After two weeks of testimony in which they were given radically different representations of his actions the night he shot three men on the streets of Kenosha, the jury has began deliberating in Kyle Rittenhouse’s murder trial.

The jury in Kyle Rittenhouse’s murder trial began deliberations Tuesday after hearing opposing accounts of him as a “wannabe soldier” searching for trouble or a concerned citizen who was attacked while attempting to protect property.

After Judge Bruce Schroeder permitted Rittenhouse to pick numbered slips of paper from a raffle drum to choose which of the 18 persons who sat in judgment throughout the trial would decide his fate and which would be dismissed as alternates, the case was sent to the anonymous 12-member jury.

A courtroom clerk, not the defendant, is normally in charge of this responsibility.

If convicted as charged, Rittenhouse, 18, risks a life sentence in prison for killing two men and wounding a third during a night of racial injustice protests in Kenosha in the summer of 2020. The former police youth cadet, like the people he shot, is Caucasian.

The jury appeared to be mostly made up of white people.

Prosecutors claimed Rittenhouse initiated the bloodshed, while he swore he acted in self-defense after being attacked. The case has sparked a national debate about guns, protests, vigilantism, and law and order in the United States.

With a decision expected soon, Gov. Tony Evers said 500 National Guard men would be ready to deploy to Kenosha if necessary.

Prosecutor Thomas Binger stated during closing arguments on Monday that Rittenhouse started the deadly chain of events by bringing a semi-automatic gun to a rally and threatening others, then walking away like a “hero in a Western.”

However, Rittenhouse’s lawyer, Mark Richards, said that Rittenhouse was ambushed by a “crazy person” who he thought would take his gun and kill him.

Rittenhouse, then 17, had traveled to Kenosha from Antioch, Illinois, in an attempt to protect property from riots in the days following the shooting of a Black man, Jacob Blake, by a white Kenosha police officer.

Rittenhouse was “looking for trouble that night,” according to Binger, who repeatedly showed the jury drone video of Rittenhouse pointing his rifle toward demonstrators.

“This is the provocation. This is what starts this incident,” the prosecutor declared. He added: “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.”

Joseph Rosenbaum, 36, and Anthony Huber, 26, were slain by Rittenhouse, who also wounded Gaige Grosskreutz, now 28.

Rittenhouse testified on the witness stand that Rosenbaum chased him down and grabbed his rifle, testimony that was largely backed by video and several of the prosecution’s own witnesses.

Huber was shot and killed after being caught on film assaulting Rittenhouse with a skateboard. Grosskreutz also stated that when he was shot, he had his own gun pointing at Rittenhouse.

To accept Rittenhouse’s claim of self-defense, the jury must conclude that he believed there was an unlawful threat to him and that the level of force he used was reasonable and necessary, according to Schroeder’s instructions to the jury.

Image Credit: Getty

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