Crime
The movement appears to limit attorneys from making statements to the media that could possibly be seen as prejudicial to courtroom proceedings in Learn’s case.
Prosecutors in Norfolk County are asking a decide to bar attorneys for Karen Learn — the Mansfield lady accused of killing her Boston police officer boyfriend — from talking about sure facets of the case outdoors the courtroom.
In a movement filed Friday, Assistant District Attorneys Adam C. Lally and Laura A. McLaughlin argued that the protection crew’s techniques have fueled an invasion of witnesses’ privateness.
“As a part of their ‘trial by media’ technique, the defendant has sought to focus on the witnesses’ credibility and character by way of using the media and has inspired the unwarranted invasion of witnesses’ private privateness,” the movement reads.
The movement seeks to dam Learn’s attorneys — David Yannetti, Ian Henchy, Alan Jackson, and Elizabeth Little — from “making extrajudicial statements to the media that could possibly be seen as prejudicial to the felony proceedings,” a coverage in keeping with the Massachusetts guidelines {of professional} conduct for attorneys.
Lally and McLaughlin asserted that restraints on attorneys’ feedback outdoors the courtroom could also be warranted in sure circumstances to “shield the integrity and equity of the judicial system.” Legal professionals and legislation enforcement witnesses for the prosecution additionally agreed to comply with the proposed order.
Yannetti informed Boston.com in an e-mail that the protection crew plans to oppose the DA’s movement in courtroom.
The background
Learn is accused of putting John O’Keefe along with her automobile on Jan. 29, 2022, whereas dropping him off at a fellow Boston police officer’s residence in Canton following an evening of ingesting. She has pleaded not responsible to fees of second-degree homicide, motorcar manslaughter whereas driving below the affect, and leaving the scene of a collision inflicting harm and loss of life.
In a protection technique that has already drawn appreciable information protection and a focus on social media, Learn’s attorneys have argued that the 43-year-old was framed for killing O’Keefe, suggesting that company on the afterparty had been actually in charge.
The attorneys have pointed to cellphone information they declare signifies not solely that O’Keefe entered the house in Canton that night time, however that the home-owner’s sister-in-law searched “ho[w] lengthy to die in chilly” at 2:27 a.m. — hours earlier than Learn discovered O’Keefe’s physique outdoors within the snow.
Prosecutors, in the meantime, have famous that O’Keefe’s cellphone information additionally exhibits him strolling round hours after he’d been declared useless, additional arguing that the protection crew misinterpreted information and produced a defective timestamp for the Google search.
What the brand new movement says
In Friday’s movement, Lally and McLaughlin argued that the protection crew’s statements outdoors the courtroom “go additional than zealous illustration; they’re unsubstantiated proclamations, supported solely by self-serving hypothesis and conjecture, probably to not be admissible at trial and performed with the intent of materially prejudicing the felony proceedings by risking the impartiality of potential jurors.”
Prosecutors additionally accused Learn’s attorneys of encouraging media retailers to contact witnesses with “inflammatory” questions, and of submitting motions that contained witnesses’ names, dates of delivery, social safety data, addresses, and cellphone numbers.
“In response to protection counsels’ name to motion, witnesses have suffered unwarranted invasion of privateness as they’ve been receiving repeated and harassing cellphone calls, relations of witnesses have been contacted and harassed, and the sufferer’s household has suffered emotional hurt because of the public dissemination of … [post-mortem] images,” the movement reads.
The proposed restrictions
Lally and McLaughlin proposed a set of restrictions that may apply to attorneys on each side, in addition to legislation enforcement witnesses. The movement notably doesn’t search to restrain Learn, media retailers, or non-law enforcement witnesses.
The proposed order would bar attorneys on the case from sharing data that they know or ought to know may have “a considerable chance of materially prejudicing potential trial jurors or witnesses or may have a considerable chance of heightening public condemnation of the accused or legislation enforcement.”
The recommended restrictions additionally look to dam attorneys from making or releasing extrajudicial statements on sure topic issues associated to the case, together with:
- Testimony or anticipated testimony;
- The existence or contents of any statements Learn made to legislation enforcement personnel;
- Forensic testing outcomes;
- The substance of proof a celebration expects to attempt to introduce at trial;
- Data that an legal professional is aware of or ought to know is prone to be inadmissible as proof at trial and that if disclosed would “create a considerable threat of prejudicing an neutral trial”;
- And the existence and material of any ongoing grand jury or different felony investigation of Learn or of any potential witnesses.
What’s subsequent?
Learn is due again in courtroom on July 25.
Current courtroom hearings have been marked by heated debate over proof, and prosecutors stated in Friday’s movement that they’ve supplied Learn’s crew with a “substantial” quantity of discovery.
“This proof establishes that the defendant, whereas intoxicated, in a snowstorm, operated her motorcar in reverse for a time period, earlier than putting the sufferer at a excessive charge of velocity,” the movement asserts.
However Yannetti, one among Learn’s attorneys, informed Boston.com the protection attorneys “dispute the prosecution’s arguments about what they suppose might need occurred.”
He added: “They’re mistaken.”
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