Court video, updates: Longtime friends of John O’Keefe take stand in Karen Read murder trial

DEDHAM, Mass. — Jennifer McCabe retook the stand on Wednesday morning in the Karen Read murder trial after she faced an intense, four-hour round of questioning from the defense on Tuesday. Then Kerry Roberts and Laura Sullivan, friends of O’Keefe, testified.

Jennifer McCabe’s sister owned the Fairview Road home in Canton that John O’Keefe’s body was found outside of in January 2022. And she was inside when prosecutors allege Read, 44, of Mansfield, struck O’Keefe with her SUV. Read is charged with second-degree murder in his death.

McCabe’s intense and confrontational testimony ended shortly before noon. Kerry Roberts, a longtime friend of O’Keefe, took the stand next.

• WATCH LIVE: Streaming coverage of Wednesday’s witness testimony begins at 9 a.m.
• Also streaming on Facebook, X, and YouTube
• Live court updates from Boston 25′s Ted Daniel

PLAY-BY-PLAY FROM DAY 16 OF TESTIMONY:

3:40 p.m.

• Laura Sullivan is excused. Judge calls it for the day. No trial tomorrow. Court will be back in session for a full day on Friday.

3:20 p.m.

• Laura Sullivan’s sister Etta is called to the stand. She was on the Aruba trip and the one Read thought O’Keefe kissed.
• Etta says Read told her to “f herself” and she says she replied, “f you too.” That was their first meeting.

3:15 p.m.

• Laura Sullivan says Read texted her about O’Keefe’s death: “We were both at the same party. I didn’t go in. I went home”

3:00 p.m.

• Laura Sullivan testifies that Read thought O’Keefe had kissed Sullivan’s sister in Aruba and got angry.
• Read apologized to Laura Sullivan and offered to pay for some of her sister’s room.

2:30 p.m.

• Kerry Roberts is excused. The judge calls Laura Sullivan from Pembroke to the stand. She was in Aruba with O’Keefe Read and others on New Year’s in 2022.
• Laura Sullivan says Karen Read took the bill on the first dinner they had in Aruba

2:00 p.m.

• Court Resumes with judge’s direct examination of Kerry Roberts.
• Kerry Roberts describes seeing O’Keefe in the hospital after he was pronounced: She says both of his eyes were swollen and she noticed scratches on his right arm.
• Kerry Roberts says she allowed police to search her phone. She says the police took her phone and Jennifer McCabe’s phone.

1:00 p.m.

• Judge calls lunch. ADA Lally will continue to question Kerry Roberts when the jury returns.

12:50 p.m.

• Kerry Roberts: “His phone was under him and it was grass.”

12:45 p.m.

• Kerry Roberts: “He had blood coming out his nose and his mouth, his left eye looked like a golf ball, I was concentrating on doing chest compressions.”

12:40 p.m.

• Kerry Roberts: “She ran over to a mound of snow” “at some point I realized it was the shape of a body” “She lifted up his shirt and started to lay with him.”
• Kerry Roberts is in tears as she watches police dashcam video of the 1st officer arriving at 34 Fairview.

12:15 p.m.

• Kerry Roberts uses green laser pointer to show where she says she saw damage to Read’s taillight and a piece of metal sticking out

12:05 p.m.

• Kerry Roberts describes JO as a “neat freak”. “You did not wear footwear in the house,” she says.
• ADA Lally asking Kerry Roberts about JO’s ability to access his Ring cameras from his phone. This is when Roberts, JM, and KR arrived at JO’s home

12:00 p.m.

• Kerry Roberts testified she called police, hospitals, and JO trying to figure out what happened to him.
• Kerry Roberts says she saw, “there was a piece missing” from Read’s taillight in JM’s driveway before they left that morning to JO’s house and later 34 Fairview.

11:50 a.m.

• Roberts: “Karen called me at 5 in the morning” on the 29th. Kerry Roberts says it was the second call. She says she missed the first one.
• Kerry Roberts: “I answered the phone and she said ‘John’s dead. Kerry, Kerry Kerry,’ and then she hung up. In a later call Kerry Roberts says that Read told her JO may have been hit by a plow.

11:45 a.m.

• Roberts says O’Keefe was “one of her closest friends.”

11:40 a.m.

• Court returns after morning recess.
• Judge tells Jury that they can’t hold statements about harassment against Read and jury should consider it only for determining “witnesses credibility”
• Kerry Roberts is called to the stand next. She’s friends with Jennifer McCabe and was in the SUV with KR and JM when KR said she saw JO’s body and jumped out.

11 a.m.

• Jen McCabe’s testimony ends with a heated exchange with AJ. Judge sends the jury out and talks privately with the lawyers.

10:55 a.m.

• On redirect, AJ asks why the “I hit him (3x)” did not come up under oath until a 2023 proceeding. (federal grand jury) On harassment AJ says “I’m sure it sucks to be harassed, I’m sure it does”.

10:45 a.m.

• JM tells ADA Lally that people have been “harassing” her family since 4/23. JM: “I’m a witness that’s all I am, I’m not on trial and people are terrorizing me”. She says Trooper Proctor alerted her that a rolling rally was coming to her home and Lally said police put up “pole cameras” to record the rally

10:30 a.m.

• Statement Kerry Roberts made that JM says “horrified” her She says KR said JO really loved “Amy” and KR was “just a babysitter with benefits

10:20 a.m.

• JM tells ADA Lally KR initially told her she and JO got in a fight and she left him at the Waterfall, then she says KR told her JO was “dead, a plow hit him”.
• She says the story changed several times

10:15 a.m.

• JM says she turned off her phone when she went to bed and left her search tabs open.
• She tells ADA Lally when she made the “hos long to die in cold search “I went to the tab that was already open”.
• When asked if she made the search at 2:27 am she answers “I did not, no”

10:10 a.m.

• JM tells ADA Lally she saw the vehicle (KR’s SUV) in one place “and when I came back it was further up”
• ADA Lally: Were you looking for a body outside the home? (paraphrased)
• JM: “Absolutely not”

10:05 a.m.

• AJ ends on the “hos long to die in cold” Google search. Lally on redirect now

10 a.m.

• AJ: “Did you delete that search because you knew you would be implicated?
• JM: “I did not delete that search… I would have never left... (JO) out to die in the cold”

9:55 a.m.

• On the “hos long to die in cold” google search, JM initially says AJ put it out on social media.
• AJ says he doesn’t have social media. She then says “Turtleboy”
• McCabe tells Jackson her Google search occurred after JO’s body was found at the request of KR.
• AJ: Why did you do it again Ms. McCabe? (re: google search)
• JM: “I can’t answer that beyond my hands were frozen and shaking and she was screaming at me.”
• AJ accuses JM of searching twice to “cover your tracks”
• JM: “Again, absolutely not.”

9:50 a.m.

• Jen McCabe tells AJ she doesn’t remember what she typed in the “hos long to die in cold” search.
• AJ: “You literally are saying under oath you don’t remember?”
• McCabe asks AJ to show her the “hos long to die in cold” google search.

9:40 a.m.

• JM confirms she traded calls with MSP Trooper Michael Proctor on 1/29, 1/30. and 1/31

9:30 a.m.

• McCabe testified she went to the home of MSP investigator Michael Proctor in September 2023.
• She says she went there to see his wife and says “Michael Proctor wasn’t home”.
• She says they met to talk about the “Vicious harassment”
• JM: “I’m a state witness who’s being tortured because of lives” “It’s a social media witch-hunt”

9:25 a.m.

• AJ says JM called Lt. Lank at 9 a.m. on 1/29/22 (morning body found) to tell him something important.
• Yesterday JM testified that KR said ‘I hit him (3x) AJ refers to Lank’s notes of conversation
• AJ: “What you said is that I hope my client ‘didn’t hit him’, correct?
• JM: No

9:20 a.m.

• Alan Jackson (AJ) begins by asking Jennifer McCabe (JM) to review records from a “group chat”.
• The judge allows the document in.

8:50 a.m.

• Jen McCabe is expected to be back on the stand this morning in the Karen Read murder trial. The defense will continue to cross-examine her.

PREVIOUS STORY:

Jen McCabe is the prosecution’s witness that googled “how long to die in cold.”

The defense has long suggested she’s part of a cover-up.

She testified to helping Karen Read find John O’Keefe in the snow and said Read implicated herself in O’Keefe’s death. She also testified, “I’m not sure if it’s in this document but I can tell you today with 100 percent clarity, she said I hit him, I hit him. I hit him.”

Defense attorney Alan Jackson said McCabe never testified to that at the Grand Jury in April 2022.

“It’s probably the most powerful part of your testimony, ma’am,” said Jackson.

McCabe responded, “And I will never forget it.”

“Ms. McCabe, the truth of this matter is that you manufactured this new story for this jury because you think it helps you out,” Jackson said.

“Absolutely, not,” McCabe answered.

Jackson also accused McCabe of plotting with family and friends before police interviews.

McCabe addressed a text she sent to a friend when police interviewed them at their home.

Jackson said, “The very next text is from you telling the group ‘She’s telling him everything!!’”

“Yes,” answered McCabe. She continued, “We never worked together to come up with a story, we have the facts and the everything was a comment about your client.”

DAY 15 OF TESTIMONY:

Like others, McCabe said she saw Read’s Lexus pull up to 34 Fairview Road – and later move to the area where O’Keefe’s body would later be found.

But McCabe said she never saw a body.

Calls from McCabe’s cell phone were also a point of contention.

Jackson said records show she made several that were deleted from her phone.

“You do know that your phone was forensically analyzed and those calls were in the deleted file folder,” Jackson asked.

McCabe answered, “I have seen that but there were 20 calls all in the group that were all deleted so cherry-picking a few makes it look a different way.” She continued, “I never deleted any calls when I willingly handed my phone over.”

Jackson said McCabe deleted 6 calls she had made to John O’Keefe’s phone.

McCabe previously testified that those could have been butt dials.

Read, 44, of Mansfield, has been charged with second-degree murder, among other charges, in the death of O’Keefe, her boyfriend.

The defense’s theory is that O’Keefe was actually beaten up inside the Albert home and dragged outside in a snowstorm and that the Albert family is at the center of an effort to frame Read.

Prosecutors claim Read drunkenly struck O’Keefe with her luxury Lexus SUV while making a three-point after dropping him off at the home. They allege she fled the scene and left him to die.

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