Karen Read, a former Boston finance professional, is set to be retried next week in the case involving the death of her police officer boyfriend, John O’Keefe, whom prosecutors allege she abandoned with critical injuries during a snowstorm in January 2022.

Read has consistently proclaimed her innocence. The initial trial concluded with a hung jury after her defense suggested an alternative theory—that someone else was responsible for O’Keefe’s death, left him outside, and attempted to incriminate Read.

“Her entire case hinges on if she can get over the law enforcement problems,” stated Joseph Giacalone, a former NYPD sergeant and a criminal justice professor at Penn State-Lehigh Valley.

Those problems helped derail the first trial. Here are five things to know ahead of Tuesday’s do-over:

5. Read has been talking about the case

Read has given a number of public interviews about the case – rare for a defendant in a high-profile criminal case.

“My life is in the balance, and it shouldn’t be,” she told Boston 25 last month. “The more information the public has, the more they understand what we already know.”

Karen Read smiles in court before the start of motions in Norfolk Superior Court in Dedham on Wednesday, Nov. 13, 2024. (Greg Derr/The Patriot Ledger/IMAGN)

To that end, she’s been speaking out – and so have a number of supporters who have sided with her theory of a cover-up online. In another interview, she weighed in on her dalliance with Higgins, the ATF agent.

“I knew Higgins found me attractive,” she told Vanity Fair in August. “It helped me emotionally validate myself, which is embarrassing to admit.”

The tactic could backfire, Gelman said, especially if she winds up making an “impeachable statement” along the way.

“I don’t really like that she’s done so many interviews,” Gelman told Fox News Digital. “There’s enough publicity with the case.”

Fox News’ Chris Eberhart contributed to this report.