Karen Read Found Not Guilty in Murder Retrial

Karen Read was found not guilty for the murder of her Boston cop boyfriend — and she got off with a slap on the wrist for drunk driving after a months-long trial that captivated the country.

The verdict Wednesday in her second murder trial — a year after the first attempt to put her behind bars ended in a hung jury — is a stunning victory for the financial analyst, whose legion of fans say she was railroaded by vindictive cops who bungled the investigation.

Read was accused of hitting John O’Keefe, 46, with her Lexus SUV and leaving him to die in a snowbank outside a house party in Canton, Mass. in January 2022.

A jubilant Read, 45, took a victory lap as she walked out of the Norfolk County Superior Court to throngs of screaming supporters.

“No one has fought harder for justice for John O’Keefe than I have. Than I have, and my team,” she said.

“I could not be standing here without these amazing supporters who supported me and my team financially and more importantly emotionally for almost four years,” she also told her adoring fans.

Read wiped away tears as jurors acquitted her of second-degree murder, leaving the scene of an accident causing death and manslaughter while driving under the influence. She was sentenced to one year of probation on the drunk driving charge.

The wild twists and turns in the case — including a lead investigator who was caught searching her phone for nudes and called her a “wack job c–t” — and Read’s own penchant for attracting attention inside and outside court made the case true-crime catnip.

“It just had so many storylines that you couldn’t look away because you couldn’t make it up,” legal expert Randolph Rice told The Post following the verdict. “It was that good.”

“You had an attractive defendant, a police officer-victim and it was easy for people to understand” the Maryland attorney said.

An obsessive pro-Read blogger and campaigner, “Turtleboy,” raised the profile of the case — even as he was charged with intimidating a witness int he case.

Meanwhile, O’Keefe’s family and loved ones were left broken up by the verdict with a group of friends calling it a “devastating miscarriage of justice.”

“Today, our hearts are with John and the entire O’Keefe family. They have suffered through so much and deserved better from our justice system,” said the friends, including Kerry Roberts and Jennifer McCabe who were key witnesses against Read.

“While we may have more to say in the future, today we mourn with John’s family and lament the cruel reality that this prosecution was infected by lies and conspiracy theories spread by Karen Read, her defense team, and some in the media.”

Kate Peter, who runs an anti-Karen Read YouTube channel, was more blunt, calling Read a “narcissistic sociopath.”

“There is no justice for John in this. His family has been harassed, maligned, booed and mocked,” Peter told The Post. “His closest friends have been demonized and harassed to a literally criminal level.”

The confounding case began in late January 2022 when O’Keefe’s body was discovered on the front lawn of 34 Fairview Road in Canton — about 20 miles south of Boston. O’Keefe was the caregiver for his orphaned niece and nephew at the time of his death, after his sister and brother-in-law died months apart.

Read was charged days later and was indicted by prosecutors who accused her of striking her beau with her SUV following a night of heavy drinking. The couple, who had a tempestuous relationship, had gotten into a drunken argument earlier that night before she dropped it off at the party.

But Read’s defense team insisted she had nothing to do with O’Keefe’s demise and was being made a scapegoat by investigators and the victim of an elaborate cover-up. A lead investigator in the case added fuel to that fire when it was discovered he sent nasty texts about Read to his buddies.

Her lawyers claimed O’Keefe suffered injuries at the party and was dragged him into the snow to die.

Rice, the legal analyst, said he believes the prosecutors, led by special prosecutor Hank Brennan in the second trial, did the best they could after investigators bundled the case.

“When you’re collecting blood in [red] solo cups, that’s what you got as evidence,” Rice said, referring to the ameturish conduct of detectives and crime scene techs.

He also credited the defense for poking enough holes in the prosecutors’ argument that jurors didn’t know what to believe by the time the case was sent to them.

Read was first taken to court in 2024, but the prosecution of the dirty blonde ended in a mistrial due to a hung jury. Some jurors on the first trial later claimed the panel agreed to acquit on the murder and leaving the scene charges, but could not come to a consensus on the manslaughter charges.

The second – and final trial – that started in April had some key differences, like keeping the controversial lead investigator Michael Proctor off the stand. He lost his job between trials.

Read didn’t testify in either trial, but her words were used in the second trial after she did scores of interviews, including with Vanity Fair last fall.

She also spoke out following court at times, including claiming her former friend, Jennifer McCabe, was lying on the stand.

Read was known for her facial expressions and giving her supporters the love gesture in sign language as she walked in and out of court. At one point during the first trial, Judge Beverly Cannone slapped down Read when she apparently smirked while her defense lawyer Alan Jackson was addressing the court.

But Read was all smiles Wednesday – and so were her supporters.

“There really is some justice,” one Read backer told NBC 10 outside the courthouse. “This could be any one of us. We’re all Karen Read.