The bulk of the testimony during week two of the Karen Read retrial came from a cellphone expert and a key witness who was a close friend of John O’Keefe.
A consequential moment, however, happened without the jury in the room.
The judge allowed two of the defense’s key witnesses to testify later at trial over the strong objections of the prosecution. Still, she had harsh words for Read’s lawyers.
Judge Beverly Cannone said there were “repeated and deliberate” discovery violations by Read’s lawyers and even described the defense’s actions as an “ambush that has been set upon here.”
Ultimately, Cannone allowed the experts from the accident reconstruction company ARCCA to testify. They are expected to tell the jury that the evidence they reviewed does not support the theory that Read’s SUV struck O’Keefe and that O’Keefe’s injuries are not consistent with being struck by a car.
Prosecutors say Read backed up her SUV into O’Keefe and left him for dead during a snowstorm in Canton just after midnight on Jan. 29, 2022. O’Keefe was a Boston police officer and then-boyfriend of Read, now 45.
The ARCCA witnesses’ testimony is central to the defense’s case. A last-ditch effort by Special Prosecutor Hank Brennan to exclude their entire testimony this week didn’t work.
“A defendant‘s right to a fair trial is paramount to everything, so I am going to allow the ARCCA witnesses to testify,” Cannone said on Tuesday.
Norfolk Superior Court Judge Beverly Cannone is presiding over Karen Read’s murder trial. (Pat Greenhouse/Globe Staff)Pat Greenhouse/Globe Staff
Here are the biggest takeaways from the trial this week:
1. Prosecution tried to disqualify key defense witnesses. It didn’t work
The situation with the ARCCA witnesses is unprecedented for one main reason: They were initially hired by the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate whether Read’s SUV could have hit O’Keefe based on the prosecution’s evidence.
“It‘s pretty uncommon for a federal entity to retain a purportedly impartial expert to opine on a state’s death case,” attorney Eric Faddis, who’s followed the case from Colorado, said in an interview. He’s a former prosecutor, and added, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen that.”
Weeks before the trial started, Brennan said in court that the district attorney’s office received notice that the federal investigation by the U.S Attorney’s Office for Massachusetts had ended.
That doesn’t mean the implications of the federal investigation are over, however.
Brennan asked Cannone to exclude the ARCCA witnesses from testifying because the “raw data” from an investigation they produced for the federal government remains protected by the Justice Department.
Therefore, Brennan argued, they should not be allowed to testify to their findings that the evidence doesn’t support Read’s SUV hitting O’Keefe.
Special prosecutor Hank Brennan questions ARCCA crash analyst Daniel Wolfe during the retrial of Karen Read in Norfolk Superior Court in Dedham on Monday. (Pat Greenhouse /The Boston Globe via AP, Pool)AP
“My position has changed that these earlier opinions should not come in because we have no ability to fairly cross-examine,” Brennan said on Tuesday. “It‘s fundamentally unfair.”
Even so, Judge Cannone allowed the experts to testify about their original report from 2024 and about a new report, not expected until May 7, to rebut an expert hired by prosecutors.
2. Jennifer McCabe, a key prosecution witness, testified
Prosecutors have made Read’s statements central to their case. “I hit him, I hit him, I hit him,” some witnesses have testified hearing Read say at the scene.
They also heard other similar statements, “Did I hit him? Could I have hit him?” while she ran around frantically outside 34 Fairview Road and O’Keefe lay in the snow.
McCabe is one of the most significant witnesses in the case since she was with Read and another woman, Kerry Roberts, when they found O’Keefe. McCabe testified she heard the “I hit him” statements.
Jennifer McCabe speaks on the witness stand as Judge Beverly Cannone listens in the background during the Karen Read murder trial in Norfolk Superior Court in Dedham on Wednesday. (Greg Derr/The Patriot Ledger via AP, Pool)
At both trials, McCabe went through a tough cross-examination from defense attorney Alan Jackson. This time around, McCabe appeared less combative and, at one point, Jackson asked if she’d sat through a “fake cross-examination” with Brennan in preparation for the second trial. She said, “No.”
Last trial, McCabe would at times turn to the jury when giving lengthy answers. At one point, she told Jackson, “You’re spinning all of this,” after he remarked there were a lot of “coincidences” in her testimony last year.
Jackson’s line of questioning in both trials drove at how McCabe often communicated with other witnesses in the case before interviews with law enforcement and pointed out inconsistencies in her testimony and statements to law enforcement, grand juries and the last trial.
In a dramatic moment this week, Jackson handed McCabe a transcript of her testimony to the Norfolk County grand jury, which was over 200 pages long. He asked how many times she had told the grand jury about the “I hit him” statements. She said she didn’t know.
“It‘s because you didn’t, did you?” Jackson said.
McCabe’s testimony changed this trial about when she saw Read’s SUV outside the Canton home. At the first trial, she testified to seeing the car outside of 34 Fairview Road up until 12:45 a.m.
Not once, but six times, McCabe looked out the door of 34 Fairview after midnight, she testified during the first trial.
At 12:27 a.m., she texted him, “Here!?” Then at 12:31 a.m., she texted, “Pull behind me,” according to testimony from both trials.
At 12:40 a.m., she texted “hello.” At 12:42 a.m. “Where are you?” and at 12:45 a.m., she texted “Hello.”
In previous testimony, McCabe said she texted O’Keefe when she saw the SUV outside and that each text corresponded with a trip to the front door of 34 Fairview Road. But on Wednesday, she said she couldn’t remember if that were true.
Jackson pressed McCabe on her testimony from the first trial about the last time she saw Read’s SUV and when she noticed it was gone. McCabe said she could not remember the specific times.
“At a bare minimum, you were at the door looking out the window … four times, correct?” Jackson asked this week.
McCabe agreed that was true, but only after a string of questions from Jackson.
After McCabe’s testimony, Read told reporters: “She’s lying … Another witness, another instance of perjury.”
3. O’Keefe’s phone data shows he could’ve entered the house, expert agreed
Ian Wiffin, a digital intelligence expert with Cellebrite, testifies under direct examination by special prosecutor Hank Brennan during Karen Read’s murder retrial in Norfolk Superior Court in Dedham on Monday. (Pat Greenhouse/The Boston Globe via AP, Pool)
Ian Whiffin, a digital intelligence expert with the company Cellebrite, testified that O’Keefe took 36 steps between 12:31 a.m. and 12:32 a.m. for a total of 84 feet on Jan. 29, 2022.
Massachusetts State Police Trooper Nicholas Guarino, a digital forensics expert, determined the distance from a flagpole on the front lawn of 34 Fairview Road to the front door at the house is 72 feet.
As Read’s lawyer, Robert Alessi, pointed out during cross-examination, O’Keefe travelled enough distance to enter the home.
Whiffin’s report indicated the accuracy of the location data declined around 12:26 a.m. One of the reasons he listed for the declining accuracy is that the device could have entered a “building or covered area,” which he agreed could have included the home at 34 Fairview Road.
“Therefore, according to your report, the phone of John O’Keefe could be in the house, correct?” Alessi asked.
After a pause, Whiffin said it could, based on the low-accuracy location data from that time. But he said the highest accuracy location data showed O’Keefe’s phone was outside the entire morning.
Part of Whiffin’s testimony included a PowerPoint presentation with several slides, one of which included a map with large circles that showed the radius of O’Keefe’s location based on his cellphone data.
That slide was not part of the presentation he showed on direct examination, but Read’s lawyer showed it to the jury and questioned the expert about it.
Under cross-examination, Whiffin agreed the circles included a “substantial” portion of the house and meant O’Keefe’s phone could’ve been anywhere within the circles.
A map created by Ian Whiffin, a a digital intelligence expert with the company, Celebrite, using John O’Keefe’s cell phone data. The white circles show areas where O’Keefe’s cell phone could have been on Jan. 29, 2022, according to Whiffin. Pool stream
4. Battery temperature data and the ‘Hos long to die in cold’ Google search.
Brennan urged jurors during opening statements to pay attention to the data presented at trial, especially GPS, health and battery data from O’Keefe’s cellphone.
The battery data presented at trial this week was new, but how much will jurors weigh that testimony in their decision?
Special prosecutor Hank Brennan questions Ian Whiffin, a digital intelligence expert with Celebrite, about the data on John O’Keefe’s iPhone during the retrial of Karen Read in Norfolk Superior Court in Dedham, Mass., Monday April 28, 2025. (Pat Greenhouse/The Boston Globe via AP, Pool)AP
Whiffin analyzed the battery temperature of O’Keefe’s phone and said it dropped to 72 degrees at 12:37 a.m. That would be around roughly six minutes after Read and O’Keefe arrived at 34 Fairview Road, according to testimony at the last trial.
At 1:36 a.m., the battery temperature dropped to 50 degrees, and then hours later, fell to 43 degrees by 6 a.m. By 6:14 a.m., the temperature reached 37 degrees.
That means O’Keefe’s cellphone battery temperature dropped 35 degrees in about 5 hours and 37 minutes.
Whiffin told jurors he conducted a test where he put an iPhone in a freezer, and that the battery dropped about 50 degrees in 15 minutes.
In a second test, Whiffin put the phone outside when the temperature was about 34 degrees, and the battery dropped 31 degrees in less than 15 minutes.
Alessi pointed out that O’Keefe’s phone only dropped 11 degrees in 15 minutes.
But Whiffin defended his testing, saying he didn’t know what condition O’Keefe’s phone was found in — whether it was in a pocket or a case, or something else. The testing proved that ambient temperature would affect a battery, he said.
Jurors also heard about one of the most contested issues in the case: a Google search for “hos long to die in cold,” with “how” misspelled.
When Massachusetts State Police used Cellebrite for an extraction of McCabe’s phone, it showed a 2:27 a.m. timestamp for the “hos long to die in cold” Google search, according to Whiffin.
Whiffen went into great detail during direct examination with Brennan and explained how timestamps were recorded on McCabe’s iPhone based on when she opened the tab, not the time she made the Google search. The expert showed how McCabe had made other Google searches about a youth sports team around 2:27 a.m.
The record for the search appeared as deleted, however, and Whiffin said he didn’t have an explanation for how that happened. He said he was “confident” the search was not deleted by user interaction.
Under questioning from Alessi, Whiffin said Cellebrite had updated its software so that the 2:27 a.m. search no longer appears. Whiffin agreed that a separate cellphone extraction tool used by law enforcement still registers the 2:27 a.m. time stamp on McCabe’s phone.
Whiffin offered lengthy testimony over two days.
5. A review of texts and calls
Both the defense and prosecution used McCabe’s texts and calls in attempts to sway the jury on Friday.
On Friday morning, Jackson’s fiery line of questioning revealed McCabe made another call the morning of Jan. 29, 2022, that she hadn’t previously testified to in front of a state grand jury or in statements to police.
McCabe’s phone records show she made a call at 5:07 a.m. to her sister and Brian Albert‘s wife, Nicole Albert. The call lasted for 38 seconds, Jackson said.
McCabe testified that the call did happen, but that Nicole Albert never picked up the phone and the two did not speak.
McCabe said because it was a “chaotic morning,” the unanswered call to her sister didn’t immediately come to mind when she testified who she communicated with the morning O’Keefe was found, which she said only included Read and two others.
Jackson also sought to undermine McCabe’s credibility by walking the jury through messages sent in a group chat on Feb. 1, 2022. The chat featured Brian and Nicole Albert and Jennifer McCabe’s husband, Matthew McCabe. He also asked about the calls McCabe made to O’Keefe between roughly 12:30 a.m. and 12:50 a.m.
Jennifer McCabe described them as “butt-dials.”
But on Friday, Brennan framed all of the messages and calls as evidence of McCabe’s frantic state of mind.
“Was your sister part of many of these texts as part of your support group?” Brennan asked. McCabe replied yes.
“Did anybody tell you that you shouldn’t rely on your family and have a conversation about what you went through?” Brennan asked. Read’s defense tried to object, but Cannone allowed the question.
“No, no one did,” McCabe said.
On re-direct, Brennan had McCabe read aloud texts she sent describing how the image of O’Keefe lying in the snow was haunting her, and where she expressed grief over his death.
Read, 45, is charged with second-degree murder, manslaughter while operating under the influence and leaving the scene of an accident causing injury or death in connection with O’Keefe’s death.
Read’s lawyers contend that her SUV never struck O’Keefe and that Jennifer McCabe and others conspired to frame Read.
The trial will resume Monday at 9 a.m.
MassLive reporter Irene Rotondo contributed to this article.
