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The jury makes their decisions in a way that is not public. In some cases, their verdicts can have big consequences.
Kyle Rittenhouse is one of those cases. A jury in Wisconsin acquitted him of all charges relating to his conduct in the streets of Kenosha in August 2020 that left two men dead and another wounded. The verdict seems crazy to some observers. How can a teenager escape criminal liability after he travels from out of state to a scene of civil unrest, violates a curfew specifically designed to keep people off the streets, and carries with him an assault weapon that results in deadly injuries, if our laws allow him to do so?
The property owner testified that he did not ask for Rittenhouse's help. Rittenhouse claimed that he went to the scene of unrest to provide medical assistance to the injured, even though he had no training as a medic. He was not a government official. He wore a backwards baseball cap and openly carried a weapon of war. When people saw him, they assumed he was an active shooter and attacked him to protect themselves. People died.
The big picture is not looked at by juries. Judges tell juries to ignore anything outside of the evidence they hear in court, to tune out the media, and to focus on the facts. The details matter to jurors. The prosecution has to prove each and every element of every offense beyond a reasonable doubt. The prosecution has to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Rittenhouse did not act in self-defense. A steep uphill climb is where a negative is found. Video recordings of the events of that night were shown to jurors. They slowed it down so that the jury wouldn't see the big picture of Rittenhouse's poor judgement in bringing the gun to the scene of chaos, but his mental state in the precise moments that the shots were fired.
Sometimes victims of crime feel like they get less protection than the accused at trial. Due process is required by our Constitution for people charged with a crime and facing loss of liberty. The judge wouldn't allow the decedents to be referred to as victims. It is a common practice in a criminal case to use the term "victim" in order to suggest that the person is guilty. Our system believes that it is better for ten guilty people to go free than for one innocent person to be convicted. Sometimes those protections leave us feeling like an injustice has been done.
This case will have repercussions outside of the courtroom, even though the jury is not concerned with the big picture. Rittenhouse will be the poster boy for right-wing extremists. Rittenhouse would make a good congressional intern, according to Rep. Matt Gaetz. Rittenhouse will be a guest at the next State of the Union address. Why has a kid in Kenosha become a cause celebré?
The larger culture wars are raging in our country. Rittenhouse said he wanted to help protect the city. The threat? Protesters are angry over the police shooting of a black man. In Georgia, there was a murder trial going on where white men were accused of killing Ahmaud Arbery, a Black jogger, because they suspected him of being in a home under construction. If the defendants in these cases were Black, their experience of the criminal justice system would be vastly different.
Cynical politicians will use this verdict to exploit the divisions in our country. They will use the narrow lens through which jurors view a case to proclaim that this verdict is a larger message to society. The case will be used by political opportunists to advance their own agendas. They will cite this case to promote irresponsible use of assault weapons. We are all less safe when people with no experience or oversight feel free to take the law into their own hands.
The Kyle Rittenhouse Verdict makes us all less safe.
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