In their own response, prosecutors restated their claim that without a public verdict, Karen Read was not acquitted on any charge.

The ACLU has jumped into the Karen Read Supreme Judicial Court fight on the side of the accused murderer. The American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts filed a brief in Read’s appeal to Massachusetts’ highest court to have two of the three charges against her — including second-degree murder — dropped in her second trial scheduled for January.

The filing by the civil liberties group’s chapter in Massachusetts comes as the Supreme Judicial Court prepares to hear arguments about the result of a trial that captured local and national headlines for months earlier this year.