Jurors weighing the homicide case towards Karen Learn, the Massachusetts woman accused of running down and killing her police officer boyfriend in 2022, ended the week with out a verdict Friday, their fourth day of deliberations after a trial that included dozens of witnesses and allegations of botched detective work.
Learn’s defense lawyers argued that the investigation was flawed, with undisclosed conflicts of curiosity, offensive text messages and a failure to contemplate different suspects. They’ve alleged a conspiracy amongst regulation enforcement officers to cowl up the demise of Boston police officer John O’Keefe by the hands of one in every of their very own and body Learn in his killing.
Whatever the trial’s end result, authorized consultants stated, the proceedings uncovered an often-hidden aspect of regulation enforcement that may be rife with issues.
“One of many legacies of the Karen Learn homicide prosecution is that it places a highlight on a number of the flaws and missteps within the police investigation,” stated Daniel Medwed, a professor of regulation and prison justice at Northeastern College and an skilled on wrongful convictions.
“If there are missteps and sloppiness in a homicide investigation involving the demise of a police officer, what does that counsel concerning the course of in a extra run-of-the-mill case with a civilian sufferer?” he stated.
“This needs to be trigger for concern and a few analysis,” he added.
Stara Roemer, a former Dallas County prosecutor turned prison protection lawyer in Texas, stated the actions of the lead investigator within the case, Massachusetts State Trooper Michael Proctor, mirror an issue with some cops who present little respect for the themes of an investigation.
At trial, Proctor acknowledged making derogatory feedback about Learn and sharing particulars concerning the investigation with family and friends. He testified that the feedback have been unprofessional however didn’t compromise the investigation.
“I’ve by no means seen this type of an look of impropriety,” Roemer stated. “I’m certain that this occurs every single day. The distinction between this case and different instances is that, usually, the detectives going dwelling and speaking to whoever a couple of case — they’re not speaking about it with individuals who know the folks which are concerned within the case and are potential suspects.”
“If I have been a police officer and I noticed this, it’s like, how are you anticipated to exit and do your job?” she added. “How do you belief the police?”
The Massachusetts State Police didn’t reply to a request for remark. A message left on a quantity listed for Proctor was not returned.
A night out and an after-party
Learn and O’Keefe, 46, who had been a Boston police officer for 16 years, had been at a bar with different present and former regulation enforcement officers the night time earlier than he was discovered useless. O’Keefe had deliberate on going to an after-party on the dwelling of a now-retired Boston police sergeant, prosecutors have stated, however by no means made it inside.
O’Keefe was found within the entrance yard of Brian Albert’s dwelling round 6 a.m. on Jan. 29, 2022.
He was later pronounced useless at an area hospital. The medical expert attributed his reason behind demise to blunt power trauma to the top and hypothermia, and Learn was later charged with second-degree homicide, vehicular manslaughter and different crimes. She pleaded not responsible.
Prosecutors have alleged that Learn — drunk and indignant over her troubled relationship with O’Keefe — backed her SUV into her boyfriend whereas dropping him off on the after-party.
At trial, Norfolk County Assistant District Legal professional Adam Lally stated automobile knowledge from Learn’s Lexus confirmed her SUV traveled backward for 60 ft at 24 mph exterior Albert’s dwelling. The SUV’s taillight was damaged, Lally has stated, and items of it have been later discovered exterior Albert’s dwelling.
Forensic testing confirmed that O’Keefe’s hair was on the automobile’s bumper and his DNA was on the taillight, Lally stated.
Lally additionally pointed to Learn’s personal feedback — “I hit him” — that emergency personnel recalled her saying on the morning of Jan. 29.
Read says she was set up
Learn has denied hanging O’Keefe, and her legal professionals have stated she dropped him off and he went inside Albert’s dwelling.
Learn later realized that her boyfriend by no means got here dwelling, her protection staff has stated. Hours after Learn stated she dropped him off, she went to search for him with two different girls and located him in Albert’s entrance yard.
Learn’s protection legal professionals have challenged key items of the prosecution’s bodily proof, together with the damaged taillight. Citing dwelling safety video that confirmed Learn backing into O’Keefe’s automobile as she left to seek for him on the morning of Jan. 29 and discrepancies in Proctor’s police reviews, they recommended the items of taillight discovered exterior Albert’s dwelling might have been planted. (Proctor testified that the discrepancy was a typo.)
And the protection staff has stated that Learn’s feedback from the morning of Jan. 29 have been twisted from a panicked query — “May I’ve hit him?” — into a press release.
Medwed, the Northeastern professor, stated that how these feedback have been used might present affirmation bias amongst authorities.
“She’s upset, she’s speculating,” he stated. “She will be able to’t keep in mind what occurred as a result of she was so inebriated and possibly she’s pondering she hit him.”
“In the event you assume Karen Learn is responsible, then all of those factoids would assist that concept,” he added.
Learn’s legal professionals, who have been permitted to current an alternate concept of O’Keefe’s killing at trial, argued that O’Keefe might have gotten right into a deadly scuffle on the get together with one other regulation enforcement officer — an agent with the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives whom Learn had traded flirtatious texts with, then “ghosted.”
The legal professionals have alleged that those that attended the get together then dumped O’Keefe’s physique exterior and framed Learn to cowl it up. She was “a handy outsider” in regulation enforcement officers’ try to guard one in every of their very own, her legal professionals stated.
Lally has dismissed that declare as “rampant hypothesis.”
Language, relationships under scrutiny
Proctor admitted throughout trial that he used slurs and offensive language to explain Learn in textual content messages to household, pals and supervisors. Throughout testimony, Proctor additionally acknowledged having undisclosed private {and professional} ties to Albert, the previous Boston sergeant who owned the house the place O’Keefe was discovered.
He testified that his feedback and relationships didn’t compromise the investigation.
Proctor testified that he had labored a chilly case investigation with Albert’s brother, an officer with the Canton Police Division, and had gone out consuming with him. And Proctor’s sister was shut pals with Albert’s sister-in-law. The investigator testified that he’d beforehand requested the sister-in-law to babysit his youngsters.
Throughout the investigation, Proctor testified, he interviewed the sister-in-law — who had been out consuming with O’Keefe and Learn earlier than the get together — and admitted discussing that dialog together with his sister. The sister-in-law later provided Proctor a thank-you reward through his sister “when that is throughout,” in line with textual content messages between the siblings that have been introduced as proof in court docket.
In testimony, Proctor stated he by no means requested for a present or acquired one. He denied sharing progress of the murder investigation together with his sister and added that he’d solely made her conscious of “newsworthy stuff.”
Proctor shared particulars of the investigation with a number of highschool pals. In a gaggle chat on the night time of Jan. 29, hours after O’Keefe was discovered useless, one of many pals wrote that the one that owned the home the place O’Keefe’s physique was found “will obtain some s—.”
“Nope,” Proctor responded, referring to Albert. “Home-owner is a Boston cop, too.”
Proctor presents a major problem for the state’s case, stated Roemer, the previous prosecutor turned protection legal professional in Dallas.
“All the pieces about Trooper Proctor was an issue,” she stated. “He shouldn’t have been concerned on this case. He ought to have taken himself out as a result of he knew people who have been witnesses on this case.”
To keep away from a possible battle of curiosity, state police led the investigation into O’Keefe’s demise. However Proctor broken that effort by sharing particulars concerning the case with others, Roemer stated.
“When you’ve got any person like Trooper Proctor going round telling all people on the town intimate particulars of the investigation, you’re compromising it,” Roemer stated. “Even when there’s not a conspiracy, you’re compromising it. He doesn’t know who these individuals are speaking to. However what he does know is that the people who he’s speaking to know the people who reside inside the home the place this occurred.”
Two early-morning calls
At trial, Proctor stated he wasn’t conscious of two telephone calls between Albert and the ATF agent, Brian Higgins, that the protection described as “curious” and probably vital. The calls have been made at 2:22 a.m. on Jan. 29, roughly 4 hours earlier than O’Keefe was discovered useless.
Higgins stated he had no recollection of the calls. Albert stated a one-second name from his telephone to Higgins was unintentional. He stated he didn’t reply a return name moments later that lasted 22 seconds. Proctor stated he wasn’t conscious of the calls as a result of investigators don’t sometimes seize witnesses’ telephones.
Within the chat together with his pals, Proctor stated that Learn, whom he referred to as a “whack job” and recognized utilizing a slur, had “waffled” O’Keefe, or hit him along with her SUV. He added that there could be “severe fees” introduced towards her.
Requested at trial if he’d wrapped up the case earlier than absolutely investigating it, Proctor responded that in these early hours he’d already developed compelling proof displaying Learn had struck O’Keefe along with her automobile.
Medwed stated the revelations about Proctor’s investigation confirmed what he’s usually seen in wrongful convictions — a bent amongst investigators to develop “tunnel imaginative and prescient,” or a resistance to pursuing potential proof or data that doesn’t match their concept of what occurred.
“The way in which that we see the proof is tinged by our expectations and our concept of the case,” he stated. “It appears as if the police did develop a concept fairly early that Karen Learn dedicated the crime. Because the case advanced, there might need been different avenues of investigation that they didn’t pursue.”
