Photo courtesy of NPR.
A Wisconsin judge dropped the misdemeanor gun possession charge against accused murderer Kyle Rittenhouse on Nov. 15. Rittenhouse admitted to killing 26-year-old Anthony Huber and Joseph Rosenbaum, 36, in Kenosha, Wis., on Aug. 25, 2020.
Rittenhouse killed Huber and Rosenbaum during a Black Lives Matter protest after Jacob Blake was shot by a police officer on Aug. 23. in Kenosha. He claimed self-defense.
The 17-year-old killer traveled from Antioch, Ill., to confront Black Lives Matters protesters. The MAGA supporter killed the two men with his semiautomatic Smith & Wesson M&P 15 with a 16-inch barrel modeled after a military-style rifle at the protest. He also shot a third man, Gaige Grosskreutz, 28, who survived.
The Wisconsin judge allowed the defense to bar the prosecution from referring to the dead murder victims as “victims” but allowed for them to be referred to as “looters” and “rioters.” The defense argued self-defense because one of Rittenhouse’s murdered victims was armed with a skateboard.
Grosskreutz had a handgun but put his hands in the air when Rittenhouse shot Huber. Huber had hit Rittenhouse with his skateboard after the MAGA supporter shot and killed an unarmed Rosenbaum.
MAGA supporters and Rittenhouse sympathizers have garnered sympathy by portraying Rittenhouse as a teenage do-gooder trying to stop rioters instead of a murdering MAGA supporter who killed innocent BLM protesters. The prosecutor told the jury that Rittenhouse was
the one with the big gun and his self-defense claim was lunacy.“You lose the right to self-defense when you’re the one who brought the gun, when you are the one creating the danger, when you’re the one provoking other people.”
The underage weapons possession charge carried a jail sentence of up to nine months. Rittenhouse is still charged with first-degree intentional homicide and faces life in prison if he is convicted.