Crime
As jury deliberations start in Karen Learn’s homicide trial, a number of authorized consultants provided their takeaways and predictions within the sensational case.
It’s a key query within the case that has launched a thousand theories: Will Karen Learn stroll free, or will she find yourself behind bars?
It’s all as much as jurors now.
Deliberations started Tuesday after the prosecution and protection provided up their closing arguments. And following greater than eight weeks of witness testimony, jurors are left with heated voicemails, crude texts, a damaged taillight, and two vastly completely different theories of what occurred to Boston Police Officer John O’Keefe.
On the one hand, there’s the state’s argument that Learn drunkenly and deliberately backed her SUV into O’Keefe — her boyfriend of two years — one snowy morning in Canton. Prosecutors allege the couple’s deteriorating relationship and Learn’s jealousy drove her to kill as she dropped O’Keefe off at a home occasion someday after midnight on Jan. 29, 2022.
Learn’s attorneys have one other concept: That O’Keefe walked into 34 Fairview Highway that morning and was viciously overwhelmed, attacked by the householders’ canine, and left to die in a blizzard. They are saying Learn was framed in a conspiracy meant to guard a well-connected native household, and that regulation enforcement officers have been in on the coverup.
Although the jury’s verdict stays undecided, a number of authorized consultants who spoke with Boston.com forward of closing arguments agreed: For higher or for worse, Learn’s trial has left an enduring impression.
“Your entire case is uncommon from my perspective — John O’Keefe isn’t the standard sufferer and Karen Learn isn’t the standard defendant,” legal professional Katherine Loftus mentioned in an electronic mail interview. She pointed particularly to Learn’s unprecedented media marketing campaign and accusations of a coverup and “lazy police work.”
“It’s actually a narrative that might not be believed if it was written as fiction,” Loftus added. “I anticipate that this trial will trigger divisions and arguments amongst buddies and households for a few years to come back.”
Authorized consultants’ takeaways on the trial
Daniel Medwed, a felony regulation professor at Northeastern College, famous the rising public fascination in Learn’s case.
“It appears to have morphed from largely an area story to at least one with nationwide reverberations,” he mentioned in an electronic mail interview. “I believe the distinctive substances of the case — the loss of life of a police officer, claims of an unlimited regulation enforcement cover-up, the prospect of a lady on trial, and the ample forensic and technological proof — has created an attractive stew that just about everybody needs to devour.”
Learn’s attorneys, he added, have been spectacular of their efficient cross-examination of prosecution witnesses. Loftus likewise praised the protection for his or her “wonderful job of attacking every witness and each bit of proof.” She pointed to an outdated regulation college adage, “a brick isn’t a wall,” and mentioned prosecutors have an uphill battle to maintain their proverbial “wall” from crumbling.
One notable instance of this got here throughout the testimony of the lead Massachusetts State Police investigator, Trooper Michael Proctor, who admitted he “dehumanized” Learn in vulgar texts despatched to buddies, household, and colleagues.
Rosanna Cavallaro, a professor of felony regulation and proof at Suffolk College Regulation College, mentioned these texts — the place Proctor known as Learn a “wack job c**t” and made gentle of her Crohn’s illness — “actually considerably compromised” his testimony.
Whereas prosecutors tried to cushion the blow by introducing Proctor’s texts earlier than the protection might, “the character of the feedback was so stark and I believe shocking to the typical juror that an investigator at a homicide scene or a doable homicide scene could be behaving in that means, or making feedback that had that tone to them,” Cavallaro famous.
What proof will matter most to jurors?
Cavallaro mentioned she was additionally struck by the dispute over the timestamp for witness Jennifer McCabe’s “hos lengthy to die in chilly” Google search.
McCabe instructed jurors she made the search at Learn’s insistence shortly after the ladies discovered O’Keefe’s physique round 6 a.m. on Jan. 29, 2022. Two digital forensics consultants, Jessica Hyde and Ian Whiffin, testified that McCabe’s cellphone information places the “hos lengthy” search at 6:24 a.m.
However a protection knowledgeable, Richard Inexperienced, testified that McCabe made the search “at or earlier than” 2:27 a.m. that day. Hyde and Whiffin each mentioned the sooner timestamp really signifies when McCabe first opened the browser tab.
“The typical juror doesn’t have any perception of their very own,” Cavallaro mentioned. “The entire foundation for knowledgeable testimony is that it’s an issue that’s past the typical juror. That the typical juror has to say, ‘OK, which of those consultants appears to me to know what they’re doing?’”
Medwed, in the meantime, speculated the crash information and geolocation proof may weigh closely on jury deliberations, “each when it comes to the defendant’s location at exact occasions and the power of the know-how to put Officer O’Keefe in particular places.”
And Martin G. Weinberg, a distinguished Boston-based felony protection legal professional, pointed again to Proctor’s texts.
“Jurors mirror the general public,” he famous in an electronic mail interview. Some, he mentioned, might be so offended by the messages “that they may discover it very exhausting to belief that the rest of the case was insulated from the bias and disrespect proven by the State Police lead investigator.”
Weinberg drew similarities to the O.J. Simpson homicide trial, the place jurors balked at Los Angeles Police Det. Mark Fuhrman’s “extremely offensive racial bias.”
“Different jurors will as a substitute predictably concentrate on the a number of forensic consultants that ADA [Adam] Lally pivoted his case round with obvious ability and precision,” Weinberg predicted. “How either side presents its arguments, first the attorneys in court docket after which the jurors within the sacred secrecy of jury deliberations, will decide the result.”
How will Karen Learn’s trial finish?
Both means, Weinberg famous, “I doubt a quick verdict.”
In line with Loftus, the size of the trial performs into the decision-making course of.
“Along with that, the case has change into a lightning rod within the larger group, and it’s exhausting to think about that the identical isn’t taking place within the jury room,” Loftus mentioned. “I anticipate we are going to know moderately rapidly whether or not they’re struggling to come back to a unanimous verdict — both they return swiftly, or alternatively, if the decision takes longer, it usually is a sign that the jurors can’t agree.”
The upcoming Fourth of July vacation may additionally imply jurors are antsy to achieve a choice earlier than later, she famous.
Nonetheless, the jury’s final determination is anybody’s guess.
Medwed, who weighed in earlier than the protection rested its case, mentioned one chance is a break up or “compromise” verdict the place Learn is convicted on some expenses however acquitted on others. Learn has pleaded not responsible to expenses of second-degree homicide, motorized vehicle manslaughter whereas driving below the affect, and leaving the scene of a collision inflicting harm and loss of life.
“I’d be mildly shocked if she’s convicted on all expenses given the holes within the case, however I could also be improper,” Medwed added.
There’s no chance that Learn might be convicted of second-degree homicide at this level, Loftus opined. Whereas she acknowledged there’s a “small likelihood” Learn might be discovered responsible of the manslaughter cost, she mentioned this consequence can also be unlikely.
Given the circumstances, Cavallaro mentioned it appears uncertain all 12 jurors will assume the prosecution’s case is hermetic.
“There’s been a little bit of a facet present with individuals outdoors of the felony course of taking a form of extraordinary curiosity in it and drumming up controversy,” she mentioned of Learn’s case. “However on the finish of the day, I believe there’s a gaggle of 12 individuals in there which can be paying cautious consideration and which can be going to have the ability to work out whether or not or not … the state has met the very excessive burden that they’re required to fulfill.”
What subsequent?
Learn’s subsequent steps will depend upon the decision she receives. She might file an enchantment within the occasion of a conviction, and Loftus famous that the protection staff’s allegations of police misconduct could also be key.
“Provided that there have been no substantiated findings as of but in opposition to any of the concerned police witnesses, it will possible be an uphill battle,” she acknowledged.
Nonetheless, if any expenses or findings outcome from the State Police inner affairs investigation into Proctor or the federal probe of the case, “it possible sparks no less than an inquiry into the idea for an enchantment at a later date,” Loftus mentioned.
A trickier query is whether or not prosecutors would retry Learn’s case if a hung jury leads to a mistrial. Whereas Loftus instructed prosecutors would “most definitely take the ‘second chunk on the apple,’” Medwed was extra uncertain.
“Retrials are notoriously tough even in a boring case as a result of the passage of time makes the proof much less contemporary and recollections much less dependable,” he mentioned. “And this case is way from run of the mill. If new proof emerges, although, that would change issues.”
Whatever the trial’s consequence, Weinberg mentioned the “expert lawyering” from Learn’s attorneys “has hopefully had a constructive impact even past this single trial.”
He pointed to regulation enforcement officers’ “solemn obligation” to observe greatest police practices and keep away from stigmatizing a defendant, including, “The burden of being accused as Ms. Learn has of a profoundly critical offense requires no much less.”
Loftus, in the meantime, described the trial as a “fascinating” window into the division pervasive within the U.S. at the moment.
“Much like the need to select a ‘staff’ in our present political setting, so is the need to struggle for Karen Learn’s guilt or innocence, seemingly with no skill to waiver in between,” she mentioned. “I anticipate that the fervor will ultimately dissipate, however it’s going to take a while earlier than it fully subsides (if ever).”
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