Karen Read has blasted a key murder trial witness who gave damning testimony about how the accused killer found her Boston cop boyfriend dead in the snow, boldly insisting: “She’s lying.”
Read, 45, lashed out at the witness, Jennifer McCabe, soon after her former friend took the stand for a second day on Wednesday to recall the chaotic moment they found John O’Keefe’s frozen body on Jan. 29, 2022.
“Another witness, another instance of perjury,” Read told reporters as she left the court in Dedham, Mass.
McCabe, who was with Read the morning O’Keefe was found, had testified that she’d allegedly overheard her friend telling first responders, “I hit him, I hit him, I hit him” soon after making the grim discovery.
The witness, too, described how Read was allegedly running around and screaming so much that police suggested she sit in a police cruiser.
McCabe told jurors that while she was in the cop car comforting her friend, Read allegedly asked her to Google hypothermia and how long it takes for someone to die in the cold.
“I did not tell Jen to make the Google search,” Read insisted outside court. “I certainly didn’t tell her to make the one of 2:27 [a.m.] either.”
The timing of the Google search has been argued back-and-forth during the trial.
Read’s lawyers have previously argued that the Google search happened hours before O’Keefe was discovered, which could implicate McCabe rather than Read.
McCabe, for her part, testified she made the search at Read’s insistence after they found O’Keefe.
“It’s just more of the same,” Read said as she ripped her ex-friend’s testimony outside court.
“Inconsistencies, every statement’s different, under oath, not under oath, ‘The cops are all wrong.’ This is very similar to what we saw a year ago.”
McCabe also testified for three days at Read’s first trial last year, which ended in a mistrial.
Prosecutors have alleged Read backed into her 46-year-old boyfriend with her Lexus SUV after a night of drinking at a friend’s home in Canton — and then left him to die as a snowstorm approached.
Read’s legal team have argued she has been made a scapegoat in a law enforcement cover-up, suggesting that O’Keefe was killed by someone inside the home after he was dropped off.
Much of the focus Wednesday was McCabe’s cross-examination as Read’s attorney Alan Jackson challenged her recollection of events.
The defense attorney suggested, too that McCabe had coordinated with other witnesses to make sure all their statements matched up — something she denied.
After testifying about apparently overhearing Read tell a first responder “I hit him”, the defense attorney grilled her on why those comments couldn’t be found in earlier police reports or in the 227 pages of her grand jury testimony.
Instead, Jackson said she told the grand jury that she recalled saying to a paramedic: “Did I hit him? Could I have hit him? Is he dead? Is he dead? Is he dead?”
“In point of fact, in your entire grand jury testimony, you never said my client said the words I hit him,” he said.
McCabe hit back, insisting she had told cops what Read said — even if it wasn’t in the reports — and that it wasn’t in the grand jury testimony because she wasn’t asked specifically about it.
She added that there were many conversations with paramedics and police at the scene.
“I hit him. I hit him. I hit him is just as fresh today as it was three years ago,” McCabe said.
With Post wires
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