How could Trooper Michael Proctor's damaging texts about Karen Read impact her trial outcome?
DEDHAM - There were hours of testimony in Karen Read's trial Monday, but one hour stuck out for many who were listening. Trooper Michael Proctor, the case officer leading John O'Keefe's death investigation, read his damaging texts from his personal phone about the case out loud in court.
The texts were to his wife, his friends, and coworkers and superiors within State Police. He used several expletives, referred to Read as a "whackjob," made jokes about her medical condition, and suggested he was searching her personal phone for nude photos.
Read is accused of killing her boyfriend, Boston Police Officer John O'Keefe, by hitting him with her car back in 2022.
These damning texts were a part of his direct examination, as a witness for the prosecution.
Why would prosecutors call Proctor to the stand?
"The prosecution's in a really tough point when they decided to call Trooper Proctor, because they have to decide if they meet this head on, and be the one that asked him the questions, and then allow him to explain it, or if they let it come up in cross examination," Emily D. Baker explains.
She's a California-based former district attorney with a popular online stream channel with analysis of the case daily. "If [texts] come up in cross examination, there's no explanation. It's 'you said this, you said that,'" she explained.
The texts were "worse than I expected," Baker told WBZ. She said it's "extremely unusual" to have a law enforcement officer's personal cellphone extracted and become evidence in a trial, typically because officers know better than to use their personal phones to discuss a case.
"Once those personal cellphones get extracted, it's everything," she explained. "And that could be the officer's own photos of their family themselves, their children, personal text messages, emails. It opens up everything, and they know that very well."
On Monday, some jurors were visibly shaking their heads or gasping subtly at some of the texts. Ten of the 17 jurors are women.
How will the texts impact jury deliberations?
"I don't know how the jurors are going to get around it, because even if the jurors don't believe the defense theory of the case, I don't know how they get around this investigation seeming to have a direction from the very beginning," Baker said.
"The jury's going to start looking for people who aren't connected, and in this case there's only a few of those witnesses, and I think we've got some to go. So, I want to see the cellphones, the medical examiner, and any accident reconstruction," in the rest of the state's case, she said.
In addition, Proctor's texts to supervisors and coworkers - in his words, joking - about looking for nude pictures on Karen Read's phone suggest poor evidence preservation, Baker says.
"He seemed to be manipulating her cellphone directly," Baker explained. "So, any evidence from her cellphone, I'm going to question because in my experience, I've never seen anyone manipulate a device. That device is always extracted into a mirrored image or drive or a Cellebrite extraction."
Impact on public perception of police
Proctor's testimony could also influence public perception not only of this trial, but of policing in general.
"This goes beyond just darker humor," Baker said. "This goes into really a disdain for the person that he is supposed to be objectively investigating, and it really leans into people's fears that the people policing us really don't see us as equal citizens to them."
On Tuesday, the Massachusetts State Police confirmed Trooper Proctor is still employed by the agency and he is the subject of an open Internal Affairs investigation. A spokesperson would not confirm whether he was actively working or on leave.
The State Police union said it would not comment until after the trial is over.
Proctor will be back on the stand Wednesday morning for more cross examination.