The Karen Read Trial: Drowning in Noise, Justice on Mute

If there is one takeaway that anyone watching the Karen Read trial online can agree upon, it’s that the case-- from pretrial through present day-- has spawned its own unique brand of digital noise.

During the first, and now second Karen Read trial, the online commentary resulting from the livestream of the trial has, almost daily, erupted into a raging digital wasteland fueled by online insults, vile taunts and cruel attacks of John J. O’Keefe’s family, prosecution witnesses, as well as anyone daring to express an opposing viewpoint. The toxicity has gotten so pervasive that even a retired Massachusetts judge- someone trained in measured judgment and restraint, with invaluable firsthand local court knowledge- has faced digital vitriol for sharing highly informed legal perspectives. All of this noise highlights a certain absurdity and online dysfunction relating to the Karen Read case, but it also has broader implications of how deeply poisoned true crime discourse has become lately, how such discourse undermines our criminal justice system, and whether justice can survive in an environment where the loudest voices seem less interested in truth than in feeding the outrage machine.

This is one of the more comprehensive overriding issues that continue to interest us at F.A.C.E.S. as we study the unique ecosystem of online true crime content, particularly in how it’s increasingly favoring scandal-mongering and character assassination over facts, leading to discourse that harms crime victims. The Karen Read case has, for years now, become our laboratory, a real-time experiment in how some unethical content appears to weaponize audiences and favor clicks and views over facts.

What we are witnessing is genuinely disturbing; the case appears to suggest the ease at which some creators manipulate audiences and public opinion in order to exploit the viral nature of outrage and emotion for clicks and views; the dangers presented by some irresponsible and unethical content creators that exploit audience trust to orchestrate campaigns of harassment against victims and witnesses while maintaining plausible deniability; and the manipulation of naïve people into becoming instruments of targeted crime victim and witness abuse, perhaps without even realizing it in some instances.

In some legal circles, there's growing concern that much of the noisiest Karen Read online commentary is not about uncovering truth—instead, it's often discussed as litigation public relations (and yes, that does exist) dressed up as legal analysis. In other words, the goal isn't to educate a concerned public; it's to craft narratives, capture clicks, and capitalize on unknowing and generous audiences who may prefer comfortable lies to uncomfortable realities about judges, evidence, witnesses, and how our legal system works.

What's particularly troubling is watching some attorneys—people who should know better—offer commentary that sometimes seems deliberately misinformed or one-sided. In court, these same lawyers must operate under strict rules designed to protect the process and ensure fairness and integrity of the system. But in online commentary, there appears to be no rules at all, leaving some observers feeling that creators may simply be pandering to audiences who wallow in their own biases, demanding confirmation rather than challenge; turning analysis into performance art for the digitally depraved.

But this is what gets lost in all the online noise: nobody knows EXACTLY what happened the night John J. O’Keefe died, except the people who were actually there. While it may seem intuitive, it nevertheless bears emphasizing here, because this uncomfortable reality is what viral content creators do not appear to want to acknowledge. Even if Karen Read confided every detail to her defense team or to an online provocateur blogger, that secondhand account will never be completely accurate because those individuals were not witnesses to the actual tragic events that occurred that cold winter night. Likewise, testifying experts will look to available data to try and determine to their best ability what they believe happened, but it’s ultimately just their opinion, informed by whatever data points they can put into place. In other words, unless there is clear video footage or a completely reliable eyewitness to an alleged crime, all theories constitute

educated guesses based on available evidence.

The reality is that all theories require some degree of faith on the part of the jurors to reach a verdict. In other words, while some of the online Karen Read commentary continues to hone in on and isolate certain cherry-picked details to imagine the existence of all sorts of alternative possibilities, it does not follow that these details necessitate a jury reaching a not guilty verdict. Rather, the jury will consider all of the evidence, the totality of everything admitted and presented in court-- every witness, every expert, every exhibit, every point made by each “side” must be examined. The jury will determine credibility, weigh conflicting opinions, and decide what to accept or discard.

Consequently, to find Karen Read guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, the jury does not just look at every little detail in a vacuum, consider every conceivable alternative possibility on earth (or any other fantastical other-worldly scenario like the one facitiously suggested by Commonwealth expert witness Dr. Judson B. Welcher that Karen Read’s SUV could rocket into outer space) and then reach absolute certainty. Speculative, illogical, or improbable scenarios unsupported by credible evidence do not constitute reasonable doubt—it’s just noise. And online, it can be deafening.

At the end of this trial, I'm confident that an unbiased jury will carefully examine, weigh, and interpret all of the evidence in their search for truth and justice. Whatever the jury decides, I will respect their service and verdict, even if I personally disagree. That's because I believe in the integrity of our legal system, and I rely upon the collective wisdom of twelve impartial citizens who've heard every piece of evidence firsthand.

But here's the thing: if true crime consumers are going to depend on online legal commentary for their objective understanding of what's happening in criminal trials, we need trustworthy information. If we, as an audience, tolerate dishonesty and bias seeping into such coverage—or worse, if we remain indifferent while creators exploit our tribal psychology and confirmation bias for clicks and views—we'll never get anywhere near “truth.” Instead, we'll become exactly what some manipulative content creators may want: ignorant, easily misled audiences who will never truly understand justice or appreciate or have faith in the remarkable system we've built to pursue it.

And that may be the greatest tragedy of all- not just the individual criminal cases that get spun or distorted, but the slow poisoning of our collective ability to recognize truth for ourselves when we see it. The “true” crime unfolding in live time lately isn't just what happens when we are un- or misinformed about what we are observing in courtrooms—it's also what happens when we let ourselves be programmed by people who slyly profit from our outrage while remaining coldly indifferent to the damage they cause to victims, and to faith in the criminal justice system itself.