What the hell was a 17-year old boy doing with an AR-15 at a police brutality protest in the first place?
Kyle Rittenhouse was found not guilty of five charges filed against him. Those charges were first-degree reckless homicide with the use of a dangerous weapon, first-degree intentional homicide with the use of a dangerous weapon, attempted first-degree intentional homicide with the use of a dangerous weapon and two counts of first-degree recklessly endangering safety with the use of a dangerous weapon when he put Richard McGinniss and another unknown male at risk.
Rittenhouse killed two people, Joseph D. Rosenbaum and Anthony M. Huber, and injured one in the arm, Gaige P. Grosskreutz.
A reporter for Daily Caller — a right-leaning news outlet — Richard McGinniss interviewed Rittenhouse. In the interview, Rittenhouse said his reason for being at the protest with the gun was because he was there to protect the businesses. He also said he was pepper-sprayed by someone in a nearby crowd while protecting the property.
The entire case was just messed up altogether. Some would say the prosecutors closed this case before it even opened. The whole trial was rushed, not thought out well, and the prosecution doomed this case from the get-go by being absolutely negligent and lazy, listening to the opinions of the public rather than listening to what they should have been listening to, the evidence.
McGinniss testified, and he took a video of the whole ordeal showing Rosenbaum trying to take Rittenhouse’s rifle away from him. Rittenhouse thought he was trying to attack him, so he shot Rosenbaum, but the altercation went back further when Rittenhouse was seen chasing Rosenbaum with a fire extinguisher.
If this would have been a plea of self-defense, it would’ve had to follow under Wisconsin law and be done its way. The way Wisconsin defines self-defense is if a jury is convinced that Rittenhouse feared for his life, killed or seriously injured by Joseph D. Rosenbaum, Anthony Huber and Gaige Grosskreutz, then he won’t be found guilty of anything.
Kenosha County assistant district attorney Thomas Binger tried to claim the reasoning for Rittenhouse acting in self-defense was because he played “Call of Duty” — a war simulator video game — and said that the guns used in the game are AR-15s, and for whatever reason, the prosecutor even asked Rittenhouse to describe the game in the trial.
“It’s a video game where two players are playing together, I don’t really understand the meaning of the question, to be honest,” Rittenhouse replied.
The prosecution even tried to link Rittenhouse’s experience playing the game as the reason why he chose an AR-15 instead of a smaller gun like a pistol. Rittenhouse responded with the reason why he chose the AR-style gun was because it was his understanding that Wisconsin law prohibited him from carrying a pistol, but not a rifle, and said because it looked cool. When the prosecution asked him why he did what he did, he remained silent, which made the prosecution angry, but he was allowed to remain quiet under the Fifth Amendment.
Bottom line is, he is guilty of something. Legally, he may not have been found guilty, but morally, he was definitely guilty. He shot three people, killing two of them for Christ’s sake, and he didn’t get any type of repercussion? Something’s not right here. He was let go without any charges against him because he is just another one of those privileged white men, and in today’s society, being white, especially a man, you got it made in America. It’s always been that way, and it probably will always be that way. The people’s reaction to him being released has been much the same as when Derek Chauvin killed George Floyd. There are protests since many think Rittenhouse was let off too easily.
Some people will love him for it and give him praise, while others will hate him for it, send him death threats or even worse, but he will spend the rest of his life with blood on his hands.
