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00:00Is this what you boarded in?
00:02Yes.
00:03They only make about four decent suits for women that don't make you look like Hillary Rodham Clinton,
00:08and I've got them all, so now I'm on to dresses.
00:13All set? Everyone's phones off?
00:15Walking out.
00:19So, did you drive your car into John?
00:23I did not drive my car into John.
00:25Didn't reverse it.
00:27Didn't reverse it.
00:30Did not hit John with my car.
00:32Is there any chance this was an accident?
00:34There is zero chance this was an accident.
00:37There was zero chance John was hit by a vehicle.
00:44You're tired of it, you've spent so much time.
00:46No, I just, no, I'm not tired of it.
00:48I hate answering it because I feel like I'm being so scrutinized.
00:52Like, did she blink three times or twice?
00:54And did she like smirk or look to the right or down and up and left and whatever?
00:58And like, it just feels so fake.
01:00Even though it's true, I'd rather like explain everything else.
01:04And like, I did not hit John with my car.
01:06Like, I can't make it sincere enough.
01:10I hate saying it.
01:11Karen Reed is accused of hitting her boyfriend, a Boston police officer, with a car and leaving him to die in the snow.
01:17Was this an accident?
01:19What do they have against me? Why am I in shackles right now?
01:22And then everything shifted from horrible accident to second degree murder.
01:28For law enforcement, this is one of their own.
01:31And that raises the stakes.
01:33Prosecutors have alleged she was angry, she had been drinking, she killed him, and then she tried to cover it up.
01:40Objection.
01:41I'll let him have that.
01:42There's a whole other side of the story.
01:44Karen Reed was framed.
01:46There is corruption in this city.
01:50Phones being destroyed.
01:52People being killed.
01:53People being killed.
01:54People being killed.
01:55People being killed.
01:56People being killed.
01:57People being killed.
01:58People being killed.
01:59Corruption in this city.
02:02Phones being destroyed.
02:04Butt dials at two in the morning.
02:06The most shocking part is that not a single witness actually saw this happen.
02:12I am a witness and these people are terrorizing me.
02:16She's a babe, no ass.
02:18No nudes so far.
02:19No nudes so far.
02:22Wow.
02:23Are you kidding me, dude?
02:25There were gasps.
02:26There was head shaking.
02:27All eyes are on us now.
02:28People are following it.
02:32In all my years of practice, this is the first time I've ever shown up to a court hearing
02:36where there are people cheering for a defendant.
02:41This is not about justice.
02:43This is about spectacle.
02:45A quite literal murder carnival.
02:47It's as though she was the happiest murder defendant in America,
02:51walking a red carpet on the way into her own murder trial.
02:54Are we not at a trial for a police officer?
02:57Elle magazine wants to feature me.
02:59Can I do it?
03:00Damn right you should do it.
03:03Karen Reed is the face of this case,
03:06but this is so much bigger than her.
03:10This so-called justice system here in Massachusetts
03:14will never, ever, ever be the same after this.
03:28My name is Karen Reed.
03:31I'm 44 years old.
03:33I've never been married.
03:35I don't have any kids.
03:37I don't, like, envision myself having, like, the white picket fence bullshit.
03:43I've worked for a lot of people.
03:46I've worked for a lot of people.
03:48I've worked for a lot of people.
03:51I've worked for a lot of people.
03:54Bullshit.
03:56I've worked in a financial services company for decades.
04:00I was a lecturer at Bentley University.
04:04Now I'm being charged with murdering a Boston police officer.
04:08I could face life for a second degree, life in prison.
04:14So as we approach trial, I'm moving to a hotel in Boston.
04:20It's weird, like, you're used to working all day
04:23and having a life and a career and a routine,
04:26and then you don't have it, and now you're fighting for your life.
04:31I still can't believe what's happening to me.
04:37We make this prayer in Christ our Lord.
04:40Amen.
04:41Very nice.
04:43I've lived most of my life in Massachusetts.
04:48I have an older brother and a younger sister, so I'm in the middle.
04:54Definitely the most outgoing.
04:58I've always been very reactionary and I guess a little maybe impetuous.
05:03I'm private, but I'm open, so when I'm with people, I'll tell them anything.
05:12Welcome back to Lifestyles of the Almost Rich and Famous,
05:16and I am your host, the lovely, the beautiful Karen Reed.
05:21When she was a young girl, she would do plays constantly
05:24when we'd have, like, if we had cookouts or the pool.
05:28We're going to watch Mom. Everything you do is grand.
05:31She always brought a lot of fun.
05:34Yeah, she's got a great personality, she really does.
05:37This is my daughter.
05:39I was dean of business at Bentley University.
05:42I did that up until the time this event transpired.
05:51My father loved his job so much, and there's an old phrase,
05:55you love your job, you never work a day in your life, and that's my dad.
05:58And, I mean, my dad's going to be 76, I've just turned 44,
06:02and I need my dad more than ever.
06:05John died two years, two months ago,
06:09and we dated maybe just shy of two years.
06:13OK, first thing you need is the graham crackers.
06:15You reach into the bag, reach into the bag, and you pull out seven graham crackers.
06:19OK, also inside the bag, if you look, there is some chocolate bars.
06:23Johnny and I grew up together on the same street.
06:26We met when we were four.
06:29I went to the same nursery school.
06:31And we went to school, elementary, junior high, high school, all the way through.
06:35Stayed close friends during college.
06:37Stayed close friends when I was moving around the country for my job.
06:41He would visit me wherever I lived.
06:44So I knew Johnny for over 40 years.
06:47Johnny was from a family of five, his mom and dad,
06:50and then his older sister, Kristen,
06:52and he had a little brother, a younger brother, Paul.
06:55Then he moved to New York.
06:58And then he had a little brother, Paul.
07:01Anyone that knew Johnny would say the same things.
07:04Johnny was relentlessly generous.
07:07He was funny.
07:08All we ever did our entire lives growing up was laugh.
07:11He was loyal.
07:12He was very, very tight with his family, really protective of his family.
07:18Johnny and I started dating when I was around 25 years old.
07:21We had a big love that evolved into a friendship that lasted a really long time.
07:26Johnny was a really sweet, dependable, reliable, honest guy.
07:33Very loyal.
07:35Selfless.
07:39I met Johnny in college.
07:41We went to Northeastern together.
07:43He was always going to be a cop.
07:44He went to school for criminal justice.
07:46His grandfather was a cop, and he just, it was always, it was never a question.
07:51From what I hear on the job, he was a great cop, you know.
07:54This is Johnny's badge number, 2490.
07:56His grandfather, also John O'Keefe, his badge number was 490.
08:02So when he became a police officer, he requested that badge number, but they had retired it.
08:07So he added a two.
08:08So, in honor of Johnny, we wear his badge number everywhere, his friends and his family,
08:14just to try to help keep his legacy alive.
08:21It was nine years prior to John's death.
08:23Johnny's sister, Kristen, we call her Christy.
08:27Christy was diagnosed with a brain tumor.
08:31She fought hard, but she passed fairly quickly.
08:36I think it was five months.
08:37She was young.
08:40Johnny was devastated.
08:41They were very close.
08:43And then his brother-in-law died of a heart attack,
08:46almost two months to the day that Christy died, like one day off.
08:50And they had two children.
08:53Johnny entered a very difficult situation.
08:55He has this niece and nephew that just lost both of their parents.
08:58And he said, I'm taking the kids.
09:01He said, I think my sister would like it.
09:02I think she'd be proud of me.
09:04I'm super close to the kids anyway, and I want to do this.
09:07There was never a question for Johnny.
09:09It was never like, oh, should I or could I?
09:11I have all this other stuff.
09:12It was just, just did it.
09:14He assumed that role rather seamlessly.
09:16They needed somebody to be there, and he was there.
09:20He loved them with all of his heart.
09:22I think that's what guided all of his decisions.
09:24I think he, you know, if he had kids of his own,
09:27he would have been an unbelievable dad.
09:32I met John in February of 2004 through a friend of his from high school.
09:38And we maybe dated another couple weeks after that.
09:41And then I went to work that spring in Ireland, just temporarily.
09:45But because of that, I stopped seeing him.
09:48And I just lost touch.
09:53Then at the beginning of the pandemic,
09:56I had been home working remote for about two weeks
09:59and was going stir crazy.
10:01And I hadn't been on Facebook in years.
10:06Johnny's a single dad, and, you know, everything's going in lockdown.
10:09So from what I understand, he put out a Facebook message
10:12to several ex-girlfriends, and she was the one to reply.
10:18I didn't answer right away because it was like a picture of him with a bunch of kids.
10:22I thought, oh, he looks like he's married and he's got kids.
10:24And then I ended up reaching back out to him,
10:27and then I learned the backstory of where these kids came from.
10:31I knew John for only two years, but I knew a lot about him.
10:34He loved life.
10:36There were things he liked to do.
10:38There were things that made him laugh and smile,
10:40and songs he liked, and Red Sox games he liked to tune into.
10:45And John loved his sister more than anyone or anything.
10:49And he loved those kids.
10:52I didn't really aspire to have kids,
10:57but I cared about John's kids.
11:01Prior to Johnny's death, everybody in Johnny's orbit liked Karen.
11:06There wasn't a single person that said, you know, I don't think he should be dating her.
11:10Everything we could see looked like a happy relationship.
11:15But the key to that is that you don't know what happens behind closed doors.
11:21John, I f***ing hate you!
11:24You're a f***ing pervert!
11:34Why are you doing this film?
11:37This is my version of testifying.
11:39Doing this film is my testimony.
11:42This has happened to me.
11:44And, you know, I know what happened between John and me.
11:48I know what happened in our life and time spent together before then.
11:54I know the events of that morning.
11:55I know what I said.
11:56I know what I didn't say.
11:58And I haven't been able to say it.
12:02It's incredibly frustrating.
12:05I want to say what happened exactly as it happened.
12:16John and I argued the morning of the 28th, Friday morning.
12:22Most of our arguments were about his kids and that he thought I spoiled them.
12:29And I thought it was a real low blow of him to get on me for that.
12:32But it pissed me off.
12:34And I said, I got to get out of here for a minute.
12:37So I came down here to my house in Mansfield.
12:40Sat in the other room and I worked remote all day.
12:43Forecasters anticipate Boston will experience one of the biggest single day snow totals on record.
12:49That day, everyone was getting ready for this massive blizzard.
12:52But I realized I didn't want to be shut in here with the snow.
12:56I'd rather be up there with John and the kids and doing something fun.
13:01And we always had fun on the weekends.
13:04And then at about 6 p.m., either I called my father or he called me.
13:09And he said, how was your day? What are you up to?
13:11And I told him what happened.
13:13And I hated complaining about John to my parents because they liked him a lot.
13:18And my father just said gently to me, Karen, why don't you stay home tonight?
13:22It's going to snow.
13:25But I didn't.
13:26I didn't.
13:28Dad, if I'd listened to you, none of this would have happened.
13:34I think I left here in Mansfield at 8.30 and I met John at a bar in Canton, C.F. McCarthy's at 9.
13:41And then we went to the waterfall right next door to McCarthy's.
13:45At the waterfall, it was Jen and Matt McCabe.
13:48We saw Jen McCabe all the time.
13:50She coached John's niece's basketball team, so we saw her two or three times a week.
13:55And then Brian and Nicole Albert and Brian Higgins were there.
14:02The previous weekend, I had met the Alberts for the first time with the McCabes.
14:07And then it was getting late and John said Jen just invited us to the Alberts.
14:14And my attitude always when I was out and about with John was, you know, he's got to blow off steam.
14:19It suits us all if John blows off a little steam because he always has steam.
14:24So I said, sure, let's go.
14:26This can't last forever, right?
14:30Everybody was some level of intoxication.
14:32That was what we did in Canton.
14:34Everybody drank.
14:36They leave these bars.
14:37They're in their little enclaves where they can all go drunk driving on the way home and nobody gets pulled over.
14:44So I'm driving and John got on the phone with Jen and he's telling me it's 34 Fairview.
14:52And we arrive at 34 Fairview.
14:54It didn't look like there was any soiree going on.
14:59It didn't look inviting.
15:01The outside was dark and I didn't see any familiar looking vehicles.
15:06And I said, John, can you make sure we're welcome?
15:10And he said, John, can you make sure we're welcome?
15:13He said, I'll run in.
15:16So when John got out of the car at Brian Alberts' house, he took my full vodka soda, which is sitting in the cup holder.
15:25And he walked up the driveway and John always walked, kind of skipped and walked at the same time.
15:30He was always in a rush.
15:31And I saw him reach the breezeway door, which is the second, the side front door.
15:38And he opened the door and went to walk in.
15:41And I waited probably a minute and he doesn't come.
15:46And it only took like two or three minutes for me to be irritated.
15:51So I started, I called him.
15:53I didn't want to wait for him to respond to a text and he didn't answer.
15:57I said, you've got to be kidding me.
15:59What are you doing?
16:01You just went in and I'm sitting here.
16:04Either we're welcome or we're not, but it shouldn't take you five minutes to, to determine that.
16:11And then about 10 minutes went by and I, I left and I was not happy.
16:26And little did I know, John was not getting my phone calls.
16:31And then that was it.
16:32The last I ever talked to him was when he got out of my car at Brian Albert's house.
16:39Boston police officer, John O'Keefe, a veteran with the department,
16:43was found face up in the snow on Saturday morning during the blizzard on Fairview Road in Canton around 6 a.m.
16:50He later died.
16:51What happened that morning was on a local news program.
16:56And on the morning of January 29th, 2022,
17:01I got a call from another close friend saying that Johnny had died.
17:07Johnny? Like, what? Not Johnny. Like, how?
17:11Like, you know, he was stunned. Just stunned. Devastated.
17:19It was just an utter disbelief.
17:21Utter disbelief.
17:22I was screaming, like, please God, not John O'Keefe, not John.
17:27All I could think about was the children and Paul and Peg and Papa.
17:35I still can barely believe it.
17:37They don't make people like that anymore, you know?
17:45Sorry, I can't.
17:52My daughter is, um, was one of Johnny's godchildren.
17:57And so my oldest, I had to tell her.
18:00So that was rough. That was rough.
18:04We had no detail.
18:06At that point, I immediately called Johnny's brother, Paul,
18:09and Paul started to fill in some of the gaps.
18:13I think the very first explanation that I got was that
18:18Karen had hit John with her car.
18:21When Brennan called me, we both went, wait, what?
18:25Did she do this? Did she do this?
18:28She's like, I don't know yet, but it looks that way.
18:32Everybody liked Karen.
18:34And everything changed on the morning of January 29th.
18:42Karen Reed left the courthouse after posting bail,
18:45charged with hitting her boyfriend, Boston Police Officer John O'Keefe,
18:49with her SUV early Saturday morning.
18:52Suddenly, John's death was on the 6 o'clock local news.
18:57They had somebody saying that Karen Reed hit John O'Keefe in her SUV.
19:04The wounds that he suffered were commensurate with what EMT said
19:10was being hit by a blunt object, the vehicle.
19:14Everything you're seeing there is presenting as a motor vehicle accident,
19:20that she hit him and left him to die in the snow.
19:29Just three days after John died, they arrested me here,
19:33literally where I'm sitting right now.
19:35This is my dining room at my house.
19:37They had already seized my vehicle and my cell phone,
19:41so I knew I was a suspect.
19:43And I wasn't hearing about anybody else being a suspect,
19:47so I knew they were coming for me.
19:53It was about 7.45 at night.
19:55I was on the phone, and I heard a bunch of car doors shut at the same time.
20:00And I looked out, and they brought about a dozen cops.
20:04It was like a SWAT team.
20:05I was being charged with vehicular manslaughter.
20:08My wife gets all the notifications on her phone for everything,
20:12and I heard her kind of gasp.
20:15And I said, what?
20:16And she goes, your sister's been arrested.
20:19It felt so surreal to see your sister paraded in front of cameras in handcuffs
20:24and being made to look like the worst person on the planet.
20:30I remember it all perfectly.
20:31I remember being in jail.
20:32I remember the hearing, the cameras, my parents.
20:35And I remember the statement of the case.
20:37I was just dying to know, what do they have against me?
20:41Why am I in shackles right now?
20:44I felt embarrassed for the position I was in,
20:48and I wanted to get back to my home base and figure out what the hell was going on.
20:55When I first heard an explanation about how Jenny died,
20:58it was that Karen Reid was driving drunk,
21:02and she had hit John with her car,
21:05and she was arrested.
21:08And I thought, well, that's a simple open-shut case.
21:12I figured she was remorseful.
21:14I figured she must be devastated at what she had done,
21:18like she was just going to fall on the sword.
21:20And it was not that complicated.
21:25I had no idea just how out of hand things were about to get,
21:28and still had no idea just how big things were going to be.
21:36When John was killed,
21:38David Yannetti is the first and only call-in aide for local council.
21:44So he's been with me from the beginning.
21:46Then he went on TV.
21:48This is a defensible case.
21:50I will tell you that my client has no criminal intent.
21:54She loved this man.
21:56I've had my own firm since 1999.
21:59Before that, I was a lawyer.
22:02I've had my own firm since 1999.
22:05Before that, I was an assistant district attorney, a prosecutor,
22:09and I spent the majority of my time there
22:12investigating and prosecuting homicides.
22:15When I heard that an officer was killed,
22:19I knew that there's a heightened sense of importance
22:24that is given to those cases.
22:26Even if prosecutors thought that they had a case
22:29that they couldn't prove,
22:31they wouldn't let this one go.
22:33It became clear that this was going to require a lot of work,
22:39so somebody else would have to be brought in.
22:42So I called Harvard's Criminal Justice Institute,
22:45and a professor got on the call,
22:48and he said, you need to look into the Kevin Spacey case,
22:52look into the attorneys, maybe you can get some help there.
22:55And long story longer, that's how I found Alan Jackson and Liza Little.
23:00This is just a royal flight 288 from Los Angeles.
23:03Your bags are being offloaded on carousel number 7.
23:06Welcome to Boston.
23:14My name is Alan Jackson. I'm an attorney in Los Angeles.
23:17I got an e-mail, and the subject line of the e-mail
23:20was something along the lines of murder of a Boston cop.
23:25And I took one look at one of the autopsy photos of John O'Keefe,
23:31and I saw his arm, and I said, are you kidding me?
23:35He was hit by a car?
23:37And I actually remember Alan calling me into his office
23:39and saying, Liza, you've got to read this, you'll like this case.
23:42Let's call Karen Reid.
23:45The motions that we really need to put some effort into
23:48have not been done yet.
23:49You know, police misconduct and...
23:51Alan and I have been working together for almost nine years now.
23:56We've both worked on the Spacey case,
23:59and we've done several big murder trials in Los Angeles.
24:04I do want to see the war room, though. Can you meet us down there?
24:07Right.
24:12Nice, nice, nice, nice. This is perfect.
24:15Where are our boxes?
24:17Oh, shit.
24:20Oh, my God.
24:21Karen, do me a favour?
24:23No.
24:24And just unpack all this shit and make sense of it.
24:27That's why I said no.
24:29We're right on the cusp of the trial.
24:31It's going to start in a couple of weeks.
24:33Most of this is just for the courtroom, right?
24:36So there's three sets of witnesses.
24:37No, no, no, no.
24:38I'm on trial for my life right now,
24:40but I'm not afraid of whatever emotional or mental hurdles
24:47I know I will be facing in the next two months.
24:50I know I'm innocent.
24:52I like it.
24:54Welcome home.
24:57In this case, everybody has an opinion, and it's binary.
25:01Either you think that she did it,
25:04backed into her boyfriend with her SUV,
25:07and there he lay, and tragically he passed away.
25:10Or you think, wait a minute.
25:13Something doesn't sound right about that.
25:15None of the evidence fits.
25:17Evidence was missed, bizarrely missed, and then later found.
25:22There are two conflicting, contrasting theories,
25:27and the public doesn't have an answer yet.
25:31So it's sort of a classic whodunit.
25:37We need to look deeper at what actually happened to John O'Keefe.
25:46The day after this happened, the day after John was killed,
25:50I was confused and bewildered.
25:53There was no memory of anything happening,
25:56but I had been drinking, and it was late.
25:59I never heard from him again, ever, obviously.
26:03So I thought, could I have run him over?
26:06Did he try to get me as I was leaving, and I didn't know it?
26:09I mean, I've always got the music blasting. It's snowing.
26:11I got the wipers going, the heater blasting.
26:13I come and hit the back of my car, and I hit him in the knee,
26:17and he was drunk and passed out and asphyxiated or something.
26:21And then when I hired David Yannetti, I asked him those questions
26:25the night of January 29th.
26:27Like, David, what if, I don't know, what if I ran his foot over?
26:30Or what if I clipped him in the knee and he passed out
26:35or went to care for himself and he threw up or passed out?
26:40And David said, yeah, then you have some element of culpability.
26:43So that's how I thought about things for about three days.
26:49I'm looking at a police report that says that she accidentally
26:53hit her boyfriend with a car, and based on what she said,
26:57my thoughts were, this is a district court motor vehicle homicide case.
27:02Stakes are much lower, but of course the case became much more than that after that.
27:11Hundreds gathering to pay tribute to Boston Police Officer John O'Keefe.
27:15His wake held Sunday at St. Francis of Assisi Church in Braintree.
27:21I remember it was a really raw day. It was cold out.
27:25And the media was kind of swirling again everywhere.
27:28And hundreds of people were waiting in line patiently.
27:33The pallbearers, we were situated on the inside of the front door
27:38of St. Francis Church, and we could hear a bagpipe.
27:42And we were instructed that the hearse had arrived.
27:46And when we opened the large church doors and saw, it wasn't one bagpipe.
27:53It was 50 bagpipers and hundreds of police in formation.
28:03And there were a handful of local Boston news outlets covering the memorial.
28:08Support was overwhelming.
28:12It was surreal carrying his casket.
28:15Just to think that years earlier he was in my wedding party,
28:19and here was this friend of 40 years that was always there.
28:27He was just always there. He was part of my life.
28:32I was just trying to process how that...
28:37It just changed.
28:43Part of the highway was closed down, like the city shut down for John O'Keefe's funeral.
28:48That's an honor, you know? I remember being touched by that,
28:51being on the highway and just the highway being cleared for him.
28:55And then people were lined up with their hands on their hearts, wearing blue ribbons.
29:01It was beautiful. It was like his legacy had spread far and wide already.
29:05Even before this was sensationalized.
29:09I think he would have been very proud to have earned that kind of send-off.
29:20As soon as I was arraigned publicly on February 2nd,
29:24they said there was a stay-away order between me and any member of his family.
29:30So I did not go to John's funeral or any memorial for John.
29:35I've never been to his grave.
29:37I was really looking forward just to have this behind me.
29:41New developments tonight in the case of Karen Reed.
29:44A Massachusetts woman accused in the death of Boston police officer John O'Keefe.
29:50I didn't think I was going to get arrested again for John's death.
29:53But I was wrong.
29:56This nightmare was just beginning.
30:01After Karen Reed was charged with manslaughter,
30:07the prosecution took the case to a state grand jury
30:12and presented second-degree murder.
30:16And that returned an indictment.
30:18The grand jury said, yeah, there is enough evidence here for this case to go to trial.
30:24Involuntary murder.
30:26To go to trial.
30:29Involuntary manslaughter is an unintentional killing
30:34that's done as a result of acting recklessly,
30:38causing the death of another.
30:40Karen's charged with second-degree murder,
30:42which is essentially murder with malice aforethought.
30:46And I was floored.
30:48You know, my first thought was, you know, what do they have?
30:53He's a Boston cop. I mean, that tells you all you need to know.
30:57The blue wall went up, and Karen Reed's on the outside of that blue wall.
31:01She's the outsider. She's the patsy.
31:06I heard the car doors again, and there they all are again.
31:09Not quite as theatrical as the first time I was arrested.
31:12But I saw the two lead detectives, Trooper Proctor and Trooper Buchnick.
31:16At first I thought they were here to ask me questions or something.
31:19Oh, she's out back.
31:21Outside? Yeah.
31:22When they went around back, I thought they were going to hurt me
31:25because I heard them say, let's do it around back.
31:28And so I'm shaking like a leaf.
31:30I opened the door, and I said, what's going on?
31:35And they said, you're under arrest.
31:37I said, for what?
31:38And they said, you've been indicted on second-degree murder charges,
31:42and you're under arrest.
31:43And they read me my rights again.
31:46And I backed away, and Trooper Proctor came and grabbed me
31:51and tried to turn me and get my arm,
31:54and I kept trying to writhe away from him
31:57because I didn't understand why I was being arrested.
32:01Let him handcuff you, please.
32:02I'm being charged with second-degree murder now?
32:04That's correct.
32:13I was upcharged, so the charges got upgraded from vehicular manslaughter
32:17to second-degree murder, which means there's an element of intent
32:21that I knew what I was doing.
32:23It wasn't an accident.
32:25Second-degree murder carries a life-in-prison sentence.
32:29You would be eligible for parole,
32:31but there's no guarantee that you'd make parole.
32:33It's a life sentence.
32:35I mean, 10 years or life at this point feels the same to me.
32:38I've spent two nights, two days in prison,
32:41and it felt like an eternity.
32:43So you could lock me up for six months,
32:47and at the outset, it would feel like a lifetime.
32:52I mean, I'm 44 years old, so 20, 30, 40,
32:57it's the rest of my productive life.
33:04I was cuffed by a proctor.
33:06I had on boxer shorts, no underpants, a tank top,
33:11and I had thrown a cardigan on it when I heard them out front,
33:14and I had on my slippers.
33:16So what type of medication do you need that you need right now?
33:19I need medication.
33:20I need some personal bathroom items.
33:22Okay, what type of medication?
33:24Can I have normal shoes, please,
33:26so I'm not on TV looking like this?
33:28These, I don't even have underwear.
33:30Can I put pants on?
33:31Again, your parents didn't come over here and retrieve anything.
33:34But I don't want to be on Channel 4 in my pajamas.
33:37I wouldn't worry about the news right now.
33:39Can you speak to me right now?
33:41No.
33:42Is she okay?
33:44Give me a hand.
33:46She's more concerned when she looks like she's on TV.
33:49Have a seat there for me.
33:53I was taken in the cruiser up to the barracks again, booked again.
33:58Ready, 1, 2, 3.
34:03I knew I was going to be paraded around again.
34:06It's scary.
34:08I'm in a completely vulnerable position here,
34:11so your mind just races.
34:13They're about to lock you up,
34:16and they think you're a murderer.
34:18That's when I realized this was for keeps.
34:22They wanted a pound of flesh from me.
34:41I've got to search you, okay?
34:43Yeah, can you pull the pockets out so I don't have to...
34:48Nothing in the pockets, nothing in the waistband, anything?
34:51The second night was much, much worse in jail than the first
34:55because I started to think I wasn't going home again.
34:59So that night was one of the worst in my life.
35:02Okay, and no pockets in the shirt?
35:05No.
35:07All right, baby, you can take this, okay?
35:14The first time Karen was arrested,
35:17I remember going back to my home office that afternoon,
35:22and my paralegal told me that a guy named Mike had called the office
35:27and he has important information for me.
35:30I called him back, and I have a memory of sitting at my desk
35:34at home in my office,
35:36and, you know, he had a gravelly voice,
35:40and, you know, it was like a holy smokes moment
35:44because he said that perhaps someone else
35:50caused the death of John O'Keefe.
36:00Very early on in the case, it was just the fog of war, right?
36:03David didn't know what he was dealing with.
36:05He comes in on this case. He had never met Karen before.
36:07She's accused of hitting this guy, a cop, with her car,
36:10and he ends up dying,
36:12and David is standing there with his hands out going,
36:14I wonder what happened. I need some evidence.
36:16I don't have anything.
36:20But then he got a call at his office,
36:23and this person said in almost whispered tones,
36:29you need to look at the folks inside 34 Fairview.
36:34You need to look really hard.
36:36That's the homeowners.
36:38You need to look really hard at the occupants of the house.
36:42Something here is more than meets the eye.
36:47We didn't have any inkling
36:49that there might have been somebody else out there who did it,
36:53so, you know, it was a turning point.
36:58I called him into my office,
37:01and he came and sat with my investigator and me,
37:04and, you know, it didn't really go anywhere with him beyond that.
37:10It's not like he was a witness or that we could use him,
37:14but that tip was invaluable
37:17because it sent us in a different direction
37:20very early on in this investigation.
37:24Had that tipster never provided that information,
37:28I'm not sure if we'd necessarily be here
37:32because initially David was saying
37:35something to the effect it was a bad accident
37:38and she's not criminally liable.
37:40But then after this tipster, we start seeing the new defense,
37:45which is they're saying Karen Reed's been framed.
37:48The defense says that Reed did not hit O'Keefe,
37:50but that he was actually beaten inside of the home
37:53and that his body was later dumped outside.
37:56The Peels were the only ones fighting for the truth
37:58of what happened to John O'Keefe.
38:00Just to be clear, you didn't do it.
38:03We know who did it, Steve. We know.
38:06And we know who spearheaded this cover-up. You all know.
38:09Yes, we do.
38:10And no, she didn't do it. No, she didn't do it.
38:13This is an innocent woman.
38:14The defense has an alternative story about what happened here.
38:20There's an alleged police cover-up here.
38:22John O'Keefe went inside that house,
38:24and the allegation is that something happened in there.
38:27Who do you think did it?
38:28Well, certainly the Massachusetts State Police is involved.
38:30There are people that were in that house that are involved.
38:33Brian Albert is involved.
38:35Jennifer McCabe is involved.
38:37The rest of the folks that were in that house.
38:39There's some level of involvement by every one of them.
38:43The people in the house that night included Brian Albert,
38:46the owner of the home, and Brian Higgins.
38:50Brian Albert is a Boston police officer.
38:53He's the head of a fugitive unit.
38:55Brian Higgins is a federal ATF agent
38:58and friends with the chief of police of the Canton Police Department.
39:03This all happened outside of the home of a Boston police officer.
39:07And so for the first two years of this case,
39:10we knew something wasn't right,
39:11and we were fighting tooth and nail to try to get access to cell phone data,
39:16electronic information that we knew was the key to this case.
39:19You can't prove a conspiracy by just asking tough questions of witnesses.
39:23You have to have the data to back that up.
39:25One of the things that we've tried extraordinarily hard in this case to do
39:29is to uncover all of the electronic communications.
39:32How do you prove a conspiracy?
39:34You need to see people's phones.
39:35We live in the 21st century.
39:37That's how conspiracies are conducted.
39:40And that's one of the things that Alan and I
39:42had actually had previous success on in the Spacey case.
39:46The prosecution did an extraction of Jen McCabe's phone.
39:50She was one of the women that was in the house that night.
39:52She was one of the people who had suggested that John come over to the house that night.
39:57So we hired a computer forensics expert to look through her extraction.
40:04And lo and behold, I'll never forget, I was standing in this office,
40:10and I get a call, and our computer forensics guy,
40:13he didn't know much about the case.
40:17Didn't know what the timing was,
40:19didn't know what the impact of certain dates and times were, nothing.
40:25And he said, I just wanted to tell you, I don't know if this means anything to you,
40:29but in Jennifer McCabe's phone, there's a Google search for how long to die in the cold.
40:36She misspelled the word how, spelled it H-O-S.
40:39And I said, what?
40:43Are you sure?
40:45Because that wasn't in their report.
40:47He said, yeah, I'm sure.
40:50And he said, was it 227 and 40 seconds?
40:55Okay, what date?
40:58And he said, January 29th.
41:03And I thought, this can't be.
41:05This can't be.
41:07Jennifer McCabe, according to the evidence that we have from her phone,
41:13Google searched how long to die in the cold
41:17at 227 and 40 seconds a.m.,
41:20three and a half hours before John's body was discovered.