The following are not established and remain disputed or unproven:
The precise mechanism of injury (vehicle strike vs. alternative scenarios)
The exact timeline of incapacitation
Whether any third parties were involved
Motive based claims (e.g., intent, cover-up, financial or reputational incentives)
Assertions that any single interpretation of the data is “definitive"
All digital data requires: calibration context
device-specific limitations forensic validation
Absence of recorded movement is not proof of absence of movement. I would have thought that the outcome of defamation cases will hinge on intent and knowledge, not just truth/falsity.?
JOK has not gotten justice, anyone that is not concerned about the behaviour of everyone involved in this entire debacle should be absolutely aghast.
there is extensive digital, physical, and testimonial evidence, none of it establishes a single uncontested account of what happened; instead, conclusions about timing, cause of injury, and responsibility depend on interpretations of data that carry technical uncertainties and competing explanations, which is why a jury could not reach a unanimous verdict and why related defamation claims remain unresolved
This could be argued that it means that beyond the basic facts of death, presence, and ongoing litigation, nearly every substantive claim about causation or culpability is still an inference rather than a definitive conclusion
Your post is theory driven narrative that narrows the field of relevant actors. Focussing mainly on Karen Read, but not the fired lead officer ...... What is that ,?
"Absence of recorded movement is not proof of absence of movement. I would have thought that the outcome of defamation cases will hinge on intent and knowledge, not just truth/falsity.?"
Regarding absence of recorded movement in the phone data, note that the phone starts recording movement again in the morning, after JOK's body is moved and the phone is picked up. This demonstrates that the phone had been capable of recording movement all night. The phone didn't power off. It was found underneath his body. It shows movement up until a time that is in very close proximity to when Read reversed her SUV, then it stops showing movement, then it shows movement again in the morning when we know it was moved. Note also that the phone's temperature data are consistent with it being underneath JOK's body all night but don't fit with any other theory. It didn't get cold enough to have been in the snow, exposed to the outside. It didn't get hot enough to have been in the house. We know the temp data was being recorded accurately because we see the temperature quickly go down after JOK's body is moved off of it, and then we see it go back up when it's taken off the ground and put in a pocket and then a vehicle.
So JOK's body was on top of the phone all night, beginning right around when Read accelerated in reverse and then drove off. I haven't heard anyone propose an alternative that would also be consistent with the motion and temperature data.
As for showing defamation, there are 5 elements, each of which the plaintiffs need to show by a preponderance of the evidence: 1. Claims identified plantiffs 2. Claims are false 3. Claims were relayed to a 3rd party 4. Claims were made negligently 5. Claims damaged plaintiffs' reputations
They don't need intent, though if they did they'd have it quite easily: Karen and TB's communications to each other are dripping with intent; they openly celebrate harming the reputations of the witnesses. TB openly asserts that his goal is to make their lives hell.
The plaintiffs don't need to show knowledge either, just negligence. Negligence would be Karen and TB not making reasonable attempts to confirm the truthfullness of the alleged defamatory statements before making them. So, did they make a reasonable attempt to confirm that, say, Collin Albert murdered JOK and Jen McCabe was on cover-up duty? It appears more like they made this up out of thin air.
I must be vocally self critical here, there appears to be patterned absence, which is probative.e.g. Continuous recording before
Continuous recording after
Gap aligned with the critical event, but....
..“This demonstrates that the phone had been capable of recording movement all night.”
Is an overreach.
The phone recorded movement before
The phone recorded movement after
What it does not prove is if it was continuously capable of recording movement during the gap
That no intervening condition (software state, sensor threshold, obstruction, battery optimization, etc.) affected recording
It's kinda like converting consistency with a hypothesis into proof of that hypothesis.A phone under a body in winter conditions is not a simple “outside air temperature” sensor, What temperature range corresponds to “snow exposure”
What range corresponds to “indoors”
How insulation (clothing, body contact, ground contact) alters readings etc, we are all guilty of treating correlation with causation, but ..Phone being dropped independently
Sensor ceasing to log for unrelated reasons
Intermediate handling etc, all need to be. excluded.
I would. E interested in the data that wasn't included or sought or challenged robustly , is there any truth to the claim that the chief who lived opposite viewed his own ring doorbell and said there was nothing on it ? ( And therefore police never looked at it ) Or is that BS too ? There's so much misinformation around, but there is also a dearth of rigour and investigation into the actions of multiple other parties that night.
I don't object to calling this evidence "probative". I certainly agree that a hypothesis isn't "proved" simply because there is evidence consistent with it: "affirming the consequent" is, after all, deductively invalid.
Then again, crimes are rarely proved with deductively certainly. Maybe we shouldn't even be using the word "proved". The challenge here is to do interference to the best explanation, give our limited information. You can't prove a theory just by fitting it to facts, but you can show it superior to other theories that don't fit the facts, or that require heroic contortions in order for the facts to fit. And this ain't particle physics; eventually we run out of plausible alternative theories.
So, regarding the phone data, it's not impossible that JOK went inside the house but something happened with his phone that prevented movement data from being recorded during that period. But that would be a really remarkable bit of bad luck for Read: his phone just happens to stop recording his movement right after she guns her SUV in reverse, but whenever caused his phone to do this was no longer an issue in the morning when his phone was moved out from under his dead body? And also his phone extraction record shows no indication of whatever caused this temporary pause in data collection? Dang.
And hey, her rear tail light is broken, and her theory is that it was planted by cops who could not have known at the time that her SUV's data recorder would eventually show her backing up rapidly in reverse right before JOKs phone stops recording movement. What great luck for them!
The phone data and the physical evidence might not constitute deductive proof, but they do provide strong independent corroboration of each other.
Regarding the temperature data, I can only say that Ian Whiffin spent a long time going through this in his direct examination. I can't remember the exact numbers. I of course agree that we're talking in wide ranges of temperatures that could be "consistent" with the phone being inside vs exposed to the elements vs under JOKs body.
Regarding the "suspicious" behaviors of other parties, to address it I'd have to know what allegation(s) you have in mind. I'll just say that, big picture, an awful lot of spaghetti has been thrown at that particular wall without much regard for whether it sticks or how well any strand fits with the others. I don't think any of it sticks, and I don't think it sticking was ever the point. There's no coherent narrative holding it all together, just a bunch of independent "ooh look at this" and "ooh look at that" which, when combined, sound like they could be pieces of some of big conspiracy of some kind and let's not worry too much about the details. No, the point was always to convince the public (and, eventually, jury) that "reasonable doubt" could be established by sheer quantity rather than quality. As though 20 very loosely related pieces of minimally probabative evidence equals one piece of highly probabative evidence.
Or, to put it in light of the questions you asked about the phone data: every allegedly "suspicious" act by a third party can be explained by something far less incredible than a phone that just so happens to stop recording John's movement right after Karen backs up her SUV, but also happens to record movement just fine in the morning after his body is found. And none of them reinforce each other the way the phone data and physical evidence reinforce each other. I don't think it's intellectually consistent to be a demanding and principled skeptic with regard to the evidence pointing to Karen's guilt, but then take stuff like "the Alberts were calling each other" and "why didn't they come out of the house in the morning?" seriously.
Some very good points in this, appreciate your responses 👍
Honestly the only people that really know what went on are the occupants of 34 fairview and KR.
AK I believe is in a world of trouble ( intentional disruption) but I can't shake the fact that if this was a KR hit and run for want of a better term, it would be stronger, there is just too much ambiguity and outrageous behavior by other parties, rather than rehash the highlights which im sure you are aware, the subsequent actions by interested parties since the fateful night are not conducive with believable ' truths' ( my word smithing is failing me today but I hope you get the idea.!)
On one side the pieces of evidence are mutually reinforcing and make guilt a strong inference, but...and it's a huge but..uncertainty is a key evidentiary pillar..injuries were not necessarily consistent with a vehicle strike, including the absence of some classic impact-type leg injuries, also regards trying to apply equal rigor to:whether phone + vehicle truly synchronize reliably
whether their interpretation depends on contested assumptions, " there's no coherent narrative...." defense is not required to produce a coherent alternative narrative
It only needs to create reasonable doubt in the prosecution narrative, which it did, twice.
" None of the them reinforce..." Ian Whiffin himself acknowledged: location accuracy fluctuates wildly (meters to over a kilometer error range)
movement detection depends on sensor thresholds and context, so it's not as much if a slam dunk one would think it is, it probably could be, if the lead investigator wasn't such a biased person, in addition to the other spaghetti throwing you mentioned earlier, in totality, phone data is algorithmically interpreted evidence, not a recording of reality, inference is not supported without assumptions about sensor fidelity in that exact environment, was google or the browser company ever subpoenaed?
phone may have entered a low-motion detection state
phone may have been stationary while the person moved or vice versa
environmental conditions (snow, cold, obstruction) can degrade data quality
GPS accuracy drops significantly in exactly those conditions,the “clean breakpoint at 12:32” is not a clean physical breakpoint—it is a sensor-defined breakpoint
Legally, that distinction is huge, especially when ones freedom is on the line.
The simplest test one can apply is to ask, would you want Michael proctor investigating a tort or criminal event perpetrated on you ? I know I wouldn't, nor would I want anyone who was bringing in the waterfall or at that party in 34 Fairview near my situation.
There is a lack of integrity by all involved, it stinks, and I don't think the official narrative is true ( for lots of reasons ) but the main one is, integrity. As an LEO you are held to a higher standard and rightly so, if they had it, then there wouldn't have been a second trial, but it's so poor, legally, morally that even a second trial couldn't convince folks it was as they claimed it was ( I'm not claiming it is as KR says it is either ) but it definitely stinks.
Add to that the sketchy behavior by interested parties, and the CYA actions .... Something is off about the whole rhing
ambiguous digital evidence is treated as being deterministic, when it's not , I would agree if the entire thing hasn't been so shoddily run tbh, but it was mess up of epic proportions, MSP and CP failed JOK miserably, how many people involved have retired, been fired, demoted, out on leave, left etc? Is that just coincidence too ? It stinks.
Thanks for the reply. I suppose it's worth addressing standards of evidence. I did venture into that since you mentioned defamation, but my primary interest is about normal human standards of evidence rather than legal standards. When it comes to my own (of course subjective) standards for what I'm willing to believe, I think the evidence of Karen's guilt is overwhelming. Obviously the jury for her 2nd trial felt that it didn't meet the reasonable doubt standard, and the few jurors who've been interviewed say they sincerely do not believe she did it (one even has her own novel theory of what happened, but I'll avoid that tangent). I'll just say that I think the preponderance of the evidence standard is going to make things much harder for Karen in her civil cases.
I'm not gonna defend Proctor's texts; they're nasty and unprofessional and he sent them to people who had no right to inside information. I also haven't seen any evidence that he did anything to undermine Karen's civil rights (beyond sharing information with third parties who weren't entitled to it). Would I want to be investigated by him? Ideally I'd prefer someone with a cooler head, but if I'm innocent in this hypothetical then all I need is a cop who isn't gonna frame me. I don't think there's any actual evidence that Proctor tried to frame Karen. He did seem to loathe her, for sure. Did he loathe everyone he investigated in the way he loathed Karen? I have no idea. I do find Karen loathesome in general, and I can see how her behavior on Jan 29th would not endear her to an investigator. This doesn't excuse him sending those texts to his friends. But it doesn't bother me that cops *think* the things he wrote in those texts about people they geninuely believe to be murderers. That's just human.
As for the Canton police, only thing I fault them for is not taking more and better photos, and not documenting Karen's alleged "I hit him!" statements immediately. The solo cups and the leaf blower were them improvising in a challenging situation. The Keystone Cops narrative is really unfair.
Unless I've missed something, no one in law enforcement has been fired or disciplined for conduct that bears upon the integrity of the evidence itself. I fully agree that LEOs should be held to a higher standard, and Proctor failed on that front. I also think that Karen's team has exploited this in order to feed an evidence-free bonkerstown conspiracy theory.
I think your concerns about data quality are fair - I'm a statistician and I take data quality very seriously. What I'm saying is that there are good answers to all of your concerns. The data do not need to be perfect in order to be extremely corroborative of one theory relative to the others. When we know that there is imprecision in our data, we don't throw the data out, we incorporate that imprecision into the analysis.
So, yes, GPS data are subject to error. Whiffin spent a lot of time on this. We know that the GPS data do a very good job of tracking the roads that Karen drove down. So we have corroboration of its accuracy at least during that point in the night.
You're right that the precision of the GPS data fluctuates, and fluctuated throughout the night. When I say that the data show JOK "stops moving" right after Karen guns her SUV backward, I'm saying that this is the only explanation that makes sense in light of the data, not that the GPS coordinates are literally constant throughout the night - there is always some variation in the readings even if the phone is stationary. But the GPS data at this time were of reasonably high precision, on account of the Waze app being open (Whiffin said ~5meter). These error circles always include the place where JOK's body was found; usually this is near their center. There are periods of time when the GPS precision goes down enough such that error circles extend and overlap a portion of the house. But then there are times following that where the precision improves; during these times the house is always excluded and the flagpole is always close to the center of the error range. So, what's the alternative explanation? That JOK happened to be in that one small part of the house only during the short window of time in which the GPS was less precise, and the real killers managed to move him into the yard before the GPS became more precise? That JOK was alive and stumbling around but never got beyond 5m radius of the flagpole? I'm not trying to be cute, I've just never heard a fleshed-out alternative theory of what could have happened to John that is consistent with all these data, even when data error/imprecision is included.
I actually agree with you on one core point: this comes down to inference to the best explanation under uncertainty, not deductive proof.
Where I think your analysis is incomplete is that you’re treating the phone + vehicle data as the primary anchor, and everything else as noise when in reality, the qualitative integrity of the investigation itself is part of the evidentiary landscape, not a side issue.
You don’t need a “bonkerstown conspiracy” to have a compromised inference. You just need enough process failures, bias indicators, and post hoc contradictions to reduce confidence in the system producing the evidence.
There are a few non-trivial qualitative issues that matter here:
Lead investigator sending highly prejudicial, derogatory texts during the investigation, including sharing case details externally
Selective investigative focus (e.g., failure to robustly pursue or preserve alternative lines of inquiry early)
Witness inconsistencies and evolving statements under oath
Question marks around evidence handling and scene control in the initial respons
None of that “proves” an alternative theory but it directly impacts how much confidence you can place in the collection, interpretation, and framing of the digital and physical evidence you’re relying on.
Inference to the best explanation only works when the pipeline producing the evidence is itself reliable,
You said there’s no discipline tied to the integrity of the evidence. That’s not really accurate when you zoom out.
Across this case, multiple individuals connected to the investigation or its periphery have been:
Fired (lead investigator)
Suspended / reassigned
Placed on leave
Resigned or retired
Even if each action is technically for “conduct” rather than “evidence tampering,” that distinction is a bit artificial. The issue isn’t just tampering, it’s credibility, bias, and professional judgment.
When you have that level of churn around a single case, it raises a reasonable question:
Is this just random coincidence, or does it reflect systemic breakdown in standards and oversight?
The case may not fail because the alternative is strong, but it may fail because the foundation of the primary narrative isn’t as solid as it appears when isolated from its context, and I think that's the crux.
It's fascinating either way because I feel the outcome will be used as case study on the future, and hopefully change in LE methodology.
The following are not established and remain disputed or unproven:
The precise mechanism of injury (vehicle strike vs. alternative scenarios)
The exact timeline of incapacitation
Whether any third parties were involved
Motive based claims (e.g., intent, cover-up, financial or reputational incentives)
Assertions that any single interpretation of the data is “definitive"
All digital data requires: calibration context
device-specific limitations forensic validation
Absence of recorded movement is not proof of absence of movement. I would have thought that the outcome of defamation cases will hinge on intent and knowledge, not just truth/falsity.?
JOK has not gotten justice, anyone that is not concerned about the behaviour of everyone involved in this entire debacle should be absolutely aghast.
there is extensive digital, physical, and testimonial evidence, none of it establishes a single uncontested account of what happened; instead, conclusions about timing, cause of injury, and responsibility depend on interpretations of data that carry technical uncertainties and competing explanations, which is why a jury could not reach a unanimous verdict and why related defamation claims remain unresolved
This could be argued that it means that beyond the basic facts of death, presence, and ongoing litigation, nearly every substantive claim about causation or culpability is still an inference rather than a definitive conclusion
Your post is theory driven narrative that narrows the field of relevant actors. Focussing mainly on Karen Read, but not the fired lead officer ...... What is that ,?
"Absence of recorded movement is not proof of absence of movement. I would have thought that the outcome of defamation cases will hinge on intent and knowledge, not just truth/falsity.?"
Regarding absence of recorded movement in the phone data, note that the phone starts recording movement again in the morning, after JOK's body is moved and the phone is picked up. This demonstrates that the phone had been capable of recording movement all night. The phone didn't power off. It was found underneath his body. It shows movement up until a time that is in very close proximity to when Read reversed her SUV, then it stops showing movement, then it shows movement again in the morning when we know it was moved. Note also that the phone's temperature data are consistent with it being underneath JOK's body all night but don't fit with any other theory. It didn't get cold enough to have been in the snow, exposed to the outside. It didn't get hot enough to have been in the house. We know the temp data was being recorded accurately because we see the temperature quickly go down after JOK's body is moved off of it, and then we see it go back up when it's taken off the ground and put in a pocket and then a vehicle.
So JOK's body was on top of the phone all night, beginning right around when Read accelerated in reverse and then drove off. I haven't heard anyone propose an alternative that would also be consistent with the motion and temperature data.
As for showing defamation, there are 5 elements, each of which the plaintiffs need to show by a preponderance of the evidence: 1. Claims identified plantiffs 2. Claims are false 3. Claims were relayed to a 3rd party 4. Claims were made negligently 5. Claims damaged plaintiffs' reputations
They don't need intent, though if they did they'd have it quite easily: Karen and TB's communications to each other are dripping with intent; they openly celebrate harming the reputations of the witnesses. TB openly asserts that his goal is to make their lives hell.
The plaintiffs don't need to show knowledge either, just negligence. Negligence would be Karen and TB not making reasonable attempts to confirm the truthfullness of the alleged defamatory statements before making them. So, did they make a reasonable attempt to confirm that, say, Collin Albert murdered JOK and Jen McCabe was on cover-up duty? It appears more like they made this up out of thin air.
I must be vocally self critical here, there appears to be patterned absence, which is probative.e.g. Continuous recording before
Continuous recording after
Gap aligned with the critical event, but....
..“This demonstrates that the phone had been capable of recording movement all night.”
Is an overreach.
The phone recorded movement before
The phone recorded movement after
What it does not prove is if it was continuously capable of recording movement during the gap
That no intervening condition (software state, sensor threshold, obstruction, battery optimization, etc.) affected recording
It's kinda like converting consistency with a hypothesis into proof of that hypothesis.A phone under a body in winter conditions is not a simple “outside air temperature” sensor, What temperature range corresponds to “snow exposure”
What range corresponds to “indoors”
How insulation (clothing, body contact, ground contact) alters readings etc, we are all guilty of treating correlation with causation, but ..Phone being dropped independently
Sensor ceasing to log for unrelated reasons
Intermediate handling etc, all need to be. excluded.
I would. E interested in the data that wasn't included or sought or challenged robustly , is there any truth to the claim that the chief who lived opposite viewed his own ring doorbell and said there was nothing on it ? ( And therefore police never looked at it ) Or is that BS too ? There's so much misinformation around, but there is also a dearth of rigour and investigation into the actions of multiple other parties that night.
I don't object to calling this evidence "probative". I certainly agree that a hypothesis isn't "proved" simply because there is evidence consistent with it: "affirming the consequent" is, after all, deductively invalid.
Then again, crimes are rarely proved with deductively certainly. Maybe we shouldn't even be using the word "proved". The challenge here is to do interference to the best explanation, give our limited information. You can't prove a theory just by fitting it to facts, but you can show it superior to other theories that don't fit the facts, or that require heroic contortions in order for the facts to fit. And this ain't particle physics; eventually we run out of plausible alternative theories.
So, regarding the phone data, it's not impossible that JOK went inside the house but something happened with his phone that prevented movement data from being recorded during that period. But that would be a really remarkable bit of bad luck for Read: his phone just happens to stop recording his movement right after she guns her SUV in reverse, but whenever caused his phone to do this was no longer an issue in the morning when his phone was moved out from under his dead body? And also his phone extraction record shows no indication of whatever caused this temporary pause in data collection? Dang.
And hey, her rear tail light is broken, and her theory is that it was planted by cops who could not have known at the time that her SUV's data recorder would eventually show her backing up rapidly in reverse right before JOKs phone stops recording movement. What great luck for them!
The phone data and the physical evidence might not constitute deductive proof, but they do provide strong independent corroboration of each other.
Regarding the temperature data, I can only say that Ian Whiffin spent a long time going through this in his direct examination. I can't remember the exact numbers. I of course agree that we're talking in wide ranges of temperatures that could be "consistent" with the phone being inside vs exposed to the elements vs under JOKs body.
Regarding the "suspicious" behaviors of other parties, to address it I'd have to know what allegation(s) you have in mind. I'll just say that, big picture, an awful lot of spaghetti has been thrown at that particular wall without much regard for whether it sticks or how well any strand fits with the others. I don't think any of it sticks, and I don't think it sticking was ever the point. There's no coherent narrative holding it all together, just a bunch of independent "ooh look at this" and "ooh look at that" which, when combined, sound like they could be pieces of some of big conspiracy of some kind and let's not worry too much about the details. No, the point was always to convince the public (and, eventually, jury) that "reasonable doubt" could be established by sheer quantity rather than quality. As though 20 very loosely related pieces of minimally probabative evidence equals one piece of highly probabative evidence.
Or, to put it in light of the questions you asked about the phone data: every allegedly "suspicious" act by a third party can be explained by something far less incredible than a phone that just so happens to stop recording John's movement right after Karen backs up her SUV, but also happens to record movement just fine in the morning after his body is found. And none of them reinforce each other the way the phone data and physical evidence reinforce each other. I don't think it's intellectually consistent to be a demanding and principled skeptic with regard to the evidence pointing to Karen's guilt, but then take stuff like "the Alberts were calling each other" and "why didn't they come out of the house in the morning?" seriously.
Some very good points in this, appreciate your responses 👍
Honestly the only people that really know what went on are the occupants of 34 fairview and KR.
AK I believe is in a world of trouble ( intentional disruption) but I can't shake the fact that if this was a KR hit and run for want of a better term, it would be stronger, there is just too much ambiguity and outrageous behavior by other parties, rather than rehash the highlights which im sure you are aware, the subsequent actions by interested parties since the fateful night are not conducive with believable ' truths' ( my word smithing is failing me today but I hope you get the idea.!)
On one side the pieces of evidence are mutually reinforcing and make guilt a strong inference, but...and it's a huge but..uncertainty is a key evidentiary pillar..injuries were not necessarily consistent with a vehicle strike, including the absence of some classic impact-type leg injuries, also regards trying to apply equal rigor to:whether phone + vehicle truly synchronize reliably
whether their interpretation depends on contested assumptions, " there's no coherent narrative...." defense is not required to produce a coherent alternative narrative
It only needs to create reasonable doubt in the prosecution narrative, which it did, twice.
" None of the them reinforce..." Ian Whiffin himself acknowledged: location accuracy fluctuates wildly (meters to over a kilometer error range)
movement detection depends on sensor thresholds and context, so it's not as much if a slam dunk one would think it is, it probably could be, if the lead investigator wasn't such a biased person, in addition to the other spaghetti throwing you mentioned earlier, in totality, phone data is algorithmically interpreted evidence, not a recording of reality, inference is not supported without assumptions about sensor fidelity in that exact environment, was google or the browser company ever subpoenaed?
phone may have entered a low-motion detection state
phone may have been stationary while the person moved or vice versa
environmental conditions (snow, cold, obstruction) can degrade data quality
GPS accuracy drops significantly in exactly those conditions,the “clean breakpoint at 12:32” is not a clean physical breakpoint—it is a sensor-defined breakpoint
Legally, that distinction is huge, especially when ones freedom is on the line.
The simplest test one can apply is to ask, would you want Michael proctor investigating a tort or criminal event perpetrated on you ? I know I wouldn't, nor would I want anyone who was bringing in the waterfall or at that party in 34 Fairview near my situation.
There is a lack of integrity by all involved, it stinks, and I don't think the official narrative is true ( for lots of reasons ) but the main one is, integrity. As an LEO you are held to a higher standard and rightly so, if they had it, then there wouldn't have been a second trial, but it's so poor, legally, morally that even a second trial couldn't convince folks it was as they claimed it was ( I'm not claiming it is as KR says it is either ) but it definitely stinks.
Add to that the sketchy behavior by interested parties, and the CYA actions .... Something is off about the whole rhing
ambiguous digital evidence is treated as being deterministic, when it's not , I would agree if the entire thing hasn't been so shoddily run tbh, but it was mess up of epic proportions, MSP and CP failed JOK miserably, how many people involved have retired, been fired, demoted, out on leave, left etc? Is that just coincidence too ? It stinks.
Thanks for the reply. I suppose it's worth addressing standards of evidence. I did venture into that since you mentioned defamation, but my primary interest is about normal human standards of evidence rather than legal standards. When it comes to my own (of course subjective) standards for what I'm willing to believe, I think the evidence of Karen's guilt is overwhelming. Obviously the jury for her 2nd trial felt that it didn't meet the reasonable doubt standard, and the few jurors who've been interviewed say they sincerely do not believe she did it (one even has her own novel theory of what happened, but I'll avoid that tangent). I'll just say that I think the preponderance of the evidence standard is going to make things much harder for Karen in her civil cases.
I'm not gonna defend Proctor's texts; they're nasty and unprofessional and he sent them to people who had no right to inside information. I also haven't seen any evidence that he did anything to undermine Karen's civil rights (beyond sharing information with third parties who weren't entitled to it). Would I want to be investigated by him? Ideally I'd prefer someone with a cooler head, but if I'm innocent in this hypothetical then all I need is a cop who isn't gonna frame me. I don't think there's any actual evidence that Proctor tried to frame Karen. He did seem to loathe her, for sure. Did he loathe everyone he investigated in the way he loathed Karen? I have no idea. I do find Karen loathesome in general, and I can see how her behavior on Jan 29th would not endear her to an investigator. This doesn't excuse him sending those texts to his friends. But it doesn't bother me that cops *think* the things he wrote in those texts about people they geninuely believe to be murderers. That's just human.
As for the Canton police, only thing I fault them for is not taking more and better photos, and not documenting Karen's alleged "I hit him!" statements immediately. The solo cups and the leaf blower were them improvising in a challenging situation. The Keystone Cops narrative is really unfair.
Unless I've missed something, no one in law enforcement has been fired or disciplined for conduct that bears upon the integrity of the evidence itself. I fully agree that LEOs should be held to a higher standard, and Proctor failed on that front. I also think that Karen's team has exploited this in order to feed an evidence-free bonkerstown conspiracy theory.
I think your concerns about data quality are fair - I'm a statistician and I take data quality very seriously. What I'm saying is that there are good answers to all of your concerns. The data do not need to be perfect in order to be extremely corroborative of one theory relative to the others. When we know that there is imprecision in our data, we don't throw the data out, we incorporate that imprecision into the analysis.
So, yes, GPS data are subject to error. Whiffin spent a lot of time on this. We know that the GPS data do a very good job of tracking the roads that Karen drove down. So we have corroboration of its accuracy at least during that point in the night.
You're right that the precision of the GPS data fluctuates, and fluctuated throughout the night. When I say that the data show JOK "stops moving" right after Karen guns her SUV backward, I'm saying that this is the only explanation that makes sense in light of the data, not that the GPS coordinates are literally constant throughout the night - there is always some variation in the readings even if the phone is stationary. But the GPS data at this time were of reasonably high precision, on account of the Waze app being open (Whiffin said ~5meter). These error circles always include the place where JOK's body was found; usually this is near their center. There are periods of time when the GPS precision goes down enough such that error circles extend and overlap a portion of the house. But then there are times following that where the precision improves; during these times the house is always excluded and the flagpole is always close to the center of the error range. So, what's the alternative explanation? That JOK happened to be in that one small part of the house only during the short window of time in which the GPS was less precise, and the real killers managed to move him into the yard before the GPS became more precise? That JOK was alive and stumbling around but never got beyond 5m radius of the flagpole? I'm not trying to be cute, I've just never heard a fleshed-out alternative theory of what could have happened to John that is consistent with all these data, even when data error/imprecision is included.
I actually agree with you on one core point: this comes down to inference to the best explanation under uncertainty, not deductive proof.
Where I think your analysis is incomplete is that you’re treating the phone + vehicle data as the primary anchor, and everything else as noise when in reality, the qualitative integrity of the investigation itself is part of the evidentiary landscape, not a side issue.
You don’t need a “bonkerstown conspiracy” to have a compromised inference. You just need enough process failures, bias indicators, and post hoc contradictions to reduce confidence in the system producing the evidence.
There are a few non-trivial qualitative issues that matter here:
Lead investigator sending highly prejudicial, derogatory texts during the investigation, including sharing case details externally
Selective investigative focus (e.g., failure to robustly pursue or preserve alternative lines of inquiry early)
Witness inconsistencies and evolving statements under oath
Question marks around evidence handling and scene control in the initial respons
None of that “proves” an alternative theory but it directly impacts how much confidence you can place in the collection, interpretation, and framing of the digital and physical evidence you’re relying on.
Inference to the best explanation only works when the pipeline producing the evidence is itself reliable,
You said there’s no discipline tied to the integrity of the evidence. That’s not really accurate when you zoom out.
Across this case, multiple individuals connected to the investigation or its periphery have been:
Fired (lead investigator)
Suspended / reassigned
Placed on leave
Resigned or retired
Even if each action is technically for “conduct” rather than “evidence tampering,” that distinction is a bit artificial. The issue isn’t just tampering, it’s credibility, bias, and professional judgment.
When you have that level of churn around a single case, it raises a reasonable question:
Is this just random coincidence, or does it reflect systemic breakdown in standards and oversight?
The case may not fail because the alternative is strong, but it may fail because the foundation of the primary narrative isn’t as solid as it appears when isolated from its context, and I think that's the crux.
It's fascinating either way because I feel the outcome will be used as case study on the future, and hopefully change in LE methodology.