Kyle Rittenhouse: Freedom fighter or cold-blooded vigilante?

‘Not guilty.” When Kyle Rittenhouse heard those words uttered in court he choked back tears, collapsed to the floor and hugged one of his lawyers. He was acquitted of murder last week but his trial in the court of public opinion continues. It has been ever since he fired the fatal shots that killed two white men and seriously injured another at a Black Lives Matter rally in Kenosha, Wisconsin, in August 2020. The teenager’s case has sparked arguments over race, gun rights, vigilantism and self-defence, and once again exposed the social and political fissures that divide the US, pitting Left against Right, Democrat against Republican. Each day things have appeared to become more polarised and politicised. In the time since the jury handed down its verdict Rittenhouse seems to have embraced his position as a lightning rod for controversy, sitting down for an interview with Fox News and threatening to sue President Joe Biden for defaming him as a “white supremacist”. Conservatives were angry the case ever made it to court. “This entire trial, this entire farce is an indictment on every institution in our society,” Republican Senate candidate JD Vance said. Meanwhile, after Rittenhouse was cleared, civil rights lawyer Ben Crump said: “If we were talking about a black man, the conversation and outcome would be starkly different.” The situation remains a powder keg waiting for someone to light the fuse. ‘Wannabe soldier’ On August 23 last year, black man Jacob Blake was shot and seriously injured by a white police officer in Kenosha. It came just a few months after the death in Minneapolis of George Floyd, who was murdered by white police officer Derek Chauvin. He knelt on Floyd’s neck for nine minutes despite the prone man protesting: “I can’t breathe.” Floyd’s murder sparked the largest racial justice protests in a generation and the shooting of Blake reignited anger, sparking protests and rioting. Into this situation, on August 25, strode 17-year-old Kyle Rittenhouse. He had travelled 32km from his home in Antioch, Illinois, to Kenosha. Strapped to his chest was an assault-style semi-automatic rifle that prosecutors claimed had been illegally bought for the underage ex-police cadet. It had been stored at a friend’s house in Kenosha. Rittenhouse was seen alongside heavily armed militia or vigilante groups that had been patrolling the streets at night. He was interviewed by a journalist as he stood guard outside a car dealership. “Our job is to protect this business,” he said. “And part of my job is to help. If there’s somebody hurt, I’m running into harm’s way. That’s why I have my rifle.” A short while later he would use that rifle to shoot dead Joseph Rosenbaum and Anthony Huber, and injure Gaige Grosskreutz. During his trial, prosecutors portrayed Rittenhouse, who claimed self-defence, as a “wannabe soldier” who had gone out looking for trouble, but he testified he had never intended to kill anyone and had to protect his own life. He said he killed Rosenbaum, 36, after he chased Rittenhouse across a carpark and made a grab for his gun, convincing the teenager he would be shot if the other man got hold of it. Moments later, as he was running down a street, Rittenhouse shot and killed Huber, 26, after the latter hit him with his skateboard in the head or neck. Then he shot and wounded Grosskreutz, now 28, who admitted in court he had first pointed his own gun at Rittenhouse. The men he shot were all white. The shootings quickly made Rittenhouse a rallying cry for supporters of the Second Amendment – which guarantees Americans the constitutional right to bear arms — and those angered by the sometimes violent protests seen in some American cities after Floyd’s death. Some saw him as an upstanding citizen who was simply there to help local businesses. To others he was a trigger-happy agitator who aligned himself with racist groups and needlessly inserted himself into a situation riven with social and racial tensions. ‘Victim’ Rittenhouse’s trial was mired in controversy from the very start. Before the case hit court he was pictured in a Wisconsin bar with members of the notorious far-right Proud Boys, appearing to make a “white power” hand gesture. He now says he had no idea who he was with and was unaware of the significance of the “OK” hand gesture he was photographed doing, claiming his former lawyers Lin Wood and John Pierce were to blame. “I didn’t know that the hand sign was a symbol for white supremacy — just as I didn’t know those people in the bar were Proud Boys,” Rittenhouse said this week. He went on to claim the meetings “were set up by my former attorney who was fired because of that, for putting me in situations like that with people I don’t agree with”. Rittenhouse’s current lawyers are locked in a legal dispute with Wood and Pierce as they seek to have the $2 million bail returned to their acquitted client. When the case made it to court, presiding judge Bruce Schroeder took centre stage for his controversial stance. He raised eyebrows when he ruled the men Rittenhouse shot could not be referred to as “victims” by prosecutors, but said the defence could label them as “arsonists”, “rioters” and “looters”. “The word ‘victim’ is a loaded, loaded word. And I think ‘alleged victim’ is a cousin to it,” he said. Judge Schroeder also said Rittenhouse’s lawyer could “demonise” the shot men “if he wants, if he thinks it will win points with the jury”. When he took the stand, Rittenhouse, who is now 18, broke down in tears, sobbing uncontrollably while saying he was “ambushed” by Rosenbaum. “I didn’t do anything wrong. I defended myself,” he told the court. “Once I take that step back, I look over my shoulder and Mr Rosenbaum was now running from my right side. I was cornered in front of me.” Some of the defence’s star witnesses appeared to bolster this notion of self-defence when they gave evidence, in particular Gaige Grosskreutz — the man who survived being shot. Grosskreutz, a trained paramedic, admitted he was carrying a loaded pistol that night and that it was aimed at Rittenhouse when he was shot. However, he claimed he had not intended to point the gun in Rittenhouse’s direction, saying: “That’s not why I was out there. It’s not who I am.” ‘Broken system’ The jury took 26 hours to clear Rittenhouse but the fallout from its decision was instant. Demonstrators gathered in several cities to protest at the verdict. “Real anger and devastation about the fact that young black men, young black boys like Trayvon Martin, are shot dead because they are carrying around Skittles and someone like Rittenhouse is not guilty in all verdicts when he shot two people and went across State lines and used a violent weapon to murder people,” Natalia Marques, a protester in New York, told the ABC. “I mean, it’s just it’s absurd to me and it really reveals how broken the system is.” Wisconsin’s Lieutenant Governor Mandela Barnes, who is black and a Democratic candidate for the Senate, condemned the verdict and accused the judge of having “virtually demanded” Rittenhouse be considered innocent. Huber’s parents, Karen Bloom and John Huber, said the outcome sent “the unacceptable message that armed civilians can show up in any town, incite violence, and then use the danger they have created to justify shooting people in the street”. And President Joe Biden, who has faced calls to apologise after linking Rittenhouse to white supremacists in a 2020 tweet, said “the verdict in Kenosha will leave many Americans feeling angry and concerned, myself included” but added that the decision of the jury should be respected. Conservatives, however, said it merely demonstrated why there should never have been a trial in the first place. “All of us who knew what actually happened in Kenosha last year assumed this would be the verdict,” tweeted former Wisconsin governor Scott Walker. “Thankfully, the jury thought the same.” Donald Trump praised Rittenhouse in a statement from Save America, his political action committee. “Congratulations to Kyle Rittenhouse for being found INNOCENT of all charges,” he said. “It’s called being found NOT GUILTY. And by the way, if that’s not self-defence, nothing is!” ‘Made heroes of vigilantes’ In the week since, the divisions over the Rittenhouse decision have only deepened, with people on both sides becoming more entrenched in their opinions. Civil rights lawyer Ben Crump said: “If we were talking about a black man the conversation and outcome would be starkly different. But we’re not. We’re talking about Kyle Rittenhouse, a racist, homicidal vigilante who, like so many white men before him, not only escaped accountability but laughed in its face.” Adam Serwer, for The Atlantic, said it should “come as no surprise that Kyle Rittenhouse was acquitted of all charges”. “It is one thing to argue that the jury reached a reasonable verdict based on this law, and another entirely to celebrate Rittenhouse’s actions. Much of the conservative media and the Republican Party, however, don’t see the killings as ‘wrongful’ in any sense, instead elevating Rittenhouse as the manifestation of retributive violence against their political enemies,” he said. Meanwhile the New York Times’ Charles M. Blow decried the “the way people have made heroes of vigilantes, encouraging, supporting and defending them”. But in The Washington Post, Gary Abernathy wrote that as soon as the shooting occurred “the narrative of ‘a possible vigilante attack carried out by a young white man’, took root — and the facts never caught up”. He went on to say that everyone involved in the case was a victim and “the legitimate grievances of black Americans about disparities in policing must be addressed”. And in an editorial the New York Post said the jury’s decision “comes as no surprise to anyone who’d paid close attention”. “Absolutely nothing suggests he was a ‘white supremacist’, as no less than Joe Biden claimed right before last year’s election,” the newspaper said. “The rank, politicised distortions of fact here — and in so many other recent incidents — should teach everyone once and for all not to trust instant analysis or agenda-driven reporting. When the facts played out via the proper judicial process, common sense and truth prevailed.” The division ripped open by the case was epitomised by Rittenhouse’s appearance with Tucker Carlson on the conservative Fox News on Monday. “If I was convicted . . . no one would ever be privileged to defend their life against attackers,” he said, adding some people were “too ignorant to look at the facts”. The teen insisted he was “not a racist person”, adding: “This case has nothing to do with race. It never had anything to do with race. It had to do with the right to self-defence.” He went on to say he supported the Black Lives Matter movement and “peacefully demonstrating”, hitting out at the coverage of his trial. “I’ve never seen something so polarising in my life . . . this wasn’t a political case. It was made a political case,” Rittenhouse said. ‘Warning shot’ But while Rittenhouse said the case was nothing to do with race, others disagree. Derrick Johnson, president of the National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People, said the verdict was hard for black Americans to accept. “Here you have a 17-year-old who illegally purchased a gun, travelled across State lines to protect property that was not his, for owners who did not invite him, and he put himself in harm’s way based on the rhetoric that he’s seen on social media platforms,” he said. “(This is) a warning shot that vigilante justice is allowed in this country or in particular communities.”

Kyle Rittenhouse: Freedom fighter or cold-blooded vigilante?

The No. 1 source of news for every West Australian