Expert clash in Karen Read retrial gives jurors key role in murder case

When there’s a battle of the specialists, it’s the jury members who hold the successful hand, in line with a retired choose in Massachusetts.

And that’s the case in Karen Learn’s information Spar in regards to the prices of homicide on the loss of life of her former pal, the 46-year-old police officer of Boston, John O’Keefe.

Learn, 45, is accused of hitting him with an SUV and leaving a home get together on 34 FairView Highway in Canton, Massachusetts, whereas he died of a cranium fracture and hypothermia throughout a snowstorm on January 29, 2022.

Cross analysis exposes the gaps within the crash checks of Protection Knowledgeable for Karen Learn

Homicide reporter Karen Learn speaks with reporters after leaving the courthouse in Dedham, Massachusetts on Friday, June 6, 2025. Her protection is anticipated to relaxation the case subsequent week. (Richard Beetham for Fox Information Digital)

Dr. Daniel Wolfe, a director of the ARCCA crash reconstruction firm, testified that the outcomes of numerous checks he has carried out to attempt to reconstruct the alleged crash that O’Keeefe killed with “inconsistent” outcomes.

However particular public prosecutor Hank Brennan tore within the validity of his strategies throughout cross-hearing, and famous that he used a dummy that was significantly smaller than O

An necessary second in his testimony didn’t come whereas discussing his findings, however when Brennan requested him for one thing that was learn in a video clip that was beforehand performed within the trial, in line with Jack Lu, a retired choose of the Massachusetts Superior Courtroom and Boston Legislation Professor.

Karen learn Denis {that a} confrontation between the deceased boyfriend and ATF agent notes

Dr. Daniel Wolfe, reconstruction specialist, explains the development of a rear gentle assembly of a Lexus SUV from 2021 throughout the Karen Learn homicide course of in Norfolk Superior Courtroom in Dedham, Massachusetts, Friday 6 June 2025. (Mark Stockwell/The Solar Chronicle by way of AP, Pool)

“There may be the speculation of Brennan – the rear gentle ‘Saves’ [O’Keefe] On the nostril, “he instructed Fox Information Digital.” Learn Glass from chosen from [his] Nostril, and [his] Nostril Bled – From her video assertion. “

Brennan performed video of one in all Wolfe’s accidents reconstructions that confirmed plastic fragments flying away from the automobile after influencing the arm of a crash dummy.

“When the rear gentle is shattered and spreads by way of the air, does it have the potential to interrupt an individual on his nostril?” Requested Brennan.

“I feel that might be unlikely,” Wolfe replied.

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Particular public prosecutor Hank Brennan asks Sgt. Yuri Bukhenik, not proven, from the Massachusetts State Police, throughout the homicide function voltage of Karen Learn in Norfolk Superior Courtroom, Monday 12 Might 2025, in Dedham, Mass. (Pat Greenhouse/The Boston Globe Through AP, Pool)

As a part of the persecution case, Brennan performed a Clip of Learn and instructed an interviewer that she took a “piece of glass” out of the nostril of O’Keefe and that it began to bleed.

Wolfe’s job was to discredit the nuclear accusation of the prosecutor that learn in O’Keefe along with her 2021 Lexus LX 570 SUV and left him on the bottom in a snowstorm on January 29, 2022.

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“Jury’s have giant statement forces and a basic depth of expertise that’s hardly ever seen in American life,” Lu instructed Fox Information Digital. “Partly due to what number of jury members there are. I predict that the jury will conclude that the conclusions of each accident reconstructionists in a jury courtroom will not be worthy of jury.”

Dr. Judson Welcher, an knowledgeable within the discipline of reconstruction, testifies throughout the homicide function voltage of Karen learn in Norfolk Superior Courtroom, Thursday 29 Might 2025, in Dedham, Mass. (Mark Stockwell/AP Picture, Pool)

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The protection additionally desires to sow cheap doubt within the crash specialists of the prosecutor, Dr. Judson Welcher and Shanon Burgess from an organization known as Aperture.

Welcher testified final week that he believes “[O’Keefe’s injuries are] In accordance with being affected by a lexus and in addition contacting a tough floor, equivalent to frozen soil. “Wolfe found that the accidents weren’t constant when they’re stacked in opposition to the harm to Learn’s SUV, in addition to the harm to O’Keefe’s clothes – of which public prosecutors declare that they had fragments of plastic plastic plastic.

LU mentioned that he expects jury directions to file a remark that the specialists don’t determine the information – jury members.

Karen studying and John O’Keefe posing for an undated picture. (Karen Learn)

“Jury’s will not be within the least grown by specialists,” he mentioned. “Quite the opposite, they see them with skepticism.”

Particularly “rented weapons,” he added.

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Jury members will take a look at the case as an entire, however though LU mentioned he believes that Brennan was scored a victory on the day, the protection has a substantial benefit.

“The protection doesn’t must show something; they only must put cheap doubt,” says Mark Beererow, a lawyer in New York Metropolis who represents Canton Blogger and reads Ally Aidan Kearney. “However in the midst of just a few hours, Dr. Wolfe was significantly doubted by dismantling crucial precept of prosecution – by way of a number of scientific research and efficient movies that he supported for his opinion that the harm to the rear gentle was not according to the collision claimed by the persecution.”

The Learn workforce is anticipated to relaxation their enterprise subsequent week. She may face life in jail if she was convicted of the highest prices.