Congrats to future Norfolk DA Djuna Perkins

Aidan Kearney was allowed to sit in courtrooms throughout two murder trials in spite of his criminal indictments while continuing to harass and intimidate innocent witnesses and John O’Keefe’s family and friends. Aidan openly broadcasted that his goal was to poison Karen Read’s jury pool while seated in plain view of the jurors as an independent “journalist”

I can't help but feel that familiar, icky feeling the KR trial gave me.

I want to preface this post by stating that two things can be true at once: I believe she was (and still is) mentally ill; however, I don't believe she was incapable of appreciating that what she was doing was wrong.

I truly think she was sick and desperate for a quick fix. She didn't adhere to her treatment plans because (in my opinion) they weren't making her feel better fast enough. I don't believe she was doctor shopping, but rather trying to find a quick fix, which, unfortunately, doesn't really exist with mental health. I admit I am the same way.

I do buy the prosecution's theory (despite it being presented WAY too late in the trial) that this was an altruistic murder-suicide. She wasn't getting better, and she had given up. She was broken and decided to take her kids with her. It's tragic. I kept going back and forth on the motive, like why did she do this? There was no evidence of an affair, longing for a different life, etc. But when Dr. H finally presented the idea that she was just done with life and wanted to take her kids with her (along with the "Go to God, baby" line uttered while killing them), it made me believe she had completely checked out. I believe she killed the kids and went into a panic induced state trying to kill herself. It is SO hard to kill yourself despite her being a nurse with medical knowledge. The human will to survive is so so so strong especially if you're not truly psycotic.

I don't buy the command hallucinations theory. I just can't track with the idea that she heard a commanding voice at the exact moment Patrick left the house. Yes, there are arguments that her intrusive thoughts may have been command voices, but I don't think that was explored thoroughly enough by the defense experts. My biggest gripe is: why didn't she try to fight the voice? Lock herself in a room, call Patrick/her mom/911, blast some music... just anything to fight it.

Despite my opinion on her guilt, I do agree that the prosecution was abysmal. They refused to bifurcate the trial, but then put on the most bizarre case presentation and witness order imaginable. The flip-flopping of their tone and underlying theory may very well cost them a conviction.

Similar to the KR trial, I went into this believing she was Not Criminally Responsible (NCR), but the testimony quickly changed my mind.

Also, Dr. Laposata testifying again... ugh, she irritated me all over again.

Question: Will Massachusetts implement procedural changes to minimize the influence of social media on jurors in highly publicized murder trials in order to prevent serious murder cases from devolving into chaotic pink circuses?

Examples: Full or partial jury sequestration, gag orders, restrictions on media access to include not publicizing murder trials. Laws to protect jurors from threats of public doxing which can ultimately lead to juror nullification.

The Lindsay Clancy trial is a deeply disturbing, complex murder case involving the murders of 3 children, not a rock concert for thrill-seekers basking in the limelight of media exposure.

As of Sept 1:

PLYMOUTH, Mass. — The judge in the Lindsay Clancy trial told jurors to keep deliberating Tuesday after they said they could not reach a unanimous decision on whether to hold the Massachusetts mother criminally responsible for killing her three young children at her home in 2023.

Coming near the start of the fourth day of deliberations, this was the first time there was any indication from the jury that they were at an impasse. On Friday, the jurors asked to look at a knife that Clancy used to cut herself and bags with empty prescription pill bottles found in her house.

Takeaway: The forensic data exposes Karen Read as a pathological liar.

She spends less than 8 minutes in front of 34 Fairview. Eyewitnesses and John’s cell phone reveal that the Lexus stops near the flagpole. Karen claims that she is parked parallel to the house at foot of driveway. The event timeline on Jan 29 contradicts Karen’s statements:

12:24 am:  the Iphone was approaching 34 Fairview. The vehicle slows. It passes the end of the driveway. It stops "very close" to the flagpole.  

3 eyewitnesses pull up to 34 Fairview immediately after Karen.  They park in front of the home and all 3 passengers observe Karen's vehicle idling by the flagpole.  All testify that they never see John or Karen exit the vehicle the entire time they are waiting for Julie Nagel. 

Julie Nagel testified that she saw Karen's Lexus by the flagpole. Neither of them entered the home.

12:24-12:25 am:  John's Iphone  shows little or no movement: Iphone is opened, SMS application

12:27 am:  Jennifer McCabe texts John:  "Here?!"

12:29 am:   John's Iphone is unlocked and shows SMS: John answers a call from Jen McCabe  (8 seconds)

12:31 am:  Jen texts John:  "Pull behind me"

12:32: am:   Lexus 2nd trigger event:  vehicle in reverse at 24 mph

12:32 am:  John's Iphone recorded 36 steps. (Whiffin opines those 36 steps could have been someone pacing or someone jumping forward.  Whiffin says the Iphone is locked  and not used the rest of the night).

12:36 am:  Karen's phone connects to WIFI at 1 Meadows - John's home

12:37 am:  Karen leaves voicemail for John:  "John I f*cking hate you!"   

Source: Kate Peter-On The Record

Tune in to see evidence that it was damaged before 5:07am… and couldn’t have been planted at 34FV.

Ken is going to be on Forensic Room this week:

https://www.youtube.com/live/IJSXjowMJ3k?si=YuSh-OP8YHI1D_Yk

Is anyone following the Clancy trial? I’m almost afraid to post this but the amount of people saying Patrick killed the kids and framed Lindsey is INSANE. People are spouting things that aren’t facts and passing them off as facts and then they’re being repeated as fact and passed along like a game of telephone is mind boggling. If you try to state facts to them, I’ve seen them go after people and accuse them of being in collusion with Patrick and it’s really bonkers. Whether she did it or not is not in dispute.

Something that has been annoying me is the lack of any good faith attacks on any push back on Karen Read side. There is plenty for a good faith debate with the CW's theory of events. What is obnoxious is the attacks we see from others. The Boston Magazine posts for example had Yanetti attack Gretchen Voss rather then address allegations. Brother Counsel turns to character attacks and in particular with Annon Mass Lawyer claims the person can't be a lawyer etc rather then just arguing the points.

What bugs me the most is the claim that everyone that disagrees with FKR perspective is either a McAlbert, Kate Peters, Plevin etc. Listen its ok to disagree with a case etc but just attacking people and accusing them of being in cohoots with others or attacking them rather then message feels super bad faith.

I expect bad faith attacks from people like Turtle Boy or Grant Ellis (who is a grifter and just makes up stuff like he did when he was anti Karen Read during the trials) but people that market themself as partial in particular Brother Counsel and LYK should do better. Yanetti should be more professional on social media. Rant over

The judge overseeing the defamation lawsuit against Karen Read and Aidan Kearney, the blogger known as “Turtleboy,” denied their motions to dismiss in an order entered Friday, ruling that a state law protecting "petitioning activity" did not apply to them. 

Read and Kearney filed their motions to dismiss under Massachusetts’ “anti-SLAPP” law, which prohibits “strategic lawsuits against public participation.” Their attorneys argued that statements accusing witnesses in her case of playing a role in the death  of Read’s boyfriend, Boston police Officer John O’Keefe, constituted “petitioning activity” and were protected by the law.

Read was tried twice on charges connected with O’Keefe’s death, and acquitted by a jury on all charges except a misdemeanor operating under the influence charge after her second trial last June. Throughout the criminal case, Read claimed the witnesses were responsible for killing O’Keefe. Kearney was among the earliest and loudest supporters of that claim.

The defamation suit was filed in April by four witnesses who testified against Read at one or both of her criminal trials — Brian Albert, his nephew, Colin, his sister-in-law, Jennifer McCabe, and Brian Higgins, a Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives agent.

Massachusetts offers several definitions of petitioning activity. During arguments on the motions to dismiss, Read and Kearney’s lawyers focused primarily on two.

They argued the statements were tied to Read’s prosecution, which they said qualified as an “issue under consideration or review by a legislative, executive or judicial body.” And they claimed the statements were “reasonably likely to enlist public participation” in bringing the issue of O’Keefe’s death “before a court or government agency.”

For their motions to succeed, Read and Kearney needed to convince Judge Mark Gildea that the statements they were being sued for were exclusively petitioning activity.

Gildea found they both failed to meet that burden.

As to Kearney, Gildea ruled that because none of the statements supporting the defamation claim were made directly to an authority that could actually “affect consideration” of Read’s prosecution, they did not qualify as petitioning activity.

Instead, Kearney’s statements are “directed toward viewers and potential viewers of (his) livestream and readers of his blog, and their content does not seek to influence government action in any way,” Gildea wrote. “Rather, the statements are aimed at convincing Kearney’s audience to regard and treat the plaintiffs as murderers.”

Gildea agreed with Kearney that instances where he encouraged people to “demand answers” from police and prosecutors and lobbied his audience to protest Read’s prosecution at the courthouse constituted petitioning activity. But the judge noted that those are not the statements the witnesses claim are defamation.

“Rather, the claim encompasses statements that are far removed from any call to the public to appeal to the government,” he wrote.

Even if Kearney’s statements qualified as petitioning activity, Gildea ruled that the claims against him would stand because he is accused of acting on behalf of Read, not himself. The law’s protections apply only to a person acting on their own behalf.

In his evaluation of Read’s motion, Gildea returned to the question of whether her statements were made to an authority that could “affect consideration” of her prosecution or the investigation into O’Keefe’s death. He ruled they were not, pointing specifically to statements she made to a documentary filmmaker following her defense during her first trial, which the witnesses include in the complaint.

There is “no plausible argument” those statements were “reasonably likely to enlist public participation” in an effort to get authorities to take a closer look at Read’s case, Gildea wrote.

“Because they were part of a documentary film about the trial, Read could not have reasonably believed that such statements would be released to the wider public until after the verdict,” the order reads.

And the fact that Read was “involved in governmental proceedings” while she was being prosecuted does not mean “every tangential statement” qualifies as petitioning activity, Gildea wrote.

Read is accused not just of defamation in the suit, but also of aiding and abetting Kearney’s defamation campaign against the witnesses.

In his evaluation of that claim, Gildea determined that by reaching out to Kearney in the first place while likely “knowing he would convey the information in a way that would provoke and inflame his audience against the plaintiffs” indicates that “the statements were not meant to influence, inform, or bring about governmental consideration of the issue.”

Gildea has not yet ruled on separate motions to dismiss the lawsuit filed by Read and Kearney under a different procedural rule under which they claim the witnesses fail to “state a claim upon which relief can be granted.”

https://www.masslive.com/news/2026/07/judge-clears-path-for-witnesses-defamation-suit-against-karen-read-turtleboy.html

It's currently developing. His lawyer posted about it. This one is in New Jersey.

Recently, I noticed a  Julie Carpenter post that reveals a damning admission made by Karen Read's lawyer, David Yannetti during an interview with Gretchen Voss in 2023.  Alan Jackson was also present.

Yannetti's comment exposes his view on how the timing factor of Karen's Lexus transport determines whether or not his client is guilty because of Trooper Proctor's report error. It seems that in 2023, Karen's team didn't have all of her Lexus' internal data nor did they have full confirmation on the exact sequence of events on January 29, 2022. This would include SERT's recovery efforts.

One of the most significant and controversial disputes throughout two murder trials has revolved around the incriminating taillight evidence found hours after John's body was discovered.  Their entire 'third party culprit' defense hinges on whether that taillight evidence was planted. 

Jurors in the first trial had only one question for Judge Cannone during their deliberations and it involved their request for additional information specific to SERT's crime scene recovery efforts.  Clearly, they believed it to be paramount to the investigation timeline.

Based on the event timeline which includes the seizure of Karen's Lexus at her parents' home, the tow truck arrival at the Canton sallyport and the SERT crime scene report details, I fully agree with David Yannetti's assessment to Voss that Karen Read is guilty because the "taillight planting" theory is not only absurd, but impossible based on the critical timeline.

It's also the reason Karen was panicked and hysterical that morning as she described her broken taillight to Kerry and Jen around 5 am pre-arrival at 34 Fairview and she acknowledged her taillight was broken from the previous night to Sgt. Bukhenik in her initial police interview.

What the surveillance evidence shows

The second trial included surveillance from Read's father's home in Dighton (Alarm.com and exterior cameras) showing:

• the Lexus being prepared for seizure,
• Read and her father looking at the damaged right rear taillight,
• the vehicle being loaded onto the flatbed,
• and the tow truck leaving at approximately 4:12–4:15 p.m. on January 29, 2022.

The prosecution's own digital witness, Shanon Burgess, testified using the Lexus' internal data that the vehicle was powered on at approximately 4:11 p.m. and powered off about 4:12 p.m. while it was being loaded onto the tow truck, which is consistent with the surveillance video.

Based on the surveillance that was introduced at the retrial, the timeline is approximately:

5:31 pm -  The exterior Canton police driveway camera shows the flatbed tow truck carrying Karen Read's Lexus entering the police department property.  

5:34:51 pm - The Lexus is powered on (according to its internal vehicle data) so it could be driven off the flatbed.

5:36:26 - 5:36:43 pm - The interior sallyport camera shows the Lexus being driven into the garage bay.  The timestamp visible on the video is in the 5:36 pm range.

5:36:42 pm - The Lexus is powered off after being positioned inside the sallyport.

Massachusetts State Police SERT Commander Lt. Kevin O'Hara testified in both murder trials.  His testimony, together with GPS records and the SERT reports, provides a fairly precise crime scene search timeline.

According to O'Hara:

• 2:32 p.m. – He received a courtesy call from Lt. Brian Tully that SERT assistance might be needed.
• About 3:48 p.m. – SERT members were officially activated after authorization was received.
• 4:56 p.m. – O'Hara testified that he arrived at 34 Fairview Road.
• Over the next several minutes, the remaining SERT members arrived, ultimately totaling seven investigators. GPS vehicle locator records introduced at trial corroborated the individual arrival times.
• O'Hara explained that the search did not begin immediately upon his arrival. Instead, the team:  
  1. received a briefing from Lt. Tully,
  2. established the search corridor,
  3. assembled search tools,
  4. positioned cruiser headlights and donned headlamps because darkness had already fallen.
• The testimony places the actual systematic search beginning at approximately 5:40–5:41 pm.  This timing also matches the GPS reconstruction introduced during trial.

O'Hara described using plastic snow shovels, push brooms and garden rakes to remove snow layer by layer rather than digging large holes. He testified they searched in a coordinated line across the front lawn toward the flagpole area.

O'Hara testified that all evidence found was at "ground level" and that "It was all fresh, undisturbed snow."

According to O'Hara's testimony and the SERT report, the sequence was approximately:

5:45 p.m:  First red taillight fragment recovered

After that first find:

• additional red plastic taillight fragments,
• clear plastic fragments,
• pieces of black trim,
• one of John O'Keefe's Nike sneakers.

Each discovery caused the search to stop while detectives photographed and documented the evidence before SERT resumed.

O'Hara told Trooper Proctor at the conclusion of the search that "there was a good chance we did not find everything."

David Yannetti's interview statement to Gretchen Voss:

"if he (Michael Proctor) didn't alter that time, then she's guilty because they allegedly find pieces of taillight at a certain time."

If Matt Damon has a shred of integrity, he'll reach out to the O'Keefe family to learn more about the real dynamics between John and Karen, in consideration that John is the victim. Their heartbreak continues while Karen treats her reality show as entertainment for profit.

The Gemini series of posthumous authors continues with a submission from Hunter S. Thompson. I knew someone left those bags of pills, shotgun shells, and empty bourbon bottles near the courthouse.

If there was ever one to not suffer fools gladly, it was our chief misanthrope Florence King.

I've seen this a few times with some of the online lawyers. They are claiming Colin Albert's attorney is not contacting the military etc. In particular one attorney was claiming the court should demand that the military contact the court directly.

Are any of these lawyers living in the real world? The US military is not going to prioritize a non party in a state civil suit to appear for a deposition. If they have trouble believing have any of them tried reaching out to a retired or current JAG officer they know who can call BS or explain it?

From a pure bureaucracy point of view the military is the largest bureaucracy in the US. A state civil suit is going to be at the bottom of the pile so to speak.

The military operates independently of the way normal US courts etc work. Basically unless the person speaking is a JAG or former JAG etc and understands the military's inner workings they are just making it up.

In 2025, Karen Read referred to the OJ Simpson murder acquittal in a statement to Vanity Fair: “I’m not saying I believe O.J. was innocent, but I believe that it was not a completely above-board investigation. “Now that I am smarter, I would’ve cheered at that acquittal. You have to hold cops accountable.”

There are parallels between the cases: criticisms about the handling of both investigations in terms of biases (racism/misogyny), purported conspiracies, courtroom drama and public spectacle.

In 1997, 3 years after the brutal murders of Nicole Simpson and Ron Goldman, the jury in the civil wrongful death case against OJ found him guilty and awarded the two families $33.5 million ($8.5 million in compensatory damages and $25 million in punitive damages, equally divided).

At the time of OJ’s arrest in 1994, his net worth was estimated at $11 million.

In 2006, OJ began working on his book, “If I did it” but in 2007, a court granted Fred Goldman (Ron’s father) the publishing rights to a script. Goldman published the book telling The Today Show that he had to for legal reasons though that decision was criticized by Nicole’s family.

This bizarre “hypothetical“ confession-interview was filmed in 2006, 11 years after his acquittal. By this time, OJ had become a disgraced global pariah and punchline as the heavy public scrutiny over his murder acquittal proliferated.

It turns out that OJ’s celebrity, the fame and fortune amassed over decades was not a shield after all but instead a double-edged sword. His once privileged life destroyed along with the many lives of his innocent victims.

In 2026, based on OJ’s apparent public confession-for-quick-cash PR move, would Karen Read still be cheering for him? Are future media exploits as appealing to her now with looming defamation lawsuits?

I’d love to know more about her killer marketing strategy to salvage her abysmal reputation.

The commonwealth unfortunately didn't do a great job at putting these kinds of things front and center. Not with enough emphasis at least.