What Went Wrong With the Rittenhouse Trial

The Kyle Rittenhouse trial in which a 17-year-old shot three people during civil unrest in Kenosha, Wisconsin, is finally over - with Rittenhouse found not guilty on all charges.

The events leading up to the shooting, the shooting itself, the trial, the prosecutor, the defense, the judge, the media circus, even the victims of the shooting, and of course, Kyle Rittenhouse himself are all at fault.

The bad news here isn’t specific to one guilty or not guilty party, the case itself simultaneously highlights the worst failures of our legal, legislative, judicial, and social systems. Absolutely nobody acted appropriately or was in the right, and instead of the takeaway being about whether Ritenhouse was acting in self defense, or whether he should have even been there in first place, the real takeaway is that this entire situation was bad from the start, reflects a new precedent about how defenseless we really are in the face of social and political chaos.

This case sucks for everyone, and here’s what sucks about it: In August of 2020 yet another Black man, Jacob Blake, was shot seven times in the back by police in Kenosha, Wisconsin - the latest in a long series of unjustified police shootings in the middle of the largest civil rights movement in US history against racially motivated police brutality. As in many other parts of the country that year, rallies, marches, protests, and riots were sparked in the city where Blake was shot, sparking a civilian “call to arms” by a right-wing city official on Facebook, which was published and distributed by Alex Jones’ conspiracy website, Infowars. Within a day, groups of armed militant civilians began patrolling the streets, and despite official disapproval by the city, their actions were encouraged by police on the ground. Among these militant groups was 17-year-old Kyle Rittenhouse, who drove from his home in Antioch, Illinois 20 miles to Kenosha, Wisconsin where his friend gave him an illegally purchased AR-15 rifle, and together they set out to, in his words, “protect businesses and help people”.

That night, Rittenhouse shot three people, killing two, in a chaotic series of events. The first man shot was Joseph Rosenbaum, a homeless man, with a criminal record that included a sexual assault charge, who had been recently released from a hospital, suffered from bipolar disorder and was without access to medication. By all accounts, that night Rosenbaum was not well, nor was he, as many on the right painted him, a radical leftist or ANTIFA. Carrying only a plastic bag with some deodorant and underwear that he got from the hospital, Rosenbaum chased after Rittenhouse and tried to grab his rifle, and Rittenhouse shot him in the head.

The shooting alerted the surrounding crowd, which included Anthony Huber carrying a skateboard, and Gaige Grosskreutz carrying a pistol, for which his permit had recently expired - they along with others attempted to disarm Rittenhouse after having seen him just kill someone. Rittenhouse fatally shot Huber in the chest, and Grosskreutz was shot in the arm but survived. The crowd scattered, Rittenhouse walked away, unaccosted by police, and the next day, at the urging of his mother, turned himself in.

The subsequent trial was a mess. To any reasonable observer, a 17-year-old crossing state lines to take part in a militia with an illegally purchased weapon is a clear problem - but between a series of prosecutorial errors and extremely odd choices by the presiding Judge Bruce Schroeder, that specific, and most obvious issue was dropped. Instead the trial narrowly focused on whether or not Rittenhouse felt his life was in danger, and ultimately the jury decided that he did and acted in self-defense. 

Obviously this resolution is contentious. But moreso, this trial was a bizarre example of how not to conduct a trial. The prosecution was insufficiently prepared to make their argument, their star witness ended up hurting their case, the defense made up some bizarre argument about zooming in on a digital picture changing the content of that picture, and clearly nobody, especially the judge, had any understanding of the technical issues they were talking about. In fact, for such a high-profile and complicated case Judge Schroeder acted so far out of the norm, that his behavior made headlines almost every single day.

He dismissed the illegal gun charge based on a misrepresented hunting loophole. He made a number of strange, vaguely racist statements and jokes. He refused to let the defense call the people who were shot victims, but said "rioters," "looters" or "arsonists" was reasonable. He let jurors take home legal instructions, and allowed Rittenhouse to personally select random jurors to disqualify - neither of which directly influenced the outcome of the case, but both of which are completely unheard of. At one point, during the trial, MSNBC was barred from the courtroom because one of their freelance producers had followed the jury bus. 

The whole thing was a deranged circus. There is absolutely nothing beneficial to take away from this shooting or its trial or its verdict. At best it highlights the total ineffectiveness of our legal system at addressing something as critical as whether or not a child should be armed in the middle of a protest - and at worst it emboldens a perspective that you can place yourself in a dangerous situation and shoot your way out, and that the last man or boy standing is innocent.

It’s not hard to believe that Rittenhouse feared for his life, nor is it hard to believe that he shouldn’t have been there in the first place. This trial didn’t solve anything.