Kyle Rittenhouse Trial

[Dill]

(11-02-2021, 11:01 PM)NATI BENGALS Wrote: I just stated all the evidence that does support it. You deem it all irrelevant. But it’s the reason we are where we are. Pretty easy to see why something of this nature would wind up in a court room and for you to be unable to comprehend that it deserves to be there is a little confusing.

I very much agree with you. When a minor illegally carrying a weapon "runs to danger" and someone gets killed, we need to examine the circumstances closely, as well as how laws may define self defense.  If people think the self defense so obvious in this case that a trial is not even warranted, that is more scary than "confusing."

In court yesterday the prosecutor insisted that "Rittenhouse started a confrontation that led Joseph Rosenbaum to begin chasing Rittenhouse across a parking lot," a claim which appears to rest on eyewitness testimony. https://apnews.com/article/kyle-rittenhouse-wisconsin-shootings-homicide-gun-politics-fb9a374d697f612a1f09d42d31f0fe77. 
 
This kind of thing matters, along with the fact R brought a gun to a riot, because the jury will be asked to factor "provocation" into the question of self defense, per instructions like these: "You should also consider whether the defendant provoked the attack. A person who engages in unlawful conduct of a type likely to provoke others to attack, and who does provoke an attack, is not allowed to use or threaten force in self-defense against that attack." 
https://wilawlibrary.gov/jury/files/criminal/0815.pdf

Video will show the jury that, before the first shooting, R was chased across a parking lot by one person, Rosenbaum, who was immediately behind him, and threw a plastic bag at Rittenhouse, which fell far short. A handgun was fired some 40-50 yards away from Rittenhouse. The shooting which followed seconds later is not on video, but a credible eyewitness, Richie McGinnis, says the unarmed Rosenbaum, the only person near Rittenhouse, reached for the barrel of Rittenhouse’s gun. Before he could actually grab it, Rittenhouse swung the weapon around his outstretched arm and fired four shots. According to the prosecutor, two shots hit Rosenbaum’s “extremities,” causing him to fall forward. The kill shot followed—to Rosenbaum’s back.  
 
McGinnis rushed to Rosenbaum to staunch the bleeding. Without realizing (he says) to whom he was speaking to, he asked Rittenhouse, standing nearby, to call 911. Instead R, still standing over the body, calls a friend.
 https://www.cnn.com/videos/us/2021/10/31/kenosha-wisconsin-shooting-rittenhouse-mcginniss-griffin-pkg-vpx.cnn

To determine whether this shooting was “clear self-defense,” based upon these facts, one must make inferences about Rittenhouse’s “state of mind” at the moment of the shooting. https://wilawlibrary.gov/jury/files/criminal/0805.pdf. E.g., If a “reasonable person” heard a shot 40 yds away, would he connect that too the unarmed person immediately behind him, who couldn’t have fired the shot, because the guy reached for his gun? Did he fear for his life when he shot the already downed Rosenbaum in the back? If one views this shooting through “legal and dispassionate lenses,” is Rosenbaum alone a “member of a mob” robbing a “reasonable” innocent bystander, by chance also illegally carrying a weapon during a riot? Or are both members of a mob defying a curfew order, one illegally armed and there to “run towards danger?” Is Rosenbaum chasing Rittenhouse BECAUSE he has a gun? How much of this can be legally irrelevant, so long as the question of who provoked whom is still relevant?

After Rittenhouse kills Rosenbaum, as he stands over the body calling a friend, bystanders finger him, correctly, as the shooter. He starts to walk away from the scene, then to run as angry people follow, apparently to prevent the shooter from “getting away.” He falls and, seeing their chance, several rush in to disarm him. One person kicks at R, and he fires wildly, missing him. Another strikes R with a “deadly weapon,” a skateboard, and is immediately shot to death. A third, with a hand gun, holds his hands up when he sees R has bead on him. Then drops his arms and R shoots him in the arm.

Is this "textbook self defense" if a shooter illegally carrying a weapon shoots two more people trying to neutralize or apprehend him? Does he get to "fear for his life," continue to generate mayhem, after he has already killed one person? It may well be if R's myriad bad/illegal decisions can be factored out by total focus on R's state of mind at the time of each shooting. We have been talking about what the videos "clearly" show, but other evidence may be factored in as well, which better frames the video action.

The legal implications of acquittal are worth consideration as well.