‘Turtleboy’ wants to see evidence in domestic assault case
Seeks details of police encounter
Aidan Kearney, the blogger known as “Turtleboy” who’s charged with intimidating witnesses in the Karen Read case and separately with domestic assault and battery of a former girlfriend, wants prosecutors to turn over evidence in the latter case, including any indication the woman may have been impaired when she spoke to police, as well as details on anything investigators may have offered in exchange for her cooperation, legal filings show.
In a motion filed Thursday in Dedham District Court, where the assault case is pending, Kearney’s lawyer asked a judge to compel prosecutors to turn over 13 items of discovery, or evidence the government must provide defense counsel prior to trial.
Among the items was all “exculpatory evidence” related to the woman’s “ability to perceive or recollect at the time of the incident or at the time of police interviews due to mental condition, drugs, or alcohol known to police or prosecutors,” the filing said.
Kearney is also seeking any evidence of “promises, rewards, or inducements” that investigators may have offered to the former girlfriend, another female witness, and a male witness, as well as records of any possible correspondence between the former girlfriend and Special Assistant District Attorney Kenneth S. Mello, who’s prosecuting both cases against Kearney, records show.
Kearney, 42, of Holden, has pleaded not guilty to charges of assault and battery on a household or family member and witness intimidation, records show. He was ordered held without bail the day after Christmas for up to 90 days. He appeared in Dedham District Court for a pretrial hearing in the matter Thursday, legal filings show.
Kearney has another hearing scheduled for noon Friday in the Read matter.
In that case pending in Norfolk Superior Court, he’s accused of intimidating and harassing multiple witnesses in the case against Read, who’s charged with second-degree murder for allegedly backing her SUV into her boyfriend, Boston Police Officer John O’Keefe and leaving him for dead during a blizzard in Canton in 2022.
She has pleaded not guilty and is currently free on bail, with a trial slated for March.
Prosecutors say Read and O’Keefe, had driven to the Canton home of another Boston police officer early on Jan. 29, 2022, after a night out drinking. Read, prosecutors allege, reversed the SUV into O’Keefe after he exited the vehicle and then found him several hours later laying in the snow when she returned to the area with two other women to look for him.
Read’s attorneys allege that O’Keefe was beaten inside the Canton home and that a family dog injured his arm during the tussle before his body was planted outside in an effort to frame Read.
Prosecutors have dismissed the defense assertion as baseless.
In a surprising development Wednesday, Mello said State Police had seized two cellphones from Read in connection with the witness-intimidation cases Mello has brought against Kearney.
“We are looking into any involvement Karen Read might have in that,” Mello said.
Also Wednesday, Mello filed a motion alleging that after Kearney was sent to jail in December, his lawyer Timothy J. Bradl misrepresented a woman as another lawyer helping Kearney. That, Mello claimed, allowed Kearney and the woman to have unmonitored communication in an effort to coordinate “continued harassment online.”
In the motion, Mello sought what he acknowledged was an “extraordinary and perhaps unprecedented” step: asking the judge to appoint an independent party to monitor communications between Kearney and Bradl and report back to the court.
The goal, the filing states, would be “to ensure that Attorney Bradl is not making his telephone available to third parties or is not engaging in communications . . . that will be transmitted to third parties.”
In an interview Wednesday, Bradl said he didn’t mean to mislead anybody and simply was incorrect about the woman, who was volunteering for a civil law firm that was aiding Kearney.