Billy & Lisa in the Morning
Karen Read Trial Recap 6.28.24
here is the story we've got our legal expert Katharine Loftus in studio. Good morning, Katherine. Good morning, everyone. Thank you for coming in on a Friday morning. We appreciate it. The jury is still out. The verdict is not in yet. And how about this? We've got Steve Cooper from Channel 7 News live outside the courthouse. Steve say hello to Katherine Loftus. Hi, Katherine. Good morning. Good morning, we're selling coop at the courthouse t-shirts. You know, that wouldn't be a bad idea. I'm just so coops at the scene. What's it like outside the courthouse right now? All right. Well, the Karen Reed supporters are out once again in full force. The pink t-shirts are here as well. And I call it Camp Karen because they get the tent set up. They have fruit salad. They have donuts and coffee. And, uh, oh, you know, everyone's out and they are hoping today will be the day that they'll get a birth. Now, Katherine, what do you think you think today is going to be the day because it's Friday going into what we can? My feeling is no. I think they're going to go into next week. That's my, that's my gut. And again, that's what you're basing it on. I think that, um, that they're obviously really thinking about it. Everybody who thought, well, we're going to come back in 15 minutes. You know, this is an eight week trial. Generally, we say half a day to a day for every week of trial. The only ask one question on the end of the first day, or the beginning of the second, I would guess that there's a couple of holdouts and they're not, if you do have a holdout and you have, you know, one or two people, three people that are not going to change their mind, it's going to take some time. It's going to drag it out a little bit. Now, Steve, I know you're outside the courthouse and you're always looking for really good angles and you're usually the guy that gets Karen to talk that gets her lawyers to talk outside the courthouse. I'm going to give you a little tease. Okay. The place to hang now, if you're looking for a story, Coop, is the bar at the Omni Hotel Seaport. Just mark that down. Okay, Steve. I couldn't talk to them yesterday. That's where they were going. That's where you want to be. Late night at the bar at the Omni. That's where you get the scoops. I appreciate it. You can put that on the back of the t-shirt, Coop. You know, business on the front party in the back. So Steve, what are you thinking now for today, honestly? Yeah, well, it's weird because, you know, yesterday, I realized I saw the jurors four times. They walked in at nine o'clock in the morning. They walked out at nine oh one. They came back in at three forty five and walked out at three forty six. And I've seen a lot of juries and and I was studying them yesterday and not one of them looked up as they walked into the courtroom. Not one of them made eye contact with me. I mean, I was staring at all 12 of them and then the two alternates and they look drained and they look weary and they look like they got a lot of stuff on their shoulders right now and they know they arrive at the courthouse with a bus and that they're in a charge bus, but there's a police cruiser in front of them, a police cruiser behind us. There's a lot going on with them right now. And it was just an interesting dynamic. The fact that yesterday, no questions, but they did say in the afternoon that they wanted to go home for the day. And I thought that was pretty interesting. And I think that goes to what you were saying, Steve, that they're taking it seriously. There's loads of evidence. I mean, this how many witnesses, probably 75, 80 around there, we have, you know, documentary evidence, we have physical evidence, we have text messages, we have Google searches, we have the accident reconstruction. This is so much for them to go through. In what you do want to jury to take the time to look at all the evidence so that even if it comes back, you know, whatever way, whether people are happy with it, you know that they actually took the time to consider the evidence. And really, that's all we can ask about jurors. There are some rumors about infighting among the jurors. Right. And that usually happens when it goes this long. Well, and I actually don't think this is that long. I really don't. We're only a company, you know, we're on day four. And the first day was really half of a day. There's always going to be disagreements. And that's what about what it's about because it's always like we have here. People have different perspectives, people have different backgrounds. So when you go into the jury room, you know, one juror might look at a piece of evidence one way and somebody else looks at it another way. And the question is, can they come to a compromise and see it, you know, come to a decision? How long can deliberations go before the judge steps in? So there's no hard and fast rule generally. So we saw in the Chezna trial, there was a mistrial declared there that went almost two weeks. So usually what will happen is I would bet if we go into next week, the jurors, if they come back, they say that they're at an impasse, the judge will read them an instruction about go back, think about it, you're in the best situation, you 12 jurors are the best people in the entire world to make this decision, you know, and after that, if they still can't decide, that's when the judge decides whether to declare a mistrial. Steve, I know you're busy out there in front of the courthouse. You'll probably have to go with the live hitter or something. Thank you so much for doing this with us, Steve. We really, really appreciate it. No way. I had a question for him before we leave. Steve, go ahead. I'm on that busy belly. I love coopies. The best. You know what I'll try this for the whole show. No, I'm talking to you guys. I need to ask you since you're down there. I'm hearing rumors that because the courthouse is so old that you can kind of hear the juries just deliberate. Is that true? I think the jurors can hear the people outside. I don't know if it's the other way around. Okay. Yeah. I mean, I don't think, you know, I think that's one of the things right now, they're doing such a great job. The court office trying to protect the jurors and, again, they're in a back room that they really have that buffer zone set up and the police are inside. They're outside and they're really, you know, everyone's sort of adhering to the rules right now. There are chants going on. There's some rallies getting to make ship rallies happening. But I think for the most part, everyone's just sort of on pins and needles right now because, you know, we're coming up on a Friday, the end of the week, people are thinking, you know, this is a TV show. This is when it's going to end. If it goes into next week, you're up against the 4th of July and the day after the 4th of July. So are they going to be deliberating as the judge can make them come back the next day? There's a lot going on right now. And I think everyone's just nervous and they're anxious. And that's what we saw with Karen yesterday. I mean, we used to be able to speak with her in the morning, noon and night. And yesterday, I mean, the security took around the opposite side of the building. It's getting more difficult to get to her and the attorneys. And I think there was nervous as everyone else. So Steve, as a journalist, waiting for the arrivals outside the courthouse this morning, do you have a specific mission, something you really want to get done? I mean, I think just hoping that you can get the question of the day into Karen, first of all, because she's the defendant and then secondarily to her attorneys and to hear if you can get any insight from them. You know, they're meeting behind closed their doors, they're hunkered down for hours yesterday. And when they come out, you want to know, what are they thinking? What are they? What are their concerns right now? You know, you heard what everyone else is talking about. But what are they thinking right now? Because, you know, hanging over her head is a life sentence. And that's a pretty weighty thing to go to sleep at night and think about it. I'll tell you what they're thinking. They're nervous. It didn't look like it was weighing on her mind last night. But listen, all right. Are you going to explain that? The Omni bar seems to be a fun place at night. So we but, uh, allegedly, yeah, Steve, we got to move on. But thank you so much. We may call you again, Steve. Okay. No, I think we just lost his signal. Well, you got satellite dishes all around. Yeah. There's media from around the world. You know what happened? Billy just made that comment and Steve hung up. No, yeah, no, yeah, yeah. Well, guess what? We need to get it. Guess what? A topic time is coming up and Billy's going to explain that comment. One of you. Yeah. All right. Please. Okay. So Justin, here we go. Earlier in the show, I made a comment about a bar that people are hanging out at. It's the Omni bar at the Omni hotel in the seaport district. And there's a video that exists this morning. In fact, Catherine, you walked into the studio. We've got Catherine Loftus in studio. You had it on your phone. Now, Winnie has already posted the video posted. If you go to my Instagram in Winnie's world, is there or kiss when we Instagram, it's there. It's a very pretty good look at a person, a woman in a male that look a lot like Catherine. I'm sorry. Karen and her attorney, Alan Jackson, looking very cozy. Yeah. There are some people are saying the video's fake. It's a a cheap fake is what the big phrase is now. But I don't know. To me, but yeah. What do you think, Catherine? It looks like so I think it's like a live video. It looks like somebody pressed it and outside the bar. I mean, it looked it was in the seaport to me. So it's Karen hanging out at the bar with her lawyer. They're not at the bar. They're outside of their outside on the sidewalk. Yeah. Well, I should add, we don't know if it's real or not. We don't. But we are this show, right? A legend. This show did get some rumblings about a week or two ago that something was going on. We didn't know if it was true. We just were like, Oh, okay, it's hearsay. And now this video comes out. So yeah. And what's this story about a big party last night? And there was like a kind of a scuffle. Well, what I have heard is that the, you know, not a party, the O'Kee family was gathering close to the courthouse because as the judge said, she wants everybody within five minutes to come back and, you know, it was that family and friends because they all want to be able to attend, you know, and they want to be close. And that maybe the kind of other side of the aisle, we found them at the hall and there was a problem that we said to, you know, stories. It's just, you know, I think that we've talked about it a lot. But what's gotten lost in this is that somebody has lost a life. That person is John O'Kee he has a mom, a dad, brothers, you know, his niece and nephew. And no matter what you think about the case or what side you're on, I think the best and right thing to do is leave those people. Yeah, exactly. Let them reflect outside the courtroom. Certainly don't need conflict very quickly before we go to the phones and the chalkbacks. You see a possible hung jury? I do. I think there's a chance, I think there's a decent chance of it every day that goes on. I really have a hard time believing that there's going to be a guilty on anything. So that leads me to believe that the longer they go, they're at an impasse. What's the difference between a hung jury and a mistrial? So a hung jury is the same thing as a mistrial. It's just what, so a hung jury means that the jurors cannot agree. So that in order to come to a verdict, you need 12 unanimous for guilty, 12 unanimous for not guilty. If they cannot decide, that means the jury is hung and then the judge declares a mistrial. So they're kind of one and the same. It's just a legal, um, ramification is the mistrial. If they start over, yeah, if they start over, how long would that take until it goes to trial again? So, um, it depends on the court schedule and how fast they want to get it done. I mean, they probably could do it within a couple of months. Um, I can't go through that again right now. I would, I would bet if, if they do it the second time, my thought is they would probably drop the second degree, go on just the manslaughter, shorten the case. Really, you know, the, the only positive thing really for the mistrial, for the commonwealth, it's, there's no positive for the defense because you have to go through the whole thing. But for the commonwealth, they basically get what we call a second bite at the apple. They get to see all the flaws that would mean any problem. Yeah. Different problems. You could use a different prosecutor. You could ask different questions. Definitely. That's witnesses. Yeah. So it could theoretically be presented in a very different way. The second time we're on. It's topic time. Karen Reed is obviously the topic. You can call us 6179311108 or send to talk about it. Let's go to the phones in Michelle. Michelle, you're up first. You have a comment or a question. Michelle. Hi, Michelle. Go. All right. So, the other day, when they were playing bingo for the alternative, did anybody see the numbers that were picked? Turtle Boy says no. Someone was playing bingo. I'm picking the numbers for the jurors. I didn't, I didn't see any numbers. No. Yeah. I'm not sure. Yeah. I didn't, I think I saw that on one of the news broadcasts yesterday. I was trying to figure out what it was all about. So, I mean, each of the jurors is assigned a number as it comes in. So say there were 200 jurors that came in for originally for an impanlement. And, you know, not during number seven, number 32, number 76, those numbers stay with them throughout the entirety. So that's interesting. Yeah. So, when you, you know, you say jury number 76, it's the person who that was the number you got when you came in for jury that day. All right. Thank you for the call, Michelle. Thank you for listening and talk back, Justin. Hey, it's your girl, Sarah from Maine. And I'm actually driving back from Canada right now. And I'm in the car with my dad, Moose from Maine. Yes. His nickname is literally Moose. And the first thing we did this one, we got in the car was we turned on the iHeart radio app because I cannot wait to hear Loftus take on everything that's been going on with the Karen retrial and I can't wait to get caught up. And it's getting us through this drive. Oh, her and her dad Sarah and Moose in Maine. I mean, it needs a muse. No, actually Sarah from Maine, I conversed with her yesterday. She sent me a DM. I sent one back and I did. But I think, I think for real, like so many people just, they've been following this, just like us and they wanted the verdict to come. They wanted to be an ending. Good morning. I will have a question for Catherine. I was wondering if she could work some magic and get a message into the jurors today to hurry up and come up with a verdict. And please don't be a hung jury because I'm leaving for vacation early tomorrow morning. I'm going to be going a week. And I don't know if I'm going to be available when they do come to a verdict. And I need to see this thing finished. Wow. Yeah. Everybody feels like that. And I think that's the interesting thing is that we are coming up on the July 4th holiday. So if they were to go through it, we'd probably get through Thursday, Wednesday, they'd probably be off Thursday, Friday, and then and then come back. But also they have families and obligations too. So I'm sure that everybody would love to see this. Yeah. Let's go to Kathy next. Kathy, you're on. You have a question for Catherine. Hi. Yes. So I'm obsessed. I've been following this. First of all, are you worried about it being so long that they're deliberating? No, I'm not. So I know that everybody feels like it's a long time because we've been following the case for so long because it was a long case. But if you look at, you know, this is a homicide trial. It's not a simple assault and battery. And there's a lot of evidence. There's a lot of things to go through. I'm not surprised that it's taking this long. I do think if, you know, if they if they kind of come back quickly, it's usually OK, we know it's not guilty. So that's what leads me to believe that there's probably an impasse about at least some of the charges, probably some of the lesser included under the manslaughter, if I'm being honest. I think the second degree is off the table. All right, Laurie, you're up next. Good morning, Laurie. You have a question? Oh, good morning. Hi. My question has to do with picking the foreman of the jury. My husband was on a trial and the jurors got to choose the foreman. Why, in this case, did the foreman get chosen by the judge? The judge. The judge. So I've never seen the the jury pick the foreman. It's from my experience. It's always either the court decides or they pick randomly from a hat. I've never seen a trial in my experience where they allow the jury themselves to pick the full person. Usually if there's a case of significance like this, the judge will pick the foreperson and they try to pick someone who looks like, you know, they can kind of control the room, maybe a little, you know, that must be a hard choice, though, because you don't really know these people know you know the selection process. They make a decision probably, right? Well, well, you know, the judge is the jury's right in there in front of the judge all day. So she's probably looking and saying this person looks like they've been paying attention to everything. This person looks like they've been taking, you know, notes, things like this. You got what the foreperson's job is to really kind of manage the jury to ask any questions if they go back to the judge. So you want somebody who, you know, looks more responsible. Okay, let's go to Steve. You're up next. Steve question. Yes. Quick question. If there is a hung jury, did she have to pay the whole amount, all that money over again from scratch? She does. She does. Right. So any, I mean, they're still representing her. It's a whole, it would be a whole separate trial. I mean, she doesn't have to have Alan Jackson and David Yeneti the second run. I don't, and I, that's obviously up to them and what their decisions would be. But it doesn't seem fair that it's not her fault that there's a hung jury. Now she's got to pay down again, double down. Right. But it's also, I mean, the lawyers are doing work. So they have to get paid for them, you know, and they have to get paid for that time. They probably factor all this in because they know that it could go either way, right? I mean, there's usually, you know, there's a set price for, okay, if we get to this point, you know, if they had gotten it dismissed prior to trial, then there's, you know, an additional fee to get through trial and then any post trial appeals or anything like that. So it's a lot of money. She's, there's a lot of money being spent on this case. Justin, what have you got in there? Good morning. I'd like to know what happens after the verdict is read. When can we really hear Karen's story? If she goes to jail, can we hear it? If she's still, if she isn't convicted, can we hear it? Like when can we hear her talk about what happened? So, I mean, she can talk anytime she wants. She went on Nightline last year and she did tell some of her story there. It's really up to her. My advice would always be just don't talk about anything. You know, there's the potential for civil lawsuits after this. So anything she says there could be used against her if there's any proceedings that way, if the O'Keeves are, you know, and I don't know whether that's for certain or not, but especially if it's hung, she's not going to say anything, she's not going to talk. So, you know, my recommendation as an attorney is just always to stay quiet. The couple of times she did talk outside the courthouse, I don't know, it kind of had a weird effect on me. I didn't, yeah, I'm like, I don't think this is a good idea. I think that I do think it's part of their strategy because, you know, I mean, whatever way you want to look at it, P.I. clearly is one of the pieces of this puzzle. And so, when she's coming out every day and being asked questions, I definitely think that's, you know, they've talked about that and how to answer. But I think some of the answers, Billy, people are agreeing with you that maybe the response isn't so appropriate. Well, you have to be so careful. One single word you say wrong could have an effect on the verdict and on your future. Right. And that's why we say, you know, but also like her facial expressions within the court. Well, right. I actually have a question if this becomes a hung during it to do the retrial. Now, at the end of the day, this was to highly publicize before. And they were, they still were able to find people that didn't really know about it. Right. But now I feel like it's going to be a lot harder to find an impartial jury because we've been watching this for 10 weeks. Right. So there's always the possibility that they could move it out and off a county or they could bring a jury in from someplace else. You know, that's something that would have to be decided if they do, you know, if there is a Mr. Lots of ifs, obviously. But it, it, you'd be surprised for as much as, you know, when we're in it. So we're really paying attention to it. But I still talk to a lot of people who kind of know, like, I'm not really following it that closely. You'd be surprised at how many people same with me. A lot of people are just, they're busy. Yeah. Yeah. They don't have the time. They don't. And you, and it's almost, it's almost one of those cases that if you don't have the time to really devote to it, people are just like, I'm not paying attention all because it's too much. So what you're saying is we have too much time on our hands. We have time for one more talk morning. I have a question for Ms. Loftus. So do you think one of the reasons why the jury might be taking so long to deliberate is kind of public backlash? If they come back with a guilty verdict, there are going to be a lot of people who are very upset. But if they come back with not guilty, then there's the fear of retaliation from the Canton police or the state police, the McCabe's, the Albertsons. Do you think that's a factor in any way? It could be. I would hope not. You know, jurors, obviously their information, as Steve said yesterday, I think that, you know, you could track them down, things like that. But if they don't want to talk, they don't have to. Obviously, it's hard to avoid what's going on. They obviously see the people when they come inside, the protesters, the, you know, the supporters. So I think there's a lot riding on it. But ultimately, I think they're really thinking about it because somebody lost their life, somebody's being charged and has their life on the line. And it's a serious decision and they're doing their job. So there's a lot of factors that go into it. So they have another full day of deliberations today, right, which would be day four or five days. Day four. Day three and a half. Day three. Yeah, it really is day three and a half because we didn't have much on like three hours. So there may be a verdict today. Maybe not. If not, are you back on Monday. We should be here Monday, because if there's a verdict, we got to talk about it. It's all we got to talk about.