Karen Read was charged with killing her Boston police officer boyfriend John O'Keefe in 2022. She was acquitted at a retrial in 2025. The O'Keefe family filed a wrongful death suit in 2024 against Karen Read and the two Canton, Massachusetts, bars they visited on the night he died, the Waterfall Bar and Grille and C.F. McCarthy's. The civil suit, filed by Paul O'Keefe on behalf of his family and his brother's estate, also alleges negligent infliction of emotional distress. In this civil case the plaintiffs only have to show the preponderance of evidence points to it being more likely than not of Karen Read being responsible for O'Keefe's death and associated negligent infliction of emotional distress.