Karen Read attorney Alan Jackson fires back at Hank Brennan for comments on jury's verdict
Karen Read's lead attorney, Alan Jackson, has accused special prosecutor Hank Brennan of ethical violations for attacking the jury's verdict.
Read was found not guilty of second-degree murder and manslaughter last week in the 2022 death of her boyfriend, Boston police officer John O'Keefe.
Brennan waited five days to comment on the verdict. In a statement Monday, he said he was disappointed with it and that there was "only one person" responsible for O'Keefe's death. Brennan also condemned "witness abuse" in the case.
Jackson fired back Tuesday with a long response, saying Brennan, "in an egregious breach of prosecutorial ethics, has tried to publicly shame and discredit that very jury."
"For him to attempt to supplant his personal views for that of the jury is a desperate attempt to save face in the wake of a unanimous rejection of the prosecution's case," Jackson said in a statement.
"The only job of an ethical prosecutor is to seek the truth in a just and fair manner. The Commonwealth fell wildly short of that responsibility. Theirs was not an effort to find justice for John O'Keefe. Rather, it was a personal vendetta against Karen Read by DA Michael Morrissey and his hand-picked prosecutors-and it cost the people of Norfolk County millions."
Morrissey has said very little about the verdict. In a brief statement to WBZ-TV he would only say "The jury has spoken."
Read is now facing a civil wrongful death lawsuit that was filed by O'Keefe's family in Plymouth Superior Court in August 2024.
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