NEED TO KNOW
- The jury foreman in Karen Read’s second murder trial is calling on the FBI to reopen the case in order to “get justice for John O’Keefe”
- The foreman spoke with The Boston Herald and said there are still “so many holes that need to be filled” in the story
- Multiple jury members have spoken out calling for a deeper investigation to track down who may have been responsible for O’Keefe’s Jan. 2022 death
Days after Karen Read was acquitted of the most serious charges she faced in her second murder trial, the jury foreman is speaking out and calling on the FBI to look into the case and “get justice for John O’Keefe.”
In a new interview with The Boston Herald, the foreman – who does not share his name – told the newspaper that he believes there are still “so many holes that need to be filled” in the story and says investigators should not stop looking into the case.
“Now that the FBI knows Karen Read is not a suspect, something happened, and multiple jurors feel that way,” the foreman told the Herald.
The foreman says he’s calling on federal investigators to step in because “no one local should be involved in the investigation,” given the victim’s ties to local police.
“It was lazy police work,” the foreman said about the initial investigation, adding that “we should start some type of investigation of what went on in that house.”
Read, 45, was acquitted last week of killing O’Keefe, her 46-year-old boyfriend, on Jan. 29, 2022, after a high-profile and lengthy second murder trial, PEOPLE previously reported.
O’Keefe, a Boston police officer, was found unresponsive in the snow outside the home of then-Boston police officer Brian Albert in Canton, Mass., the night he and others were together out at Albert’s house. An autopsy later revealed that O’Keefe had died from blunt force trauma and hypothermia.
Read was accused of drunkenly backing into O’Keefe with her SUV and leaving the scene. She was arrested in 2022 but maintained her innocence and instead alleged she was the target of a police cover up, as her defense attorneys alleged that O’Keefe had been attacked by someone at the party with whom he had a long-standing disagreement.
The case proved divisive in the local community and made headlines around the world, leading to intense media coverage. The first trial ended in July 2024 when the judge declared a mistrial following five days of deadlocked jury deliberations.
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Read’s second trial, which ended last week, followed four days of deliberations. Read was found not guilty on charges of second-degree murder, manslaughter while operating under the influence of alcohol and of leaving the scene of bodily injury. She was, however, found guilty of the lesser charge of operating under the influence of alcohol or liquor (OUI) and sentenced after the verdict to one year of probation.
Since the final verdicts were read, multiple jury members have since spoken out about the case and called for it to be reopened in order to find who was truly responsible for O’Keefe’s death.
“We just need to find justice for John,” the foreman told the Herald on Tuesday. “and get his mother some peace.”
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