Karen Read's last motion hearing before murder retrial finally opens is underway

As has happened on most days of jury selection and other pretrial hearings, Karen Read stopped outside the Dedham courthouse and spoke with reporters before leaving for the day.

"I've been ready. I have no choice but to be ready," Read said. "I feel strong. I've got an amazing team. And I'm anxious."

She said her lead defense attorney Alan Jackson "owns" her opening statement but that it was a collaborative effort from her entire team.

"In Alan we all trust, but we've all given input," she said.

She also responded to a question about prosecutors' plans to use her own televised interviews against her in their opening statement next week.

The 15-second clip is "nothing that fazes me in any way," she said. She declined to say specifically which interviews were used.

The lawyer for Aidan Kearney, a blogger who has closely covered the charges against Karen Read and is accused of intimidating witnesses, told the court that he plans to invoke his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination if he is called as a witness at trial.

Kearney is on the witness list and asked for an exemption from the witness sequestration order.

Special prosecutor Hank Brennan told Judge Beverly Cannone that he opposed the exemption but would no longer do so if Kearney resolves to invoke the Fifth Amendment.

After a brief sidebar meeting with Kearney and his lawyer, Cannone says she is granting his request to be exempt, with exceptions regarding the witnesses he is charged with intimidating.

That was the last motion on the agenda for the day.

Defense attorney Alan Jackson made one final request -- telling the court that if the prosecution wants to have a third-party person, he wants them to put a motion in writing.

Brennan said the request is already in a motion about extrajudicial statements, but he can provide a new motion if the court asks.

Court is done for the day.

Opening statements are expected to kick off Tuesday.

Special Prosecutor Hank Brennan told Judge Beverly Cannone Wednesday that full disclosures regarding expert witnesses and testing from the crash reconstruction firm ARCCA have not been given to the prosecution.

Defense attorney Alan Jackson denied this claim and said the disclosures were made in March and there are no additional reports or testing results “as yet.”

“If we get those, we will turn those over, immediately,” he said.

The ARCAA witnesses have been a key issue ahead of Read’s second trial, with Brennan having asked the court to have their testimony precluded over concerns that they were not independent as described and had been contracted by the defense.

Cannone denied his motion last month.

Read is accused of backing her Lexus SUV into then-boyfriend John O'Keefe, a Boston police officer, and causing fatal injuries before leaving the scene following a drunken argument.

An autopsy found that head trauma and hypothermia caused O'Keefe's death. He had injuries to his head, hands and arm.

Dr. Daniel Wolfe, one of the expert witnesses, testified in Read's first trial that the damage to the rear end of Read's vehicle was not consistent with striking a human head or arm.

Brennan said that he has been concerned about the ARCAA issue for months that the defense would attempt “trial by ambush” and said that if the defense can’t produce additional disclosure, the firm should provide the information he’s asking for.

“If it wasn’t so obvious this would happen I wouldn’t be so upset over it,” he said.Brennan asked the judge to allow the experts to testify but be confined to the information outlined in their previously submitted reports.

Jackson called Brennan’s protest “feigned indignation” and said the ARCCA witnesses were working on a rebuttal to a prosecution expert disclosed as recently as this February.

He said the defense received the final disclosure from the prosecution on March 24. He said the Read has a right to address and defend against those late disclosures.

Ronnie Estanislao, who was part of the deadlocked jury during Karen Read's first trial last year, told "Fox & Friends" this morning that he doesn't think she could have killed John O'Keefe the way prosecutors allege.

Read is in court today for a motion hearing ahead of her retrial on charges of murder, manslaughter and leaving the scene of an accident that investigators say left O'Keefe dead on Jan. 29, 2022.

Opening statements are expected on Tuesday.

Judge Beverly Cannone also heard motions about expert witness testimony from the sides as well as what evidence could still come into play.

One of the, special prosecutor Hank Brennan asked for the judge to allow a witness who plans to say that a dog named Chloe could not have inflicted bite marks on John O’Keefe’s arm.

Chloe was the name of a German shepherd the Albert family owned. O'Keefe was found on their front lawn on Jan. 29, 2022, after Brian Albert hosted an after-party there. According to trial testimony, Read and O'Keefe never went inside. However, Read's defense has raised doubts about that narrative and suggested he could have gone inside after she left.

“There is no way, to a degree of certainty, that these wounds were caused by Chloe’s mouth,” Brennan told the judge.

He said that the prosecution should be allowed to rebut defense evidence about an alternate perpetrator theory.

The motion Wednesday is a formality, where former juror Victoria George, a Massachusetts lawyer who recently joined Karen Read's defense, is asking to be added as local counsel for Read's out-of-state attorneys, Alan Jackson, Elizabeth Little and Robert Alessi.

They are already accepted by the court with fellow defense counsel David Yannetti as their local counterpart.

George is now associated with Yannetti's firm, and he will remain the primary local counsel, according to a court filing.

On her way out of court after jury selection wrapped up Tuesday, defendant Karen Read dared special prosecutor Hank Brennan to "Come at me," as she spoke to a group of reporters.

All 12 jurors and six alternates were empaneled Tuesday, clearing the way for opening statements next week. The sides return to court Wednesday for a motion hearing where they will ask the court to rule on a few lingering issues ahead of her second trial.

Both sides intend to play clips from her many media interviews during their openings next week, and Read stood by her public statements when asked how she felt about the prosecution's plan to play them.

"I would not have said anything that I would not say again," she said.

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