May I suggest a new entry in the Guinness World Records?

Most expensive DUI conviction in history: Karen Read, convicted in Dedham, MA, June 18, 2025.

Cost: At least $3 million, probably closer to $5 million.

No wonder District Attorney Michael “Meatball” Morrissey didn’t want to return her SUV back to Karen Read. He blew maybe $5 million in taxpayer money trying to frame her, twice, and in the end all he had to show for his obsessive legal stalking was a black Lexus, and 47 pieces of broken tail light from parts unknown.

The tab just keeps running higher and higher. This week Boston 25 and the Herald got a new batch of bills from the second trial. It turns out that Meatball squandered $599,735.45 on Aperture, a bunch of grifters who handled “accident reconstruction,” or should I say, “fantasy accident reconstruction.”

Aperture was to “accident reconstruction” what “fantasy football” is to real NFL football.

Remember, the Department of Justice hired a real company of legitimate experts to figure out whether Karen Read’s now-liberated SUV really struck her boyfriend, and the answer was a resounding no.

The feds offered this incontrovertible evidence to Meatball, but it didn’t fit with his plans for a necktie party for “the girl.”

So he hired Aperture, with the redneck expert who’d been trying to get his bachelor’s degree for 17 years and didn’t know the difference between “bytes” and “bits.” Another of the “experts” was flown in from California – first class!

And did you notice Aperture kept its bill just under $600,000 – like that somehow makes it better. They’re what they call too cute by half.

Meatball still won’t give Karen Read some of her cell phones back. According to Steve Boozang, her new local lawyer, one of Meatball’s “special” prosecutors, Robert “Triple Dip” Cosgrove, is still trying to convict her for witness intimidation or something.

Triple Dip is already pocketing two state pensions worth a total of $203,000 a year, plus whatever he’s getting for Meatball’s continuing quest to get Karen Read on something, anything.

How obsessed was Meatball? According to the records, he spent another $17,000 for transcriptions of broadcast news about the trial. He should have realized, when you’re trying to railroad an innocent person, no news is good news.

Then there was Hexordia, the firm in charge of digital forensics, or should I say, “fantasy digital forensics.” They got just under $45,000. I think these were the buffoons who said pay no attention to the fact that one of the McAlberts googled “Hos (sic) long to die in cold” at 2:27 a.m., hours before John O’Keefe’s body was found in the snow.

There have been reports that that crazy woman “expert” charged $393 an hour, which seems steep indeed. But she told Meatball’s minions she’d say whatever had to be said, to which he reportedly texted back:

“HIRE HER IMMEDIATELY!”

Don’t forget Hammered Hank Brennan, another one of the “special prosecutors.” Meatball hired him last year and it was announced that his pay was capped at $75,000.

Final bill: $566,000.

These are just the direct costs. What about all the ancillary cases, including Turtleboy and, lest we forget, the Rubber Ducky investigations? And the court costs, and the cops around the courthouse.

There were three police departments in Norfolk County involved in the case-related rubber ducky capers – the Mass State Police as well as the Canton and Stoughton PDs. Five search warrants, by Canton alone, two readings of Miranda rights, the Keystone Kops trying to extract data from yet another SUV, this one in Stoughton….

How about all the additional costs of litigating the evidence collection in at least five other murder cases in Norfolk County, including the grisly Brian Walshe wife-dismemberment, because anything Michael Proctor touched is now beyond tainted?

The tab keeps running.

This is all on Meatball Morrissey. I checked his political account on the Office of Campaign and Political Finance (OCPF) website yesterday, and his balance is currently $420,912.71. He used to have a birthday fundraiser every August (he’s 71 and doesn’t look a day over 101) but not this year.

In the last 11 months, Meatball has taken in exactly one contribution — $200, last February, from an ancient lobbyist, fellow State House hack of Meatball’s who was once employed by a corrupt ex-House speaker named Felon Finneran.

After an uninterrupted lifetime of slurping at the trough, certainly it will be difficult for Meatball to give up his $223,442-a-year handout. But it looks like he’s all done. Granted, his most visible opponent has just under $40,000 in her campaign kitty, but Meatball is down in the mid-single digits in terms of favorability and it’s as unlikely that he can regain his popularity as it would be for him to lose 200 pounds.

Meatball, why not go out on a high note and donate your $420,000 to the taxpayers of Norfolk County who you have robbed blind in your two failed attempts to lynch Karen Read?

For once in your tawdry, obese life, do the right thing. Make any excuse you want for calling it quits. You don’t have to go away mad, just go away.

Go out on a high note. Accentuate the positive. Hey, Karen Read’s finally got her car back. All’s right in the world.

And look on the bright side, Meatball – you’ll always have a special place in Guinness World Records.

Most Expensive Drunk Driving Conviction in History.

(Pre-order Howie’s new book on Karen Read and other MA law-enforcement scandals, “Mass Corruption: Vol. 1 The Cops” for $19.95 at howiecarrshow.com, click store.)

Norfolk County District Attorney Michael W. Morrissey. (Chris Christo/Boston Herald)