Livestream: Crash analyst returns to the stand in Karen Read trial

Livestream via NBC10 Boston.

On the stand:

• Trooper Joseph Paul, Massachusetts State Police

Jurors in the Karen Read murder trial are slated to hear additional testimony Monday from a Massachusetts State Police crash analyst who previously opined that data from Read’s Lexus SUV appears “consistent with a pedestrian strike.”

Read, 44, is accused of backing her car into Boston Police Officer John O’Keefe, her boyfriend of two years, on Jan. 29, 2022. Prosecutors allege she was driving drunk following a night out and intentionally struck O’Keefe while dropping him off at an afterparty in Canton. 

Lawyers for the Mansfield woman have another theory. They’ve suggested O’Keefe walked into the party at 34 Fairview Road and was severely beaten, with Read later framed in a conspiracy intended to protect relatives of the homeowner, a fellow Boston police officer. 

Read’s trial left off Friday with testimony from State Police Trooper Joseph Paul, who works with the agency’s Collision Analysis and Reconstruction Section. Pointing to data that he said could have been logged on Read’s SUV around the time she allegedly struck O’Keefe, Paul told jurors Read appeared to accelerate in reverse before her speed suddenly dropped and her steering wheel jostled slightly. 

“There’s a point in there where it appears to be consistent with a pedestrian strike,” Paul said. He also asserted that O’Keefe’s blunt force injuries and abrasions were consistent with a pedestrian collision. 

Paul further testified that Read’s car had a broken taillight, scratches, a dent, and pieces of glass on the bumper when he inspected the vehicle at the Canton Police Department on Feb. 1, 2022. 

Judge Beverly Cannone has yet to say whether Paul will be allowed to testify about Ring surveillance camera footage from O’Keefe’s driveway. Read’s lawyers have suggested the video — which shows Read’s SUV backing out of the garage and reversing toward O’Keefe’s parked car shortly after 5 a.m. on the 29th — could offer another explanation for the damaged taillight. 

Meanwhile, jurors on Friday also heard from digital forensics expert Jessica Hyde, who unpacked the cellphone data behind witness Jennifer McCabe’s contested Google search for “hos long to die in cold.” Hyde testified that the search was not made at 2:27 a.m. on Jan. 29, 2022, as the defense has suggested. Rather, she said, that early morning timestamp could indicate when the browser tab was first opened. 

Defense attorney David Yannetti asked whether Hyde’s analysis ruled out a search at or before 2:27 a.m.

“There is a very unlikely possibility based on the fact that there is no evidence that the search occurred before that time,” she replied, adding, “I can’t rule out something that doesn’t exist.”