't involved in the case. So I think when she was initially charged, those seemed like the appropriate charges to issue at that time. So family's reaction to the arrest and finding out that there's been an arrest of Karen Reed?

Relief. If she did this, she's going to be held responsible for it. And at this point, we didn't think that it was necessarily on purpose. We just know something happened. She hit him and she left. It's hard to imagine that any family would have to go through something like this. Yes, you know, Johnny died on Saturday, and then Karen is arrested on Tuesday night. And they're at court on Wednesday.

There is zero time to grief. Days after the arraignment, John O'Keefe was laid to rest. The line to get into the church was probably about a half a mile down the street. Says so much about John. It does. It does. It does. The police marched in kind of two by two to salute the casket and that was an incredible moment and you know you could hear a pin drop when that was going through and that that line lasted I don't know if

there was a thousand police officers in that it was just went on forever. And then the procession to the graves side was long. You know, we took a route through Braintree where Johnny grew up and then made our way to the grave. Very hard to say goodbye. Very hard. say goodbye very hard. Karen wasn't at the funeral. She knew she was in a world of trouble. Then a stranger called with a story that would turn the state's case on its head.

Maybe somebody else had a motive and maybe somebody else would have caused the death of John O'Keefe. It wasn't looking good for Karen Reed. She was facing prison time for manslaughter. But her case was about to take a dizzying turn after a man called her attorney's office. And he had a very distinctive voice, very gravelly voice.

He said, you know, Dave, you don't know me. I want you to know your client is innocent. Intrigued, David Unetti listened as the tipster, a former sheriff's investigator turned private eye, described a plot completely at odds with the state's theory of the crime. I didn't know what he knew or didn't know. Former sheriff's investigator turned private eye, described a plot completely at odds with the state's theory of the crime. I didn't know what he knew or didn't know.

I didn't know how he knew it. He was coy about that. But there's something else going on here, pointing to a potential other suspect. That potential other suspect was the man who'd hosted the party. You should be looking at the homeowner who is a Boston cop. He was talking about Sergeant Detective Brian Albert, a 30-year veteran of the Boston Police Department. The tipster said John had been beaten by people at the party inside Albert's house. He believed that it was Brian Albert

who had tuned up John. Karen says when she found John in the snow, it didn't occur to her he could have been beaten. I had seen John, and he was bloodied in the face, and he had cuts that were bleeding on his face, and his eyes were purple, but I didn't know when I saw him that he looked like he got beaten up.

I mean, I was just focused on trying to revive him. That's a tough leap to make at that point as well. In at least three conversations spanning more than a month, Karen and her attorney say the tipster portrayed Brian Albert as someone who liked to fight, confirming their findings. They'd been working with their own private investigator who turned up this YouTube clip of a TNT show called Boston's Finest.

Right now what was on a reality show that profiled his fugitive unit in Boston, he's in a boxing club with other cops, and he's lacing up, and he's getting in the boxing ring, and he's fighting. The tipster also seemed to have detailed knowledge of John's injuries, details that hadn't been made public. He said his injuries don't coincide with a car accident

and that added some validity and it was inside information. He knew what the body looked like too. But then suddenly the tipster got cold feet. He got nervous. I was taking notes and he did not like that. He started to back off sort of his basis of knowledge. And when police eventually interviewed him, he disputed Karen and Yannetti's story.

The tipster said he learned details about the case from talking to them and insisted he had no inside knowledge. He's re-recanted. talking to them and insisted he had no inside knowledge. He's re-re-recanted. The tipster might have abandoned his own tips, but Karen and her attorney did not. I just had the feeling he knew more than he was telling us, and he didn't want to tell us how or why he knew it.

I still feel that way. They had no idea if any of the tipster's story was true and he didn't provide any proof. However, the information he gave them became the beginnings of a defense. We were off and running. Yeah, we were off and running. This man who knows what he knows somehow,

he crystallized and confirmed our suspicions. That changed everything. But the case against Karen Reed was about to take a big turn. The state had convened a grand jury and heard from John's niece and nephew that Karen and John argued frequently, and that John wanted to end the relationship. The prosecutor also presented toxicology evidence indicating Karen was drunk when she allegedly backed into John.

In June 2022, she was arrested again on upgraded charges, including manslaughter while driving under the influence and second-degree murder. This is big. It's big because what we've gone from is essentially the Commonwealth alleging that this woman hit her boyfriend drunk by accident to a completely different theory that she has intentionally murdered him.

She did this on purpose, is the accusation. Yeah, up to that point, everybody had been kind of like, hey, it was an accident. And then this just kind of took it to a whole, whole different level. Now it's just unimaginable. But why would Karen murder John? My head's spinning. What possibly could they have that would justify that charge?

The narrative was that I just became enraged and decided to nail him in the snow. She was now looking at the very real possibility of spending the rest of her life behind bars. In June 2022, nearly six months after John O'Keefe's death, Your Honor, this is Commonwealth versus Karen Reed. his family was jolted by the news that Karen Reed had been charged with his murder. Is the anger building?

It is. It is. Because it didn't have to happen. Karen insisted it didn't happen at all, but she wanted a fresh take on the facts. So she cold called local law professors and got this advice from one. And he said one case that made some headway and was able to get charges dismissed was Kevin Spacey and Nantucket. The cell data was key. She learned that the actor was represented

by a high-powered criminal defense attorney out of Los Angeles. A guy with a huge rep named Alan Jackson. Harvey Weinstein had also been a client. And years earlier, as a prosecutor, Jackson won the murder conviction of music producer Phil Spector. Karen reached out to him. She had not held out complete hope that I would make contact with her, but in point of fact, I was very interested. That's how this connection was made. Correct. Alan Jackson joined David Iannetti on Karen's team.

You come in as an outsider into this tight-knit community, high-powered lawyer from Los Angeles. Do you tread lightly? Yeah, I don't know how to tread lightly. I tread toward the truth, period. And if that ruffles feathers, so be it. If that pisses people off, so be it. Get over it. Jackson did his signature deep dive into the digital data. And in early 2023, he struck gold on a cell phone that belonged to Jen McCabe. Remember, Jen McCabe was one of almost a dozen people

at the party that night. She turned her cell over to police in the initial days of the investigation. A Google search on that cell made early morning got Jackson's attention. At 2 27, she did a search saying, how long to die in cold, presumably how long to die in cold.

Right. This is well before John's body has been found. Correct. Jen told investigators she didn't know John was missing until Karen called her around 5 a.m. Jackson believed the timing of the Google search undermined that claim. It's hard to oversell this. It's that dramatic. The defense team met to discuss the finding. They speculated that Jen knew something happened at the party and started Googling as soon as she got home.

She walked in, walked upstairs and started Googling to try to figure out, like, what is going to happen? Are we going to get implicated in the murder of a Boston police officer? Jackson said they found the search in a deleted file on Jen's cell. She willingly turned it into, that tells me she... She thought that it was gone. It willingly turned it in too. That tells me she... She thought that it was gone. It was clean. 100%.

But at the heart of the case, the right tail light on Karen's SUV. It had been damaged, but how? The state said it shattered when Karen hit John around 12.30 a.m. The defense had an entirely different take. The taillight was cracked, not shattered, hours later when Karen went out looking for John. They said they had evidence to support that claim. Video showing Karen backing up that morning. Karen told Dennis Murphy what happened. I have seen what looks like surveillance video of that car. I think that's a ring video.

Backing, backing out of your parking space backing out of a garage out of a garage is that at John's at John's yep in backing up did you bang into his car yeah I did yep did you feel it you hear it yeah I felt a little and I on your back right on my passenger back right? On my passenger back right. Yep. You hit John's back left. Okay so this is obviously not Karen Reed's SUV but this is similar, similar tail light. So what do you think happened? Similar size. There's a different making model but it's similar size and similar situation for the tail light. One of the things that that we noted right up front was how a taillight like this is manufactured

on a late model SUV. This is all convex and it's hardened plastic. Yeah, you're not going to break this easily. You can pound on this all day long and you're not going to be able to break this with your hand, with your fist. You'll break your hand before you'll break this. When it came to John's injuries, the defense concluded they were not consistent with a car accident.

You cannot ignore the plethora of evidence that establishes that John was not struck by a car and left to die at 12 31 a.m. or 12 34 a.m. It's just not there. He had to have been killed in another way. And the only other reasonable way for him to have been killed and suffer those injuries is for him to suffer a beating inside that house. The defense team concluded that people at the party, all connected to law enforcement in some way, conspired to cover up the beating and frame Karen for John's death. Karen's father Bill and brother Nathan. There's just too many things here that don't add up.

You need a handful of powerful, influential individuals in key positions to get this done. The Alberts, along with other partygoers and the O'Keefe family, called the defense theory crazy. It's hard to keep a secret of that magnitude. — It's hard to keep any secret, let alone— — With that many people. — You know, if it was one person, that would be one thing. But if the way we're looking at this conspiracy, it is everyone in the house.

So it's just, you know, sometimes the truth is just the truth. But the conspiracy theory caught hold, and before long, people were turning out in droves to support Karen Reed, buying into this man's unrelenting crusade. We ain't got no quit! We ain't got no quit!

No, we don't. By the spring of 2023, more than a year after John O'Keefe's death, Good afternoon, Your Honor. Karen Reed's lawyers were pushing their conspiracy theory at pre-trial hearings. John O'Keefe's death. Good afternoon, Your Honor. Karen Reed's lawyers were pushing their conspiracy theory at pretrial hearings. John O'Keefe was inside the house. And prosecutors were fighting back. There's absolutely no evidence Mr. O'Keefe ever entered the residence at Fairview. That's when the case exploded out of the courtroom and into the social media feeds of thousands,

thanks to this guy. What's up, losers? How's everyone doing tonight? Aidan Kearney, aka Turtle Boy. All right, guys, so big day today. He's a former high school teacher turned blogger, part reporter, part showman, part instigator. We ain't got no quit!

We ain't got no quit! No, we don't. He told NBC 10 Boston that he stumbled onto Karen's story in April 2023. It wasn't getting much coverage. And then I was just blown away that night when I read all the court documents and I just couldn't believe, is this really happening? He posted immediately, and he's been at it ever since, amplifying the defense theory like a relentless human bullhorn.

— To frame an innocent woman and cover up for the murder of a Boston police officer. — Sue O'Connell is a commentator for NBC 10 Boston. The social media on this case was off the charts, including, you know, of course,

the main player, who seemed to be Turtle Boy. There's never been, I think, a situation like this in the greater Boston or New England area where you have Turtle Boy, Aiden Kearney, who is a blogger who doesn't operate by any regular standards of what you would call journalism. Cop killers! That's what they are. They're cop killers. Before long, Turtle Boy created his own series

about the case called Canton Cover-Up, racking up tens of thousands of views, holding nothing back, portraying Karen Reed as the real victim. What we know for sure, 100%, was she did not run him over. He wowed his followers urging them to join protests. Turtle boy without his voice, without his enthusiasm, his passion, we wouldn't all be here. How you doing? Nice to see you. And every

other single person in that house who remains quiet to this day and participated in the light. A local murder story went national. Why do you think this story, this case has grabbed the attention of so many people? I think all the questions to this are what make it really intriguing. Is it a romance that went wrong? Is it a night of partying that went wrong, or did something else happen? So we're here to make our voices heard, and the movement has grown as a result of that. And that's not all that grew. A defense fund for Karen Reed, fueled by Turtle Boy's crusade, raised hundreds of thousands of dollars.

The O'Keeffe's watched the growing frenzy with horror, and they became targets themselves, reviled on social media by Turtle Boy and his supporters, often forced to run a gauntlet when they went to court. His followers have got into all of our faces prior to, for hearings. We would have to walk through these people screaming at us. We have all been called idiots and stupid for not believing her conspiracy theory.

Yeah. Yeah. Turtle Boy called the family maggots. Yes. It was because she knew the trolls could come after her that Beth asked us not to use her last name. How do you all feel about him? For lack of a better term, a vile human being.

That's how we feel about him. Ah, no, stop! They threw him outside of the lawn like trash. For the things that he has said and continued to say and got his mob to say with this mob mentality, it's vile. You are a disgrace to your brother, dude. A disgrace. You are a disgrace. I'll say whatever I want. I've never heard of a criminal case where the victim's family is harassed both online but on their way to court.

Johnny is where the focus should be and not on the blogger and not on the defendant. It should be about the fact that Johnny died. Shame on you! Regardless of what you think happened, the fact that these parents and siblings and friends and family of John O'Keefe were not embraced in a way, borders on criminal. The O'Keefe's believed Karen and her lawyers were in on the act. John's brother, he's essentially accusing you of producing, in his words, the Karen Reed Show. That's a joke. And when you have nothing else to say about the evidence, you just attack the person who's presenting the evidence. Did you bring Turtle Boy into all of this?

Absolutely not. If they didn't bring him in, they certainly helped him along. Karen admits she and Turtle Boy spoke on the phone 189 times in the year leading up to the trial. It was almost every day for like 20 minutes. Like, what do you make of this? Or what do you think? We talk about after court, oh my God, I can't believe the judge said this. The state for its part believed its case was being hijacked. The district attorney went on camera to condemn Turtle Boy's tactics.

The harassment of witnesses and the murder prosecution of Karen Reed is absolutely baseless. It should be an outrage to any decent person and it needs to stop. In late 2023, prosecutors charged Turtle Boy with multiple counts of witness intimidation. He pleaded not guilty. Read, Karen, read! As the Karen Reed trial approached, the judge ordered demonstrators to stay 200 feet from the courthouse. That didn't dent their enthusiasm.

We just can't let, you know, roll over and let them just do this to an innocent person. It's the biggest cover-up, I think, that we've ever seen in this country. Yeah! Karen, you think you're gonna get a fair trial? Finally, April 2024, I think that we've ever seen in this country. And... And... And... Karen, you think you're gonna get a fair trial? Finally, April, 2024, the trial was set to begin

with a prosecutor determined to prove Karen's guilt by using her own words against her. She said, I hit him, I hit him, I hit him. hit him. In April 2024, it had been more than two years since John O'Keefe was found dying in the snow. And Karen Reed's trial was about to begin. How anxious were all of you with this trial starting? So intense.

It's so intense. It's the wanting to get it done with, to be able to, again, start the grieving process, start to move on with, you know, with our lives, and to be able to just grieve Johnny in private, you know, not in front of everybody. But at Norfolk Superior Court, to be able to just grieve Johnny in private, you know, not in front of everybody. But at Norfolk Superior Court,

a carnival of supporters was there to greet Karen. We got fascinated with the trial. We're coming to support Karen. I traveled just under 1,500 miles to be here. I thought somebody coming from Alabama was pretty extraordinary. Someone came from London, England. Australia, New Zealand, Russia, because this case has really struck a chord.

John O'Keefe had done nothing wrong and wound up dead. And on a regular basis, he was just left out of this conversation. And you know, Karen would arrive and people had pom-poms. They would cheer her on. Good morning. Inside the cramped courtroom, prosecutor Adam Lally opened with his long-held theory that Karen Reed was amped up on alcohol and anger and intentionally backed her SUV into John O'Keefe, leaving him to die in the bitter cold. The defendant, Karen Reed, is guilty of murder in the second degree. He argued the crime happened as John and Karen's relationship was failing.

The evidence definitely suggests that things were rocky. I mean, there definitely was a roiling in the relationship. One of the struggles likely arose around some jealousy issues. When they were in Aruba, Karen accused John of cheating on her. That Aruba group vacation happened about a month before John's death. A family friend testified that John hugged her in a hotel lobby, and Karen freaked out.

And she very loudly told me to go f*** myself across the lobby. And I said, yeah, f*** you too, and walked away. And just a couple of weeks after that trip, the prosecutor said Karen had been coming on to another man. He was ATF agent Brian Higgins, and he read their flirtatious text messages in court. — The defendant responded, you're hot. I responded, are you serious or messing with me?

Defendant responded, no, I'm serious. I responded, failing is mutual. Is that bad? — Higgins testified that as he was leaving John O'Keefe's house one night after a get-together, I responded failing is mutual. Is that bad? Higgins testified that as he was leaving John O'Keefe's house one night after a get-together, Karen did something that stunned him. The defendant kissed me. And how did she kiss you?

Not like a friend. He says Karen is the one who initiated contact with him. Yep. Karen is definitely pursuing him. And there was definitely a plan in Karen's texting that they would have some relationship, and I might guess an off-ramp from her relationship with John O'Keefe. Then the prosecutor turned to that January night. Suspense gripped the courtroom when the man who hosted the party,

Brian Elbert, took the stand. I do. The prosecutor tried to preempt the defense's allegation that Elbert was involved in John O'Keefe's death. How would you sort of describe your relationship with John O'Keefe? Although I didn't know him well, I considered him to be a friend and our relationship was very, very good. Elbert, who had also been at the bar, testified he never saw John after they all left.

John never came into my house that night. He would have been welcomed, and the defendant would have been welcomed with open arms had they come in, and I wish they had. I really do. The people in the house said, John never came in the house, Karen never came in the house,

they were outside in a vehicle where the witnesses say that they saw the vehicle was close to where John and Keith's body was found. John's family looked on as the prosecutor hammered home a fundamental point in this case. If John didn't go into the house, then there was no murder there. If you believe the conspiracy that he walked in the door and was hit right away, and then all of a sudden everyone's back home an hour and a half later, resting comfortably, you'd have to think that all of these people in this house are complete sociopaths.

If you try and sit there and put together a timeline of this conspiracy, you can't. And it would say that they are all lying, that they're all in on it and no one's breaking. No one's turning on anybody. Exactly. The prosecutor argued that there was no conspiracy, that it was Karen who was lying and trying to cover it up. Some of the strongest evidence in the prosecution's case came from Jen McCabe, who'd invited John and Karen to the house.

She recounted the dramatic phone call from Karen just before 5 a.m., when John was missing. She tells me that John didn't come home, they got into a fight, and that she left him at the waterfall. Jen McCabe had to remind her, no, you were actually in front of the house, but then you left. And I say, Karen, we saw you outside of my sister's. And what was her response to that?

She told me that she didn't remember going there. She said Karen went further, apparently implicating herself in John's death. And then she was saying, did I hit him? Could I have hit him? And then she proceeded to say that she had a cracked taillight. If that's true, then that really puts into question that she broke her taillight, where she bumps or hits John's car. Right. I think it's pretty strong evidence against Karen that her taillight was likely damaged

beforehand. John's friend, Carrie Roberts, testified about the frantic call she too got from Karen just after the call to Jen McCabe. And she said, John's dead. Carrie, Carrie, Carrie. And then she hung up. She said Karen called back about five minutes later with a more nuanced story. And she said, I'm afraid John might be dead. He might have gotten hit by a plow. Soon after, when the women went to search for John, something else seemed suspicious. Carrie Roberts and Jennifer McCabe testified that as they were driving up to the house through the blizzard in the dark, Karen was in the back seat and managed to spot John's

body where both of them couldn't see it. Yes, they couldn't see anything, but that Karen immediately saw something, ran to where John's body was subsequently discovered. Which could look like she knew he was there. What the Commonwealth wants you to believe is the reason why she knew that John's body was there is because she knew that she hit him.

As for Jen McCabe's misspelled how long to die in the cold Google search? The prosecutor anticipated the defense would bring it up, so he asked her about it. She adamantly denied she did the Google search at 2.27 a.m. and deleted it, insisting she did it after they found John's body, and only because Karen asked her to.

At that point, she grabbed my hands and she said, Google hypothermia, Google how long it takes to die in the cold. I believe I did it multiple times because as I was typing it, I don't know what else was coming up. She was screaming, my hands were shaking. By that time, first responders were on the scene.

Some testified Karen was not questioning if she'd hit John. She was outright confessing that she had. So she said, I hit him. She repeated it. I hit him, I hit him. Oh my God, I hit him. Jen McCabe said she was right there and heard the same thing. That's something that she said once or more to me.

Three times, I hit him, I hit him, I hit him. We have a lot of inconsistencies in her statements because if you saw him walk up to the house and into the door and you left, why would the thought that you hit him ever come into play? As the trial unfolded, the prosecutor said it wasn't just Karen's changing stories that proved she was guilty. He also had a trove of data, including voicemails he said would show Karen Reed was in a red-hot fury when she killed John.

You're a f***ing loser. F*** yourself. As the weeks went by in that tiny courtroom, every day was an ordeal for John O'Keefe's family sitting just feet from Karen Reed. And someone has to stare at her face every single day. And we had to sit and we had to watch the defense table giggling and laughing, you know, at times. And it was all carried live. It was somehow lost that this was a murder trial and that it wasn't a social engagement.

People lost the fact that the reason we were there was because Johnnie was killed. But you didn't lose sight of that. No, we never forgot the reason we were there. As prosecutor Adam Lally pressed his case, he would roll out piles of physical and digital evidence to show Karen killed John. He said her motive could be found in her phone messages.

So at 2.32 p.m. she says says that why would you start with me this morning? A state police investigator testified that hours before John and Karen went out that night, they exchanged angry text messages. Ms. Reed says you start a number of fights from your end. John writes back, I've explained it a few times already, not doing it again. And how does the defendant respond to that? So you're not into this anymore. And then John says, not into fighting all the time, correct. The prosecutor argued Karen's churning anger in those texts

was the fuel for what happened next. So this is 10 seconds of data. A police crash investigator used data recorded by Karen's Lexus SUV to show what followed when John got out of the car. So it's going straight, it stops, and then it's placing reverse, and then goes backward. The prosecution took data from the black box that they say shows that Karen backed up a number of feet.

So the vehicle was traveling in reverse up to 24 miles per hour and approximately 62 feet. The investigator said the accelerator pedal was still pushed down when there was a sudden slowdown and the SUV's steering wheel shimmied. What if any type of collision is that data set consistent with and why? Yeah, there's a point there where it appears to be consistent with a pedestrian strike. The prosecution argued Karen had to know she hit John from the onboard cameras. The investigator testified John's injuries were also consistent with being hit by Karen Reid's SUV.

He pointed to gashes on John's arm. The lacerations of the arm from the tail light, the dent with the scratches, those are something that would be consistent with striking the Lexus. You also made aware that there was injury to the back of Mr. O'Keefe's head. Yes, there was asphalt curbing, which could have, somewhere he could have struck

his head in there, he got projected and got spun counterclockwise due to the, where he got impacted to the vehicle. The Commonwealth needed to explain that John O'Keefe was struck by Karen Reed in her car, pivoting him around, putting him up in the air and having him slam down and bang his head on the ground, resulting in blunt force trauma. As images of John's body were displayed in court, it was especially hard on John's family and friends.

Were you in constant contact with the family during the trial period? Were you checking in on them? Yeah, to hear it brought out around his injuries, it's gut wrenching and they had to kind of sit there. Seven weeks into the trial, lead investigator, Trooper Michael Proctor took the stand. He showed the jury evidence central to the case

that Karen backed her SUV into John. The right rear tail light had large pieces missing from it. Those are all items that you recovered from the front lawn area, is that correct? Correct. Essentially the condition that they were in when you covered them on that, on those respective dates? Yes. There's also pieces of what are believed to be from her tail light, micro pieces in John's

shirt. So I think that that really was the strength of the Commonwealth's case because if you don't believe that that evidence is planted, then you otherwise have to explain, well, how did it get there? As the trial unfolded, the prosecutor presented damning evidence of what he said was a major factor in the crime,

how much Karen had to drink. She retrieves a drink from the table and appears to consume it. — A police investigator described bar security videos showing Karen drinking vodka and sodas before she got in her car and drove John to the party house. — In total, from those two videos, how many drinks did you observe the defendant

consuming over her time there? — The video shows nine drinks being consumed by the defendant. When she was tested at the hospital later that morning, more than eight hours after John got out of her SUV, Karen's blood alcohol level was just over 0.09. The legal driving limit in Massachusetts is 0.08. This is the retrograde extrapolation report that I did. A state toxicologist extrapolated the data to calculate Karen's blood alcohol when she and John arrived at the house.

With regards to the maximum, what if any result did you get from your mathematical calculations? The result was a 0.292 gram percent. He figured Karen's blood alcohol level could have been more than three times the legal driving limit when she allegedly backed into John. So you can imagine in a world where you're in a relationship and by all accounts you've been out drinking all night long and then something happens, some bit of information comes in that sets someone off to cause an angry exchange or argument between two people.

Something happened, argued the prosecutor, because soon after John got out of the car, Karen called him in a fury. With the court's permission, if I could play that for the jury. Yes. John, I f***ing hate you! We only heard Karen Reid's voice in the courtroom a couple of times.

We hear these loud, screaming, chaotic, frantic, vulgar, angry voicemails of Karen's that she left for John. Nobody knows who the f**k you are, you f**king pervert. These voicemails from Karen were intense. She used a lot of profanity. You could see the jurors. I saw the jurors, some of them looking at Karen.

You're a f***ing loser. F*** yourself. And it was really a startling and stark experience for them. But as strong as the case against Karen Reed seemed, her defense team was ready to unleash their story of what happened. Just when you think this case couldn't get any crazier, you find pig DNA. Right.

A few weeks into her trial, as Karen Reed drove to court with her attorneys, the sheer number of prosecution witnesses appeared to be taking its toll. More than 60 would testify. I swear this is like, you do start to think, they're really trying to bleed me dry here. What is the point of all these witnesses? As exasperated as Karen seemed to be, commentator Sue O'Connell says the person she saw every day in court was a fighter.

The first thing that struck me about Karen was just how involved she was in her own defense. Yeah, I mean, Karen Reed is fighting for her life. If you are Karen Reed and you're charged with murder, you're going to do everything you can. Her attorney emphasized to the jury that this wasn't just about John O'Keefe or Karen. It was about overzealous prosecutors, corrupt investigators,

and people from Canton with a lot to hide. Karen Reed was framed. Her car never struck John O'Keefe. She did not cause his death. And that means that somebody else did. To prove that, the defence pushed back on the prosecution's case, that Karen deliberately backed her SUV into John and left him to die in the cold. On cross, Alan Jackson asked the Commonwealth's crash investigator why he

was so certain Karen hit John. If his arm, elbow, took the brunt of that entire impact, how do you account for the fact that he ends up with a broken bone? I don't know. He got hit in the arm and somehow got spun around, just the arm by the way, and spins his entire body around 217 pound man and launches him that way. It made no sense. Responding to another of Karen's attorneys, even the state's own medical examiner couldn't

say if a car or something else caused the gash in the back of John's head. It could be any blunt object. It could also be the result of being struck with a large object such as a baseball bat or a barbell. It's possible. And independent experts in crash reconstruction testified about John's injuries. The fact that we only have that head injury

is inconsistent in this case with being struck by that tail light. So was the tail light damage consistent or inconsistent with striking an arm? It's inconsistent for a number of reasons. They said that it appeared he did not suffer those injuries from getting hit by a car. Correct. And conversely, the damage on the vehicle was not the result of hitting a human body. But the defense still had a problem. It was crystal clear I hit him. Multiple witnesses said that they heard Karen say I hit him.

Totally false, 100 percent false. Jackson pointed to the first responders dashcam video. Isn't it interesting that not one second of audio picks up the word, I hit him. Not one. She never said that. Karen didn't take the stand, but she gave her own explanation to Dennis Murphy. I said, could I have hit him? Did I hit him?

How could that have been? I mean, you dropped him off the house. I don't know what else could have been. I thought, did he somehow try to flag me down and maybe tripped and I ran over his foot and then he passed out drunk? I mean, I didn't think I hit him, hit him. As to whether Karen and John were on the outs that night,

Dennis asked her about that too. There's innuendo here that you guys had really been going at it. And this was sort of like a last date element to it. Was that going on? That was not going on. John made it clear to me, I'm never breaking up with you. You know, not never that we're in this good or bad,

but you're the best person I've ever been with. You're a f***ing loser. F*** yourself. The defense argued the reason Karen left those voicemails was because John had abandoned her in her car and she got angry. John, I f***ing hate you. Then there was what happened at the bar.

ATF agent Brian Higgins was there. Even though Karen had recently been flirting with him, she didn't speak with him that night. You treated her sort of like a stranger. she didn't speak with him that night. Um, with six M's behind it. Okay. And well, correct? Well, it wasn't like that. It was um, well, that's it. And his text to her was well, um, as in what about me?

What about us, yeah. What about us? Where do I fit in all this? You walk in here right in my face with this guy after flirting with me and texting with me. The defense implied Higgins had a motive to hurt John when they all went to the party house. On the fundamental point, whether John went inside, the defense turned to its digital

forensics expert and John's iPhone health data to suggest John was using stairs inside the house. This indicates three sets of floors that represents elevation change, so it doesn't indicate to us up or down. That was contrary to a prosecution witness who said the data showed John driving on a hilly stretch of road. Jackson set out to persuade the jury that those inside the house attacked John. This retired pathologist testified for the defense. John's injuries suggested a beating.

What would their motive be though? You don't have to have some deep-seated hatred for someone to get into an argument that leads to a fight, especially when people have been drinking. People such as Brian Albert, he implied. Sir, you were in the Marines before you were a police officer, correct? Yes. Did you have any training in were a police officer, correct? Yes. Did you have any training in hand-to-hand combat? Yes.

The defense attorney tried to pin him down. Obviously, any detective would be trained in techniques that culprits might use or suspects might use to cover up crimes to thwart investigations, correct? No. Never been trained in the fact that, I don't know, somebody might want to clean up the blood at a scene. No. And there was something else. A defense expert in emergency trauma was certain John's arm had been mulled by an animal.

Possibly a large dog. There's parallel lines. And those were inflicted by either teeth or claw marks. If that's from a dog, that is one nasty dog. That's from a dog. What's more, lab techs have found something truly bizarre on John's shirt. Just when you think this case couldn't get any crazier,

you find pig DNA that plays right into your theory. Jackson's theory was that the pig DNA came from a dog treat made from pork, chewed by the Elbert's dog Chloe, a German shepherd mix with a mean streak. The dog also played into his thinking that there had been a cover-up. Your family got rid of Chloe. Chloe was rehomed in May, 2020. We can use whatever words we want to. Rehomed, rehoused, whatever.

But you got rid of her. She's no longer part of the Albert family, right? Right. The defense argued there was more evidence of a cover-up from before John's body was discovered. Albert and Higgins called each other around 2 a.m. Albert said they were butt dials. Why was there a 2 22 a.m. call between Brian Albert and Brian Higgins?

Why five minutes later was Jen McKay Google searching how long it takes to die in the cold, why was all this happening? That is all evidence of a massive cover-up. Where were you at 6.03 on the morning of January 29, 2022? I was sleeping in my room. Jackson implied it was suspicious that even after John's body was discovered, Brian Albert, a trained first responder, did nothing to help. During that entire event, after you were awakened, all that chaos on your front lawn, you never came out of your house to assist or investigate in any matter whatsoever, did you, Mr. Albert?

No. To John's family, to anyone who calls this a crazy conspiracy, what do you say to them? There's nothing crazy about it. And conspiracies simply mean agreements. There were agreements to hide evidence, to obscure evidence that were all brought out during the course of the trial. Jackson was just getting started. The most dramatic moments of the trial were about to unfold. You were looking for naked photographs of Ms. Reid

as you sat in her office at 9.44 p.m. The demonstrators outside the courthouse treated Karen Reed and her lawyers like rock stars. What was it like going in and out of court every day with all those supporters, all the fanfare? That was a trip. I've been involved in a few high-profile cases here and there where there's public interest, but this was truly, this was next level. As the trial went into its seventh week, its most viral moments played out when Alan Jackson took aim at the police, who investigated the death of one of their own.

When you think about it, an officer is dead. I mean, you would think that you would want to go overboard. Correct. To make sure that everything was done correctly, properly. Collect whatever you can in that moment. Exactly. So the first thing you need to do is walk in and make sure that you lock everything down. You freeze the scene, as it were.

The interior of the house and the exterior of the house. None of that was done. And investigators didn't protect the evidence, he said. Do you think it's standard practice for a police department to borrow red solo cups from a neighbor to gather evidence? Objection. You can go ahead and answer that, Lieutenant. Of course not. Nothing about the scene was standard.

Those solo cups were put in grocery bags, not evidence bags, not grocery bags. That evidence is obviously very important. Somebody else's blood might be in that evidence. When lead investigator Michael Proctor took the stand, Jackson rained fire on him, insinuating he was not just incompetent, but corrupt. This case involves a Boston cop whose family you were actually connected to, correct? — Loosely. — The trooper admitted he'd known members of the Albert family for years.

He was friendly with one of Brian Albert's brothers and had worked with another. — You further testify that you never have gone to any supervisor at Massachusetts State Police to disclose even a potential conflict of interest in this case that you might have, correct? Correct. Jackson then urged jurors to look at the state's key evidence, the tail light. He argued it was only cracked when Karen backed out of the garage, but it was smashed into pieces after Trooper Proctor impounded her SUV.

The evidence? This police video of the impounded SUV, with a twist. — I established that the video was inverted. We were able to establish that they had manipulated evidence and literally presented it as true. And it was not true. It was completely backward. — He said the video told a different story when it was played the right way around.

— And what it did show is the person that was toward the actual right rear tail light was Michael Proctor. Jackson suggested Proctor could have smashed the tail light. But that didn't explain the plastic shards police were finding back at the scene. How could they be there if Karen hadn't hit John? What about all these pieces at the scene,

pieces on the road? The pieces that were seen. That they continued to find over the following days? Over the course of three weeks, actually. Interesting. How is it that those pieces, 46 or 47 pieces of tail light, were found over the course of three weeks? He suggested it was Proctor who planted the pieces.

Well, who had access to the tail light? Michael Proctor. Who had access to the scene? Michael Proctor. Proctor denied to the scene? Michael Proctor. Proctor denied manipulating evidence. Jackson didn't buy that. He said it was all about law enforcement protecting its own. I believe that Michael Proctor and his cohorts

erected a tall blue wall. And what I mean by that is the visual of this insular community where they protect themselves, they protect each, they protect each other. And if you're an outsider, you're not invited in. And Karen Reed was very much an outsider. You didn't say that, did you? Perhaps the most explosive moments in the trial came as Alan Jackson got Proctor to

read text messages he'd sent soon after his investigation began. What did you write after you talked about going through the quote, retarded client's phone? Objection. I'll allow it. No nudes so far. No nudes so far, correct? Correct.

And you said that to your bosses. Yes, sir. You were looking for naked photographs of Ms. Reed on a Wednesday night as you sat in your office at 944 PM? It was an inappropriate joke. Do you believe that your text messages were reflective of an objective investigator? I believe poor jokes have, in unprofessional language,

have no bearing on the integrity and the facts and physical evidence of this case. Why out of the gate does he have this animosity for Karen Reed? Why did he go so hard at Karen? The more emphasis that's on her, the less emphasis is on the homeowner. Jackson didn't let up, quoting more of Proctor's texts about Karen Reed. Hopefully she kills herself. You believed, Trooper Proctor,

that your life would be much easier if Karen Reed was just dead, didn't you? Objection. I'll allow it. No, no, no, like I said, it was a figure of speech. My emotion got the best of me based on, you know, the fact that Ms. Reed hit Mr. O'Keefe with her vehicle and left him to die on the side of the road.

She's a bitch. Objection. Is that right? Yes. A whack job, correct? Yes. No ass, correct? Yes.

She's according to you, right? Yes. Would you agree, trooper proctor, that you have dehumanized Karen Reed during the course of your investigation? I would say based off that language, yes. Could you see how the jury was reacting hearing those messages that Proctor sent? For me, watching the jury, it was probably the most compelling days where the visible

disgust on many of the jurors' faces was completely apparent. After eight weeks of testimony, both sides rested. By that point, Karen Reed had been called nearly every name in the book. All that mattered now was what the jury called her. Guilty or not guilty. June 2024. It had been an epic courtroom battle to determine if Karen Reed was guilty of second-degree murder, manslaughter while driving under the influence, and leaving the scene of a fatal accident.

A guilty verdict could send her to prison for life. drove her vehicle in reverse, struck Mr. O'Keefe, causing those catastrophic head injuries, leaving him incapacitated. The prosecution and defense made their final bids to sway the jury. He got hit, punch went through, and he fell to the ground, fracturing his skull. At some point during that altercation, the dog got a hold of him. Finally, after more than 70 witnesses and theatrics inside and outside the courtroom,

you may now retire and deliberate your verdict. The case went to the jury. How are you feeling? We were thinking it would either be a hung jury or we thought that she would be found guilty. We did not think that there was any way that this jury was going to acquit her. I thought for sure that we were going to walk away with an acquittal. The jury begins their deliberations.

Do you feel the tension? When the jury begins a deliberation, the crowds outside grow even more. Free Karen Reed! No one should ever have to go through a cabin read. John's supporters also turned out. I can imagine the level of stress that that put on the jurors. The days start to tick by. One, two, three, four.

Right. The jury continued deliberating. But by the end of the week was at an impasse. I'd ask you to clear your heads, have lunch, and begin your deliberations again. Jurors took the weekend, but when they came back on Monday... Despite our rigorous efforts, we continue to find ourselves at an impasse. Our perspectives on the evidence are starkly divided. They're hung. They can't come to a conclusion.

Your service is complete. I'm declaring a mistrial in this case. The judge comes back and tells the courtroom that she is declaring a mistrial. We were deflated. We had that hope that this is going to come to an end and we're going to be able to basically move on. And then there's the thought of, oh God, we have to do move on. And then there's the thought of, oh God, we have to do this again. That's over just like that. That switch was thrown. It was done.

It means that the prosecution didn't win. That's a win for the defense to a certain degree. That wasn't the win that we were looking for though. We will not stop fighting. We have no quit. In the days following the trial, Jackson got an unexpected boost. He said five jurors approached his team with a startling revelation about deliberations.

Every one of them have indicated that the jury was unanimous for not guilty on count one, count one being the murder charge, and they were unanimous for not guilty on count three, leaving the scene with injury or death. Karen's team tried to get those two charges thrown out. Their motion was denied and they are appealing. As for the O'Keeffe's, they're regrouping. John's parents are raising his niece and nephew. The family has sued Karen for damages in civil court

as they brace for a retrial. Did the prosecution talk to the family after this mistrial was reached? They said, we'll be ready to do this again. And the family is 100% on board with that? We are indeed, you know, again, no matter what we have to deal with, justice for Johnny. Brian Albert retired from the Boston Police Department more than seven months before the trial. Both Albert and Higgins declined to speak with Dateline.

Through their attorneys, they denied any involvement in killing John O'Keefe. The state police and the district attorney's office also declined to comment. But before the trial, the DA forcefully rejected the conspiracy allegations. There was no fight inside that home. John O'Keefe did not enter the home. These people were not part of a conspiracy and certainly did not commit murder or any crime that night.

As for Trooper Michael Proctor, he has been suspended without pay for his conduct. And Turtle Boy is awaiting trial on witness intimidation and other charges. And Karen? She's hoping her supporters will stick with her at her new trial scheduled for January. So far they've raised more than a half million dollars for her cause. What would you say to Karen Reed? I just wish you would admit what you did. Through your eyes, she has put your family through hell. She has put my family through hell.

She has put other people's families through hell to save herself. Take accountability and do the right thing. For now, John's family and friends are holding onto memories and thinking of what might have been. He should be with his family. Yep, you know, he loved his family, he loved his friends. Johnny just loved being there and being a role model. Do you ever go to his grave?

I don't, yeah. I guess what I do there is between me and him. How much do you miss him? You kind of go your whole life and you hope you make a couple good friends and he was one of them and he was one in a million. And yeah, I miss him. There isn't anybody that knew Johnny O'Keefe that doesn't feel his loss. That's all for this edition of Dateline. doesn't feel his loss. We'll see you again next Friday at 9, 8 Central. I'm Lester Holt. For all of us at NBC News, good night.