Karen Read’s legal team pushes to combine lawsuits into blockbuster trial
Karen Read wants to see a judge combine a civil rights lawsuit she filed this week with the existing wrongful death case she faces for what would be a blockbuster trial airing out multiple versions of events of what exactly led to the death of her boyfriend, John O'Keefe.
Read's team initially sought to bring "affirmative claims" against 10 defendants , including Massachusetts State Police investigators and civilian witnesses who testified against her, as part of the wrongful death action. But this week, her team opted instead to file a separate lawsuit.
In the suit, they claim what they did throughout Read's two criminal trials: that the investigators and the witnesses, who had connections to law enforcement, conspired to frame her for O'Keefe's death.
Yet both cases could still be combined if Read's defense gets its wish.
"I think the court will want to consider that motion to consolidate," attorney Charles Waters said during a Zoom conference in the wrongful death suit Friday afternoon. "There are compelling arguments on both sides. Ultimately, these are the same facts, the same witnesses, the same documents."
"I can't imagine multiple trials with the same facts and getting multiple results," Waters continued.
The change in approach came after Read's lawyers served a motion on both the existing parties in the civil case — O'Keefe's family and two Canton bars the couple drank at before he died — and the new parties she wanted to bring in.
After serving that motion and receiving oppositions from most of the parties, Read's team determined it "would be best for our client to withdraw the motion and instead file the affirmative claims as a separate lawsuit in Bristol County," attorney Damon Seligson wrote in an email to MassLive.
Legal experts were skeptical of the strategy from the start.
A lawyer for O'Keefe's family suggested he would be on board with combining the cases at least for the purposes of discovery. But he was less sold on the idea of combining them for trial.
"We are tabling whether or not these matters need to be tried together," attorney Marc Diller said. "That will only be known once we have a full understanding of what comes out in discovery."
Diller suggested that Read was not entirely forthcoming in an interrogatory — essentially a questionnaire — served on her. The document "provided no information pointing to any third-party actions or omissions," he said.
"I represent the grieving family. The plaintiffs are eager to learn under oath what information the Read team has regarding who, other than her, is responsible for John O'Keefe's death, based on what they're suggesting they know," he said, adding the family was "eager to learn everything they know."
Read's civil rights lawsuit, filed in Bristol County, names Jennifer and Matthew McCabe, Brian and Nicole Albert, Brian Higgins, Michael Proctor, Brian Tully and Yuriy Bukhenik as defendants.
The McCabes, Alberts and Higgins testified against Read at her first criminal trial, and in the case of Jennifer McCabe, her retrial. Proctor, Bukhenik and Tully all worked on the investigation of the case. Proctor has since been fired for his conduct.
Read claims all eight were part of a conspiracy to frame her for killing O'Keefe, who was found in the snow on Brian Albert's front lawn on Jan. 29, 2022.
Brian Albert is a former member of the Boston Police Department. Brian Higgins is an agent with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
Lawyers for the Alberts, McCabes and Higgins said the claims brought by Read are "entirely false, defamatory, and without merit."
"Our clients categorically deny each and every claim. This lawsuit is nothing more than a continuation of a baseless conspiracy narrative that has caused significant harm to the reputations and lives of innocent people," the lawyers said through a spokesperson.
A status hearing on the wrongful death lawsuit is scheduled for Dec. 19. No hearings have been scheduled on the civil rights lawsuit filed by Read this week.
No trial date has been set in either case.
Karen Read wrongful death lawsuit
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