By New York Post (U.S.) | Created at 2025-03-04 20:37:28 | Updated at 2025-03-04 22:59:36
2 hours ago
The federal probe into Karen Read’s murder case has been closed, prosecutors confirmed Tuesday.
The feds had been investigating circumstances surrounding the 2022 killing of Read’s boyfriend, Boston cop John O’Keefe, though it’s unclear what exactly they were looking at.
News that the federal probe — which may have been looking into possible police cover-up — was closed emerged at a hearing in Read’s ongoing murder case in Dedham, Mass. court.
“There is no longer any federal investigation into the investigation of John O’Keefe’s death or any related matters,” Special Prosecutor Hank Brennan said, according to a report by CBS News. “It is closed. It is over.”
Brennan made the announcement as he asked Judge Beverly Cannone to issue a gag order to reign in Read’s lawyers from pushing their claims of sweeping law enforcement wrongdoing.
Last week, sources told NBC10 Boston that the federal case was over and no charges were mounted against law enforcement.
Read faces retrial next month after her first trial — for allegedly mowing down her cop boyfriend O’Keefe with her SUV and leaving him for dead — ended with a hung jury.
Her lawyers all along have claimed she is a patsy in an allegedly sprawling cover-up by law enforcement officers who were actually to blame for O’Keefe’s murder — a theory which is partially responsible for a cult following in favor of her innocence.
Brennan blasted Read’s lawyers for public comments against prosecutors and other officials, including when one of them went on TV and said Norfolk County District Attorney Michael Morrissey was being investigated by the feds.
“There should be a gag order on all of these attorneys, every single one of them,” Brennan said.
Former Trooper Michael Proctor admitted at Read’s first trial to texting his buds a slew of inappropriate comments about Read while he was investigating her — including calling her a “wack job c–t.” He’s since been suspended without pay.
Read’s side held that and other messages by Proctor out as examples that the probe into her was rotten from the start.
She is accused of backing into O’Keefe with her Lexus SUV after the pair had been out drinking. She then left him outside his cop buddy’s house to die as a snowstorm was coming in, prosecutors said.
She pleaded not guilty to second-degree murder, manslaughter and leaving the scene of a crime in the January 2022 slay.
