Dateline NBC
Karen Read's retrial kicks off. A verdict in the "Mommy Doomsday" case. And Scott Peterson's blockbuster filing.
Thu, 24 Apr 2025
Listen to this week's episode of the Dateline: True Crime Weekly podcast with Andrea Canning. In Massachusetts, opening statements in the second trial of the woman accused of running over her police officer boyfriend. In Arizona, a jury returns a verdict at Lori Vallow Daybell's latest trial. Harvey Weinstein faces a new accuser, and Scott Peterson's defense team says it has new witnesses and new evidence to prove his innocence. Plus, a juror turned podcaster.Find out more about the cases each week here: www.datelinetruecrimeweekly.comListen to Keith's podcast, Mommy Doomsday, about the Lori Vallow Daybell story here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/mommy-doomsday/id1540849480Link for "Sequestered" here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/sequestered-podcast/id1792642561
Chapter 1: What is the overview of this week's true crime cases?
Welcome to Dateline True Crime Weekly. I'm Andrea Canning. It's April 24th, and here's what's on our docket. There is a verdict in the Arizona murder trial of Lori Vallow Daybell, a.k.a. Mommy Doomsday. Did her high-risk gamble to represent herself backfire?
Lori Vallow had no reaction. She stood up, walked out of the courtroom, and that was that.
Other stories we've got our eyes on this week, a bombshell filing in Scott Peterson's case. His defense team says they have evidence that proves his innocence and testimony begins at the retrial of disgraced movie producer Harvey Weinstein.
The big difference is Weinstein is facing a new charge, an additional charge of first-degree criminal sexual act against a new accuser.
Plus, we'll be talking to juror number 11, or Sarah Reed, as she's known in her daily life. She'll tell us about her experience as a juror on the Jasmine Pace murder trial and her hit podcast, Sequestered.
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Chapter 2: What are the key details in Karen Reid's retrial for murder?
All of the questions and emotions and details, you just carry them around in silence. It's almost like an emotional pressure cooker.
But before all that, we're heading to Dedham, Massachusetts, where Karen Reid's retrial has finally begun. On Tuesday morning, more than nine months after her last trial ended with a hung jury, Karen Reid's case made its way back to court for opening statements.
For the Honorable Beverly Canone, the Justice of the Superior Court, this court is in session. Please be seated.
Karen Reid is accused of the murder of her Boston police officer boyfriend, John O'Keefe. Prosecutors say Reid hit him with her SUV outside a party hosted by another Boston officer and left him to die in the snow. The charges Reid is facing in her second trial may sound familiar. They're the same as last time.
Second-degree homicide, manslaughter while under the influence, and leaving the scene of a collision causing death. Reid has pleaded not guilty to all charges, and her defense has argued she's being framed for O'Keefe's death. Now, with a new prosecutor, new witnesses, and months of media coverage, all eyes are on this second trial.
Dateline producer Sue Simpson is back to take us inside opening statements. Sue, thank you so much for joining us again. Thank you, Andrea. It's great to be back. And I will tell you, it's great to get this trial underway. Yeah. So up first, we had the prosecution's opening statement.
Good morning, Your Honor. Hank, run in for the Commonwealth.
Hank Brennan was hired by the Norfolk County DA's office as a special prosecutor to try the case. He is well-known in Massachusetts because he represented notorious Boston crime boss James Whitey Bulger during his 2013 trial. You probably remember that, Andrea.
Oh, yes. Yeah.
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Chapter 3: Who are the main legal players in Karen Reid's trial and what are their arguments?
He really started to get detailed. with his opening statement for the jury.
At 6.04 a.m. on January 29, 2022, the alarm bell sounded in the Canton Fire Department. Firefighter, paramedic Timothy Nuttall knew what that meant. His heart skipped a beat. He raced to his equipment and he picked up his bag, which was meticulous.
He approached his opening remarks as if he were telling a story to the jury. You know, the time, the morning, the alarm bell. We're living in a certain POV, a perspective of a firefighter, paramedic Timothy Nuttall, one of the first responders who came to the scene.
And he looked up. I misread and he said, what happened? And you'll hear her words to a firefighter, not all. She said, I hit him. I hit him. I hit him.
He is important because he heard Karen say, I hit him, meaning I hit John. And the prosecution says, Karen confessed at the scene by saying these words, I hit him, I hit him, I hit him.
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Chapter 4: What evidence and testimonies were presented in Karen Reid's retrial opening statements?
And the prosecution went on to play a clip of Karen's interview with Dateline correspondent Dennis Murphy, where she talks about that moment.
I mean, I didn't think I hit him, hit him, but could I have clipped him? Could I have tagged him in the knee and incapacitated him? He didn't look mortally wounded as far as I could see. Or could I have done something that knocked him out and his drunkenness and in the cold didn't come to again?
And this would have been the moment you dropped him off at the party.
Karen contends that she phrased it as a question, not as a statement. Could I have hit him? So by playing it, the prosecution apparently wants to show jurors that Karen in the moment was trying to work out how she could possibly have injured John with her car.
Do you feel like Hank Brennan gave an outline of how the state will proceed with their case, Sue?
What I think, Andrea, is that he focused on data. He focused on the technical aspects and the technology of the case. And he said all of those would show that Karen Reid killed John O'Keefe.
I simply ask you to follow the evidence, follow the science, follow the data. Ignore speculation, surmise conjecture. It will lead you to the truth.
He also talked about John O'Keefe's cell phone at length, that it was found under John's body at the scene, and that it had a lot to say.
He focused on location data, on health data, and interesting here, the temperature of the cell phone battery. You know, what he did was he picked plot points where John and Karen were and what the temperature was, you know, at certain points in their storyline that night. He also said there'd be evidence from the black box, he called it, from Karen's Lexus, her SUV.
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Chapter 5: What are the defense's claims and strategy in Karen Reid's retrial?
Picture the scene. Blood-curdling screams. ambulances, emergency lights on, fire engines, ladder trucks, paramedics, patrol vehicles, patrol cruisers, police officers, first responders, firefighters, all swarming all over Brian Albert's lawn, literally feet under his bedroom window. Yet Brian Albert, a sworn peace officer, a first responder himself,
never walked outside his house to see if he could help a fallen fellow officer on his own front lawn.
I remember during the first trial, Brian Elbert testified that he was asleep and had his window curtains closed at the time. Okay, Sue, there is so much to this story. So much.
We'll get into all of it, too, Andrea.
We will. And even though this is the second trial, somehow it feels just as interesting as the first one. Thank you, Sue. We'll be hearing from you a lot. Thanks, Andrea. Can't wait. Up next, earlier this week, Lori Vallow Daybell made a final plea to the jury at her Arizona murder trial before deliberations began. What did they decide? Lori Vallow Daybell, a.k.a.
Mommy Doomsday, has spent the last few weeks on trial in Phoenix, Arizona for conspiring to murder her fourth husband, Charles Vallow. Lori has also spent the last few weeks serving as her own defense attorney, arguing that her brother Alex shot Charles in self-defense.
Did you see with your eyes? or hear with your ears or personally witness me conspire with my brother, Alex Cox, to murder my husband, Charles Bell?
No. On Monday, she left the jury with her closing arguments and deliberations began. Tuesday, they came back with a verdict. Here to fill us in is Nate Eaton, news director at East Idaho News. And he is also serving as an NBC News contributor on the case. Hi, Nate. You're actually in Phoenix, away from home, covering this.
Yeah, I've been here the past few weeks, and what a ride it's been.
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Chapter 6: What was the verdict in Lori Vallow Daybell's Arizona murder trial?
Her words tell us that she was involved in this killing. Her actions and her words tell us the motives behind this murder.
Chad and money. The prosecutor also highlighted a text from Lori to Chad.
Right, yes. She texted Chad something to the effect of, bad news, I'm not the beneficiary.
So I talked to the insurance company. He changed it in March. Probably it was Ned before we got rid of him.
The prosecutor said, Lori Vallow and Chad Daybell believed that a spirit, a zombie, you could say, named Ned had inhabited Charles's body. Chad then wrote back, I wonder if he made the change before he got two bullets to the chest. That's a lot. Pretty chilling evidence there.
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Chapter 7: How did Lori Vallow Daybell represent herself and what were the closing arguments?
The jury got to hear Lori give her closing argument, and this was really the final test of her acting as her own attorney in this trial. How do you think she did?
Lori prepared a passionate closing argument, and she really tried to stress that this was a family tragedy and not a crime.
This is an attempt by the state to try to retrofit a crime that doesn't exist. This event was not a crime. It was a tragedy. Don't let them turn my family tragedy into a crime.
She did try to testify a couple of times during that closing statement, which was not allowed. The prosecution objected to that.
A two-minute period changed our lives forever. How are you supposed to choose between three people you love, your husband, your daughter, your brother?
All right. I'll caution the defendant not to testify about things that were not entered into evidence.
The jury got the case Monday. They went home, then started deliberating again Tuesday morning. How long would you say in total they were deliberating on this?
The first day, the jury deliberated about 17 minutes. That probably gave them enough time to pick a foreperson, and then they probably said, we're going to go home and sleep on this. They came back the next day on Tuesday, and they total deliberated a little less than three hours.
All right. What was the verdict, Nate?
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Chapter 8: What reactions followed the Lori Vallow Daybell verdict and what is the case background?
So that trial is set to begin the beginning of June.
Nate, thank you so much for these updates all throughout the trial. For more of Nate's coverage of the trial and the case in general, check out eastidahonews.com. And to learn more about Lori's story, check out Keith's podcast series, Mommy Doomsday, which is available wherever you get your podcasts. Thanks so much.
Thank you.
When we come back, it's time for Dateline Roundup. We've got the latest twist in Scott Peterson's campaign to prove his innocence. And Harvey Weinstein faces a new accuser in court. Plus, a woman tells us how jury service changed her life and why she made a podcast about it. Welcome back. Joining us for this week's Roundup is Dateline Digital producer Veronica Mazzecca. Hey, Veronica. Hey.
So our first story comes out of New York where opening statements began this week in the retrial of disgraced movie mogul Harvey Weinstein. His first trial really was one of the defining moments of the Me Too movement. Veronica, just give us a refresher.
Yeah, so back in 2020, Weinstein was convicted in New York on two counts, the third-degree rape of an aspiring actress and a criminal sexual act against a production assistant.
But last year, almost exactly a year ago, actually, a panel of appellate court judges ruled 4-3 that the trial court had erred by allowing the prosecution to bring in evidence of prior acts that Weinstein wasn't charged for.
And what they're talking about is at the trial, the prosecution, in addition to calling the two women I just mentioned, called four additional women to the stand to describe their experiences with Weinstein.
Weinstein, who has maintained his innocence from the beginning, remained in prison this past year because New York isn't the only place where he's been convicted of a rape charge.
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