A judge declared a mistrial Monday after jurors deadlocked in the murder trial of Karen Reed, a Massachusetts woman accused of killing her police officer boyfriend in 2022.
The decision came on the fifth day of deliberations after a nine-week trial in a suburban Boston court where Reed’s lawyers argued the killing of John O’Keefe, 46, was a cover-up by law enforcement officials.
Prosecutors had argued that Reed, 44, and O’Keefe had a tumultuous relationship that culminated when O’Keefe, a financial analyst, rammed her boyfriend with her Lexus SUV on Jan. 29, 2022, leaving him dead.
Reed is charged with second-degree murder, vehicular manslaughter while driving while intoxicated and leaving the scene of a fatal accident.
In a memo sent to Norfolk County Superior Court Judge Beverly Cannon on Monday afternoon, the jury foreman said that despite their tough efforts, the six-man, six-woman jury remained disagreed. Some jurors believed the evidence exceeded the standard of proof needed to convict Reed, while others decided the prosecution had not proven its case, according to the memo.
In an earlier memo, jurors told the judge: “Despite our best efforts in carrying out the duties entrusted to us, we find ourselves deeply divided by fundamental differences of opinion and state of mind.”
Following the vacating order, Judge Cannone scheduled a hearing on the status of the case for later this month.
In a statement, the district attorney’s office thanked O’Keefe’s family and said prosecutors intend to retry the case.
Outside court, Reid’s lawyer, Alan Jackson, told reporters that prosecutors had relied on compromised investigators and a compromised investigation.
“We will not stop fighting,” he said.
O’Keefe’s body was found unresponsive that morning and she was later pronounced dead, with the coroner determining the cause of death to be blunt force trauma to the head and hypothermia.
Her lawyers argued that she was entrapped by officers who were trying to cover up an assault O’Keefe allegedly suffered during a gathering at the home where her body was found.
The defense argued that the lead investigator in the case, Massachusetts State Trooper Michael Proctor, manipulated evidence, failed to properly investigate O’Keefe’s death and sent a series of libelous and vulgar messages about Reed to friends, family and superiors.
During closing arguments last Tuesday, Norfolk County Assistant District Attorney Adam Lally acknowledged that Proctor’s text messages were “indefensible” but said they had no impact on the integrity of the prosecutor’s investigation.
Lally dismissed the defense’s claim of a cover-up, calling it “a lot of speculation.”
Reed repeatedly told emergency responders she had hit O’Keefe, and vehicle data showed she backed up her SUV 62 feet at 24 mph near the home of another officer, Brian Albert, after midnight on Jan. 29, Lally said.
Lally said physical evidence supports the claim that he hit her, including a taillight that authorities said was broken after the crash and O’Keefe’s hair and DNA found in the rear of the vehicle.
Larry said no one at the meeting recalled seeing O’Keefe inside Albert’s house.
Defence lawyer Alan Jackson said the taillight was actually broken after Reid had dropped O’Keefe off at her Albert home, driven home and then left in a panic several hours later when she realised her boyfriend had not returned.
The defense presented security camera footage from O’Keefe’s home that showed Reed backing her SUV into her boyfriend’s car while out looking for him. Data from O’Keefe’s iPhone showed he had moved dozens of steps during the time prosecutors say the attack occurred, a distance that suggests he may have been in the basement of Albert’s home, Jackson said.
Reid’s defense team was allowed to present a third-party perpetrator defense — a theory about O’Keefe’s death that differs from the prosecution’s — and suggested that an agent with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, who had sexual interactions with Reid, was a possible suspect in O’Keefe’s death.
Jackson suggested that agent Brian Higgins may have been upset because Reed had ignored him at a bar before the get-together at Albert’s house, where a fight between Higgins and O’Keefe over Reed could have broken out, Jackson said, leading to O’Keefe falling and hitting his head.
Higgins testified that he had never seen O’Keefe inside Albert’s house and said he was not upset about being ignored by Reed.
According to the Associated Press, a forensic technician who investigated law enforcement’s handling of the incident for the Department of Justice testified that O’Keefe’s injuries would have been more severe if he had been hit by a vehicle traveling more than 20 mph.
“There is insufficient evidence in this case to determine what actual events caused the injuries,” expert Andrew Rentschler said, according to the Associated Press.
