The streets of Kenosha, Wisconsin have been quiet since jurors accepted Kyle Rittenhouse’s self-defeating argument and acquitted the murder teenager for two murders during a period of civil unrest last year.
But across the United States, decision sparked outrage among left-wing politics and right-wing cheers, after a two-week trial that sharply divided public opinion.
The court proceedings have paralleled an equally explosive trial in Georgia over the death of Ahmaud Arbery, a black man shot dead while jogging, and exposed a fractured country that is still struggling. grappling with racial and criminal justice issues more than a year later. George Floyd’s Murder.
For event organizers Reimagine Kenosha, who set up a tent on the lawn a few blocks from the courthouse, the aim was to “find a cure.”
“We know our facilities are still sick. . . We’re at a point of reckoning, so we need to re-imagine,” organizer Kyle Johnson said after Friday’s ruling.
Kenosha resident Jasmine Alvarez described her reaction to Rittenhouse being found not guilty on all five counts as “disappointed, not surprised. And angry. ”
“He needed to learn the consequences of his actions, and that didn’t
happened,” she said, referring to Rittenhouse, who prosecutors described during the trial as an armed “chaotic tourist” who had come to Kenosha to “seek trouble.” The teenager’s lawyers say he acted in self-defense during protests last summer against police brutality in the city.
Protesters outside Kenosha County Courthouse on Friday night, after Kyle Rittenhouse was acquitted of murder © Claire Bushey/FT
Kendall Needham, another Kenosha resident, insists the outcome of the August 2020 shooting would be different for a black man. White Rittenhouse.
“Many people [in Kenosha] spend time on very small crimes, harmless but some kids from another city come to provoke
violent and literally took two people’s lives and had to leave
no scot. ”
Rittenhouse was driving to Kenosha, a city on Lake Michigan, from neighboring Illinois after a police officer shot Jacob Blake, a black man, paralyzing him and starting days of protests and violence. chaos. Rusten Sheskey, the officer who shot Blake, no charge with a crime.
Rittenhouse testified during the trial that he was there for property protection and first aid, saying he carried an assault-style rifle to protect himself. He shot three men, killing two and injuring a third while confronting a mob.
Following Friday’s ruling, Rittenhouse supporters drove past the courthouse and honked their horns to celebrate.
Republican lawmakers and conservative commentators welcomed Rittenhouse’s acquittal, calling the ruling a vindication of Americans’ Second Amendment rights that allow people to “keep and carry weapons”. The judge in the Rittenhouse case dismissed the gun charge shortly before the trial ended.
“Congratulations to Kyle Rittenhouse on being found not guilty of all charges,” former US president Donald Trump said in a statement. “And by the way, if that’s not self-defense, it’s nothing!”
Matt Gaetz, a Republican congressman from Florida and a Trump ally, said he wanted to give the teenager an internship. Paul Gosar, a Republican congressman from Arizona who was censored by the House of Representatives last week for posting a social media video depicting him killing Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a member of Congress, said that he We’re going to “wrestle” Gaetz to hire Rittenhouse. Fox News polarizing host Tucker Carlson is making a documentary about the teen.
Democrats, meanwhile, have noted desperation.
President Joe Biden said that “while the Kenosha verdict will make many Americans feel angry and concerned, myself included, we must acknowledge that the jury has its say.” Rittenhouse was described as a white supremacist in a Biden campaign video last year.
Vice President Kamala Harris, a former prosecutor, told reporters that “obviously a lot of work remains to be done” to make the US justice system fairer.
Lilly Goren, a political science professor at Carroll University in Wisconsin, said that, like the trial of the Arbery killers, “underlying racism” in the Rittenhouse case.
She noted the defense attorney in the Georgia case — in which three white men were involved in the fatal shooting of the black man — complained about black pastors sitting in the courtroom. Pastor Al Sharpton, the civil rights leader, responded by organizing a protest by black pastors outside the courthouse last week.
Goren notes that there have never been any charges against the two police officers who shot and killed Tamir Rice, a 12-year-old black boy who was playing with a toy gun in an Ohio park, during a Another case attracted national attention.
The Rittenhouse ruling means that at future political rallies,
especially for the Black Lives Matter movement, “there can be many
basically, white man’s wariness,” says Goren.
Tensions in Kenosha had escalated ahead of the Rittenhouse verdict, as dueling protest groups gathered in large numbers. Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers authorized 500 National Guard troops to stand on duty, but protests in the city and elsewhere across the country were mostly peaceful over the weekend.
The unrest, which spread after the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis last year, is said to have spurred a discussion about prolonged racism in America. Attention has been drawn to the courthouse in Brunswick, Georgia, where the white defendants in the Arbery case also claimed to defend themselves.
