Our live coverage of the first day of second murder trial of Karen Read has concluded. Please scroll through the posts below to learn about today’s developments.

Karen Read indicated she was happy with the first day of testimony in her second murder trial over the death of her boyfriend, Boston police officer John O’Keefe.

“I feel great. Today went well. We prepped hard. I’m just proud of my team,” Read told reporters after exiting the courthouse. “I feel fortunate to have them, and we’ve got the truth, so we just forge ahead.”

It will likely be well into the trial before Karen Read and her attorneys decide if she will testify, one CNN legal analyst said.

“It is one of the most difficult decisions that a defense attorney will make,” Misty Marris, a defense attorney, said of whether or not she will take the stand in her retrial.

Read is facing second-degree murder and manslaughter charges, among others, in connection to the death of her boyfriend, John O’Keefe. Since her first trial last year, Read has participated in several interviews and a documentary about the case. She opted not to take the stand in front of the first jury.

“The defense attorney is going to wait. They’ll wait until the prosecution puts on their case and then reach a decision about whether or not it would be more beneficial — you know, accept the risk” and have Read testify, Marris said.

“The decision’s never made right from the get-go,” she said, rather, describing it as a “dynamic” decision that plays out as the trial unfolds.

Marris said Read’s defense lawyers can make a recommendation about what they think she should do, but it will ultimately be her choice. However, it could be risky for Read, she said, “because too many doors will open.”

Public statements Read made since the first trial could be used during cross examination, Marris said. Another factor is Read was intoxicated during the incident, which is “going to make it difficult for her to testify with clarity about what happened” after she dropped O’Keefe off, she said.

“They might be better off saying prosecutors didn’t fulfill that burden (of proof) and not taking that risk of her testifying,” Marris said.

The second murder trial of Karen Read began in earnest today with prosecutors and defense attorneys outlining their versions of the case before the commonwealth called its first two witnesses.

The Commonwealth of Massachusetts has alleged Read struck her then-boyfriend, John O’Keefe with her vehicle after dropping him off at a house party and leaving him to die in a snowstorm in January 2022. But Read’s defense team claims she has been framed as part of a vast cover-up orchestrated by law enforcement officers who were inside that home.

Here’s a recap of what happened today:

• Prosecutors emphasize “facts, science and data:” Special prosecutor Hank Brennan pointed to various pieces of data he said will prove Read’s guilt. He said specific location, health and battery data from his phone will illustrate the timing of O’Keefe’s final movements. Brennan also said black box data from Read’s vehicle will show she put her vehicle in neutral, then pressed the gas pedal at 75% acceleration — allegedly striking O’Keefe, who fell backwards, hitting his head and breaking his skull.
• Read’s interviews: The prosecution showed jurors clips from two interviews Read gave after her first trial ended in a hung jury. In one interview, Read appears to entertain the possibility that she did strike O’Keefe with her car. Brennan told the jury they are going to “hear from her own lips in many of her statements, her admissions” on various parts of the case, using Read’s public comments.
• Defense likens investigator’s involvement to “a cancer:” Attorney Alan Jackson presented the opening statement on Read’s behalf, outlining the defense’s allegations of a cover-up and asserting O’Keefe was injured somewhere warm, then moved out into the cold. Jackson also underscored the involvement of former Massachusetts State Police Trooper Michael Proctor, the lead investigator, calling him “a cancer that cannot be cured.” He told the jury the evidence will show Proctor handled much of the key evidence without “reasonable oversight.”
• Paramedic takes the stand: The prosecution’s first witness was Timothy Nuttall, a Canton firefighter and paramedic who responded to the scene where O’Keefe’s body was found lying in the snow. Under direct questioning, he described checking O’Keefe’s body for signs of life, but testified he found none. Nuttall also testified he heard Read state at the scene, “I hit him, I hit him, I hit him.” On cross-examination, Jackson tried to highlight inconsistencies between Nuttall’s testimony today and his statements during the first trial.
• Second witness called: Second witness Kerry Roberts was in the car with Read when they found O’Keefe. She testified that Read called her and told her O’Keefe was dead. When they pulled up to the house where his body was found, Read started shouting, “There he is!” according to Roberts, who testified she initially saw no one. She described Read getting out of the car and running to a “mound of snow” that turned out to be O’Keefe. Roberts will continue testimony tomorrow.

Second witness Kerry Roberts described in her testimony the moment she and Karen Read discovered the body of John O’Keefe.

Roberts was in the car with Read as they approached 34 Fairview Road, the home where O’Keefe’s body was found. From the back seat, Read was screaming: “There he is! There he is! Let me the f**k out of this car,” Roberts recounted.

Read started “kicking the back door” to get out of the car, said Roberts, who told the court she did not see anyone. Roberts said she unlocked the car so Read could get out of the back seat and then described seeing Read run over to “a mound of snow.”

“Once she got to it, you could tell it was a mound of snow that was the length of a body,” Read said.

Judge Beverly Cannone has adjourned Karen Read’s second murder trial for the day.

Court will be back in session tomorrow when the prosecution will continue direct examination of their second witness, Kerry Roberts, who was in the car with Read when they found John O’Keefe’s body.

Kerry Roberts testified that Karen Read called her just before officials found the body of John O’Keefe, and told her that O’Keefe was dead.

“The first thing she said was: ‘Kerry, Kerry, Kerry — John’s dead.’ And then she hung up,” Roberts said.

She said it was about 5 a.m. when Read called her. This was out of the ordinary and not something Read has done before, Roberts testified. Earlier, she said her relationship with Read was “friendly,” and she was closer to O’Keefe and helped him with his adopted kids, who were also his niece and nephew.

Roberts’ said Read was yelling loud enough on the phone that she woke Robert’s husband who was sleeping next to her.

She said she tried to call Read back at some point, but was not able to say exactly when and if Read answered. Asked by the prosecution what was said during the second phone call, Roberts said Read told her, “I think something happened to John, I think he got hit by a plow.”

Read also said, “‘We drank so much I don’t remember anything from last night,’” according to Roberts.

Roberts testified that both she and her husband tried to call O’Keefe, who did not answer. She also said she called the police and two hospitals for any information about accidents the night before.

The prosecution has called Kerry Roberts as its second witness. Roberts was in the car with Karen Read when they found the body of John O’Keefe.

Before calling Roberts to the stand, prosecutors played a clip of an interview Read gave as part of an Investigation Discovery five-part documentary series. (Investigation Discovery, like CNN, is owned by Warner Bros. Discovery.)

In the clip, Read talks about questioning her own memory.

“Did I say, ‘Could I have hit him,’ or was it told to me that I said I hit him,” Read said in the interview. “Did I really say it as many times as law enforcement’s claiming I said it,” she later added.

Canton firefighter and paramedic Timothy Nuttall has completed his testimony – the first by a witness in Karen Read’s second trial for the killing of John O’Keefe.

The paramedic who responded to the house where John O’Keefe was found unresponsive testified on cross examination that the injuries he observed on O’Keefe could be consistent with being punched in the face.

Timothy Nuttall testified earlier, in response to questions from the prosecution, that O’Keefe had a hematoma and small laceration near his right eye.

In response to a series of questions from defense attorney Alan Jackson, Nuttall said those injuries could have been from being hit, “but it could be from others as well.”

Jackson responded, “So that’s what I’m asking you: it could be, in other words, it’s consistent with being punched in the face? Correct?”

“Correct,” Nuttall said.

During a separate line of questioning by Special Prosecutor Hank Brennan during the prosecution’s redirect, Nuttall testified all of O’Keefe’s injuries, except for the one on the back of his head, were on the right side of his body.

Asked if he noticed any hematomas, scratches, or “marks that would be consistent with an altercation” on O’Keefe’s left side, Nuttall answered, “I did not.”

This post has been updated with additional testimony from Nuttall.

Court has resumed after a lunch break, with defense attorney Alan Jackson continuing his cross-examination of firefighter and paramedic Timothy Nuttall.

The court is now taking a lunch break.

On the stand when we come back: The defense will continue its cross-examination of Timothy Nuttall, the Canton firefighter and paramedic who responded to the scene where John O’Keefe’s body was found.

Defense attorney Alan Jackson is now cross-examining Timothy Nuttall, the Canton firefighter and paramedic who responded to the scene where John O’Keefe’s body was found.

Jackson pressed Nuttall on his memory, highlighting inconsistencies in his testimony today versus the testimony he gave during Read’s first trial. Jackson pointed out Nuttall has had three meetings with prosecutors in recent weeks.

Specifically, Jackson noted Nuttall previously testified that, at the scene, he heard Karen Read state, “I hit him, I hit him” – contending the statement was made twice. Today, Nuttall said he heard Read say “I hit him” three times.

“If you testified last year that you heard the phrase twice,” Jackson asked, “now a year goes by and you’re testifying in front of this jury this year you heard it three times, those two statements are inconsistent with one another. Correct?”

“Yes sir,” Nuttall said.

John O’Keefe had scratches on his arm and a bump above his right eye, the paramedic who responded to his unresponsive body testified today.

Timothy Nuttall, a Canton firefighter and paramedic who transported O’Keefe to the hospital, said he noticed he had a “hematoma right above his right eye.” He clarified that O’Keefe had a “pretty good bump” over his eye.

Nuttall said that he also noticed “several scratches” on O’Keefe’s right arm, adding that they were “notable deep.”

Finally, the paramedic said there was “a little bit of dried blood” on the back of O’Keefe’s head, in his hair. Nuttall testified that he did not know how the hematoma, scratches or blood were caused.

The Canton firefighter and paramedic who responded to the scene where John O’Keefe’s body was found testified that he found no signs of life when he arrived at the house.

“He was very cold to the touch,” Timothy Nuttall said on the stand.

Nuttall testified that he arrived to work about two hours early that morning because weather conditions were deteriorating. When the call for an “unresponsive male in a snowbank” came in as he was getting to the station, he said he jumped in the back of the ambulance to help the team on duty.

When they arrived to the house Nuttall said he heard “distance screaming.” It was still dark out, the wind was picking up and the snow was getting heavier, he testified.

“I checked for signs of life — the carotid (artery), the signs of breathing — I found none,” he said. “From there, we had ascertained that there was no signs of life.”

Prosecutors and Karen Read’s defense team both claimed in their opening statements Tuesday that the science and the facts presented at trial will support their case.

Prosecutor Hank Brennan repeatedly stressed cell phone data he contends will map John O’Keefe’s final movements: Location data will outline O’Keefe’s journey to 34 Fairview Road, the home where his body was later found. The phone’s data will also show when his body stopped moving, Brennan said, and when the phone’s battery life dropped precipitously – indicating the moment his body was left lying in the snow.

Additionally, black box data from Read’s vehicle “coincides” with the cellphone data, Brennan said, claiming it would support the prosecution’s allegations Read reversed at a high speed and struck O’Keefe.

Meanwhile, defense attorney Alan Jackson similarly claimed the science is on his client’s side. The defense will call a forensic pathologist who will testify O’Keefe did not suffer from hypothermia, Jackson said:

“His body showed no signs of it, no frostbite, no cold-induced injuries to his organs, no damage based on cold or frost.”

Scientific and medical evidence “will establish that John O’Keefe had to be injured somewhere else, somewhere warmer, and his body had to have been moved out into the cold.”

Additionally, Jackson outlined several pieces of evidence at the heart of the defense’s allegations of a police cover-up, specifically taking aim at the purported actions of fellow officer Brian Albert, whose family owned the home where O’Keefe’s body was found.

The defense has suggested the family’s large dog was responsible for some of O’Keefe’s injuries – but the family rehomed the pet shortly after the victim’s death. The family also sold the home at 34 Fairview Road, Jackson said, and Albert, along with another police officer present that night, both got rid of their phones.

“Dog rehomed, phones destroyed, house sold,” Jackson said. “You’ll learn that all these things happened shortly after the incident where John O’Keefe was found unresponsive and dying in Brian Albert’s front lawn.”

Court has resumed, and the Commonwealth has called its first witness: Timothy Nuttall, a Canton firefighter and paramedic who responded to the scene where John O’Keefe’s body was found on January 29, 2022.

Defense attorney Alan Jackson has completed his opening statement. The court is now in recess.

Karen Read’s defense says it will show that Michael Proctor, the lead investigator into John O’Keefe’s death, handled evidence without “reasonable oversight.” The defense team is expected to argue police engaged in a cover-up.

“Michael Proctor was alone with all of the critical evidence in this case,” defense attorney Alan Jackson said in his opening statement. “Alone with Karen Read’s phone, alone with John’s phone, alone with video footage, alone with taillight material,” among others things.

Proctor was the one who secured and reported evidence, Jackson said. “And he did it without any reasonable oversight,” he added.

Jackson said the jury will hear about how Proctor “intentionally lied and fabricated evidence,” including about when he had access to Read’s car.

“He lied because he did not want it revealed that he had access to that vehicle and he had access to that taillight before any taillight fragments were found at 34 Fairview,” he said.

He told the jury that the defense will present evidence that shows during the first search of the house, police did not find any pieces of taillight around O’Keefe. He said after Proctor took possession of the car, about 46 pieces of “bright red taillight” started “magically showing up” in places already searched by officers.

One witness, Jennifer McCabe, Googled “hos (sic) long to die in cold” the night of John O’Keefe’s death, defense attorney Alan Jackson told jurors Tuesday.

The Google search – which the defense contends should have read “how long to die in cold” – is another pivotal piece of evidence for the defense claims that Karen Read has been framed.

McCabe, who was with O’Keefe and Read that fateful night, acknowledged the Google search during her testimony in the first trial. But she insisted she made the search after the discovery of O’Keefe’s body lying in the snow.

The defense has said McCabe searched the phrase hours earlier and the evidence will show it was later deleted.

“Why is there a search on her phone?” Jackson asked Tuesday. “Why is it logged at 2:27 a.m. when the commonwealth claims that she first learned of John’s death and where his body was hours later, at 6 a.m.?”