A retired Canton police officer returned to the witness stand in the ongoing trial of Karen Read, the Massachusetts woman accused of murdering her boyfriend, Boston police officer John O'Keefe.
Paul Gallagher, the highest-ranking officer who responded to the Canton, Massachusetts home were O'Keefe, 46, was found unconscious in the snow, was grilled by Read's defense attorney on May 5 about the unconventional methods he used to collect evidence.
Gallagher started his testimony after a firefighter told jurors that the former financial professor said "I hit him" at least four times after O'Keefe was found in January 2022. Katie McLaughlin's testimony echoed earlier testimony from star witness Jennifer McCabe, a friend of the couple, who told the jury that Read, 45, repeated the phrase three times.
Prosecutors say Read hit O'Keefe with her Lexus in a drunken rage and then fled the scene, leaving him for dead outside the home of a fellow Boston cop. Defense attorneys have long maintained that Read was framed and the investigation was marred by bias and incompetence.
The case has turned into a years-long whodunnit legal saga that has garnered massive intrigue from true-crime fans across the country, spurring an array of podcasts, movies, and television shows. Read is back in court after the trial in 2024 ended in a hung jury.
Massachusetts State Police Trooper Nicholas Guarino returned to the stand on May 6 and walked jurors through the dozens of calls and texts from Read to O'Keefe on the morning he died.
Prosecutors played multiple profanity-laden voicemails that Read left O'Keefe, in which she says she hates him, accuses him of infidelity and tells him his children are alone. O'Keefe became the guardian of his niece and nephew after his sister and brother-in-law died.
Guarino previously took the stand to read aloud text messages between Read and O'Keefe in the days and hours before his death.
In their messages, O'Keefe and Read discussed their strained relationship, troubles with parenting and plans to see one another. At several points throughout the conversation, O'Keefe and Read bickered and acknowledged they were dissatisfied with the state of their relationship.
"Tell me if you're interested in someone else, can't think of any other reason you are like this," Read wrote at one point. O'Keefe replied: "Things haven't been great between us for a while. Ever consider that?"
Robert Gilman, who has worked as a meteorologist for over 45 years, described the historic blizzard that struck Canton the day before O'Keefe died. Gilman said about two feet of snow accumulated on the frozen ground, visibility dropped below a quarter of a mile and wind gusts reached up to 50 miles per hour during the storm.
"This was the biggest January storm in history," Gilman said.
Gilman said the snow started falling lightly around midnight on Jan. 29 - the day O'Keefe died - and picked up in intensity around 4 a.m., slowed down around 7 p.m. and ended altogether by 10 p.m. He said the temperature in the area was below freezing in the early morning hours on Jan. 29 and continued to drop as the storm worsened.
Alan Jackson, Read's attorney, began his second day of questioning Gallagher by asking whether he failed to take certain investigative steps because other law enforcement officers were involved, suggesting the investigation was botched from the start. O'Keefe was found unconscious outside the home of Brian Albert, a fellow Boston police officer.
Gallagher agreed that in his initial search he didn't find evidence including a hat, shoe or pieces of broken taillight and didn't secure security footage from the house of a Canton police officer who lived across the street from Albert. Gallagher also agreed that he never attempted to search the Albert house or separate the witnesses to take their statements.
Jackson asked if the reason Gallagher failed to do any of these things was because the homeowners were police officers.
"Absolutely not," Gallagher said, later telling prosecutors he only performed a limited search because he had no reason to believe a crime had been committed.
Jackson also pointed out that Gallagher had a personal and professional relationship with Brian Higgins, an agent for the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives who was at the Albert home the night before O'Keefe was found, according to previous testimony. Gallagher said the Canton Police Department was removed from the investigation before he learned Higgins was involved.
Gallagher told jurors he arrived at 34 Fairview Road early Jan. 29, 2022, in his personal vehicle just after O'Keefe had been transported to the hospital. After seeing pink spots in the snow, Gallagher used a leaf blower to clear the area, revealing bright red blood and a broken cocktail glass.
Gallagher collected the bloody snow in red Solo cups obtained from an officer who lived nearby. The cups were then taken to the police department in a paper grocery bag.
Gallagher said he didn't wait to get proper equipment to collect evidence because of the worsening weather. The area was not yet considered a crime scene.
"I expected it to be John's DNA, and I wasn't going to get a second chance at it," Gallagher said. "It was either collect it or never have it."
On the second day of questioning, Alan Jackson, Read's attorney, showed Gallagher a photograph of the unsealed cups near Read's SUV at the Canton Police Department and asked if the setup could be a "recipe for cross-contamination." Gallagher disagreed, saying that a trained criminalist was present and prevented such contamination.
CourtTV has been covering the case against Read and the criminal investigation since early 2022, when O'Keefe's body was found outside a Canton home.
You can watch CourtTV's live feed of the Read trial proceedings from Norfolk Superior Court in Dedham, Massachusetts. Proceedings begin at 9 a.m. ET.
Contributing: Michael Loria, Karissa Waddick and Jeanine Santucci, USA TODAY; Jessica Trufant and Brad Petrishen, The Patriot Ledger