Prosecutors in Karen Learn case search unaired footage from her TV interviews 

Crime

In televised interviews with NBC and ABC, Learn opened up about her relationship with John O’Keefe and shared her model of occasions from the night time he died.

Prosecutors are hoping to get their arms on footage from TV interviews Karen Learn gave to NBC’s “Dateline” and ABC’s “Nightline” as she awaits trial within the 2022 dying of her Boston police officer boyfriend.

In motions filed final week, the Norfolk County District Lawyer’s Workplace requested the courtroom to order each networks to show over video of Learn’s interviews, together with uncooked footage that wasn’t aired.

The recordings, prosecutors argued, are evidentiary and related to the case towards Learn, who’s accused of backing her automotive into John O’Keefe exterior one other Boston police officer’s dwelling in Canton in January 2022. 

The Mansfield girl has pleaded not responsible to fees of second-degree homicide, motorized vehicle manslaughter whereas driving beneath the affect, and leaving the scene of a collision inflicting damage and dying.

Learn “has put forth quite a few conflicting theories related to her involvement and to the existence of bodily proof recovered from her car, the sufferer’s clothes, and the health worker’s findings of truth,” prosecutors wrote in one of many motions.

Particularly, prosecutors cited a protection principle that O’Keefe was murdered by people inside the house at 34 Fairview Highway. Learn’s legal professionals have argued that she was framed, suggesting that O’Keefe was overwhelmed, attacked by the house owner’s canine, and left exterior. 

“These claims are made with out a scintilla of proof to help them,” prosecutors contended. “But, the defendant continues to make use of the media to each contradict her prior statements and to facilitate her occupation of innocence, whereas making baseless accusations towards almost each witness, regulation enforcement officer, or skilled concerned within the substantial case towards her.”

Norfolk District Lawyer Michael Morrissey additionally issued a uncommon video assertion final month, condemning the “baseless” harassment of witnesses in Learn’s case and pushing again on conspiracy theories surrounding O’Keefe’s dying.

What does the regulation say?

The request for footage from NBC and ABC is notable; Massachusetts is amongst a handful of states that should not have a so-called “protect regulation,” which permits journalists to refuse to reveal sources or unpublished info.

With no well-defined regulation in place, the choice is mostly left to a choose’s discretion on a case-by-case foundation — a typical regulation method that may spell uncertainty for journalists, in response to the nonprofit Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press. 

Even when Massachusetts did have certified reporter’s privilege, prosecutors argued, “events looking for disclosure of non-confidential supplies are entitled to hunt discovery from a media entity if they’ll present ‘that the supplies at challenge are of seemingly relevance to a major challenge within the case, and are usually not fairly obtainable from different accessible sources.’”

NBC and ABC didn’t instantly reply to requests for remark.

Protection crew looking for snowplow knowledge 

Individually, Learn’s legal professionals have filed a movement asking Canton officers to supply GPS knowledge and information relating to snowplows that have been deployed close to Fairview Highway on the day O’Keefe died.

The protection crew asserted that different visitors who have been on the dwelling didn’t see O’Keefe mendacity within the entrance yard as they left after midnight on Jan. 29. Prosecutors have stated that Learn and two different girls discovered his physique within the snow by a cluster of bushes later that morning. 

Learn’s legal professionals additionally stated {that a} protection investigator was in a position to monitor down the snowplow driver who allegedly cleared Fairview Highway that day. 

“I requested him whether or not he believed he would have seen a physique on the garden of 34 Fairview Highway, if one was there, from the view of his cab whereas snowplowing,” personal investigator Paul Mackowski wrote in an accompanying affidavit. 

The motive force responded “with out equivocation” that he would have seen a physique within the entrance yard, Mackowski continued. Based on the affidavit, the motive force additionally alleged that he noticed a automotive parked in entrance of the house — “precisely the place the physique was discovered” — round 3:30 or 4 a.m.

The requested information are “clearly related” to the query of whether or not O’Keefe was mendacity incapacitated on the entrance garden after being struck by a car, the protection crew argued.

Learn is due again in courtroom on Sept. 15 for a movement listening to.