Ricochet is the best place on the internet to discuss the issues of the day, either through commenting on posts or writing your own for our active and dynamic community in a fully moderated environment. In addition, the Ricochet Audio Network offers over 50 original podcasts with new episodes released every day.
I Have Questions
Twitter is revelatory. The general population has probably always had a stupid streak, but Twitter makes it possible for ignorance to light itself on fire and burn so brightly it overwhelms the sun.
Reading the rants about the Kyle Rittenhouse trial is something else. First, there seems to be a large segment of the population who thinks the prosecution is doing a good job. Now, granted, I just catch the “lowlights,” but from what I have seen, Assistant District Attorney Thomas Binger has been surprised way too many times by his own witnesses.
Second, the “conventional wisdom” about the law is astoundingly bad. I mean, most people commenting on the trial would be confused watching a Matlock rerun. I could be a very rich man if I could collect a dollar from everyone who assured their fellow progressives that, no matter what, the prosecution will eventually win on appeal. That’s how bad civics education is. How the hell do that many people believe an acquittal can be appealed all the way up to the Supreme Court?
And the comments about the presiding judge, Bruce Schroeder, are something else, too. Local attorneys describe him as fair but willing to be combative. My theory, which would be easy to prove or disprove with the proper resources, is that this is not the first time this judge has witnessed this prosecutor’s ineptitude. But no journalist seems even remotely interested in any backstory between them. The media loves the clips of Schroeder’s admonitions, but doesn’t go out of their way to make clear that he makes sure the jury is out of the room when he does it.
Rittenhouse will probably be convicted on the gun charge. There is no doubt that he was underage and outside the home with a firearm. The man who supplied the weapon is probably in more trouble than the person who fired it. There is a persistent belief that Rittenhouse, who lives in Antioch, IL, carried the rifle across state lines into Wisconsin. He did not. And even if he did, there is no Federal law against that. (States have their own transport regulations but anything interstate would be the jurisdiction of the Feds.)
But one never knows how a jury will rule. Especially one that feels intimidated. The political pressure has been huge, which is why in so many of these cases overcharging has become the norm. The DA feels the heat, the jury feels the heat, and so does the judge. My only hope is that the jury is more informed than the folks on Twitter.
Published in General
The response to this trial makes me want to tear out my hair. People are so incredibly ignorant and pathetic. This poor kid would have been better off staying at home that night, but he didn’t. Can’t we at least expect a just trial??
It also appears that there are a substantial number of people who are unaware that the dead are a) white and b) far less than solid citizens.
It will be interesting to see if the judge is “combative” enough to enter a judgement notwithstanding the verdict should the jury convict Rittenhouse of murder.
Rereading my opening sentence, I should emphasize that I blame the education system for this. I don’t share the disdain for the common man in the manner of, say Bill Kristol. I think their education has left them inadequately prepared to be free-born citizens.
I would not bet on it.
The people of Kenosha city and county are by and large good people, more like Judge Schroeder than the prosecution team and the petty dynasty of the Antaramian family (mayor, DA and lead detective are all related). There is a legacy of the auto industry, but the AMC plant closed in the late 1980s and the Kenosha Engine plant closed in 2010. You often would see autoworkers having beer for breakfast at the Brat Stop after the third shift, and the high school where Kyle Rittenhouse was photographed scrubbing graffiti is a slightly tired classical revival building named for Walter Reuther and is on the National Register.
The good people of Kenosha and the surrounding area did not want any of this. You could listen to the police scanner and hear the calls go out that cars with out of state plates from Washington, Oregon, Minnesota et al were filling multiple gas cans when they got off I-94. People who lived in modest neighborhoods called when the bus from Oregon that came to feed
agitatorsprotestors parked in front of houses.Yes, they are afraid. But we have to trust them. The jury, the process. We have to trust this system or else we will have yet more fiery but peaceful protests in a town near you.
There are not really any questions in this post.
There is a lot going on in this trial. In my opinion the Rittenhouse defense team should have asked for a Bench Trial. Judge, and no jury. Watching the trial has been opportunity to see a Woke prosecutor in action, and it isn’t pretty. Outside the the courtroom there have been threats to the jury if they don’t convict on social media. There have been some reports that jurors are being photographed as they arrive, and leave the courthouse.
Some attorneys believe that the prosecutor is trying to provoke the judge to declare a mistrial. I’m inclined to agree with that assessment.
There’s at least one.
Regarding the Bench Trial, I can’t recall if waiving a jury trial occurs before or after the judge is selected. If before, that would mean Schroeder would not have been known as the judge.
The prosecutor’s “act” makes me also think that he’s looking for a mistrial, but if the mistrial is with prejudice (no retrial), that would make him pretty dumb.
Civic ignorance is a serious problem, but in addition to that, most people on Twitter making these comments are only commenting based on clips they’ve seen on CNN. Very few are actually watching the trial (I am).
My favorite moment was when the prosecutor asked a videographer:
Videographer:
And isn’t the first rule for any lawyer in a trial to never ask a question unless you already know what the answer will be. Seems to me that lawyers on either side being surprised by their own witnesses aren’t real smart.
Plus, since the impact of the prosecutor’s misconduct is not immediately apparent, the judge doesn’t have to rule on the motion for a mistrial right away. As he seems to be doing here, he can take it under advisement, possibly even until after the verdict, and then rule on it. That way, if Rittenhouse is acquitted (as I think he should be), the judge can then deny the mistrial motion as moot – because obviously the prosecutor’s conduct didn’t prejudice the jury against the defendant, since they acquitted him. If they convict him, then the judge would need to consider what impact the prosecutor’s conduct had on that decision, and may then decide a mistrial is proper.
So, I doubt the prosecutor is angling for a mistrial. If he is, he needs to do something so egregious that the law gives the judge no discretion on granting it, and so judge has to grant it right away without prejudice. As it is, with the judge able to wait to rule on it until after the verdict, the prosecutor’s basically given the defense a free shot at an acquittal (assuming the judge is inclined to grant the motion.) It’s like a free play in football when the defense is offside.
A mistrial would allow the prosecutor to blame the judge, a not guilty decision from the jury would mean the prosecutor would have to bear the blame. This prosecutor would probably see this as a personal win-win.
Imagine, if you will, loners; broken, violent men; men who take pleasure in pain… No, I’m not talking about the boy with the gun, but about those who flocked to the Kenosha BLM riots at first opportunity so that they could gleefully join the mayhem. The boy was there, was identified as an adversary and became a target. In their blood frenzy, the men forgot that they were mortal, that the boy might defend his life. Bad choice.
I’m about to the point where I no longer care about the trial, I just want the prosecutor to go down in permanent flames.
They’ve gotten so used to the usual paradigm, where a group surrounds someone and kicks them as they lay on the ground, that it didn’t occur to them that the equation changed with someone who was armed.
“Le meglio è l’inimico del bene“. Voltaire
And media insists on calling the one witness a “paramedic.” People hear that and assume he was a first responder rather than just another Antifa rioter. Saying that you are a medic for the Marxist militia group, the People’s Revolution, doesn’t change the fact that you were there to assist in the riots.
Included in the victims rioting that night was an attack on Kyle Rittenhouse, an attack which ended tragically for the rioters in this instance.
The risks of rioting, looting, committing arson, violence and general mayhem may not be written in any Antifa manual, but potential for a tragic result as happened in this instance should have been inferred by everyone with any common sense …. on both sides of the ideological spectrum.
Imbecilic empty suit WI Governor Tony Evers better have the National Guard in place this time when the verdict is announced.
Death is a reasonable outcome for rioters, looters, and arsonists. I’m trying hard to not wish for it.
Yup. Same with the coroner of George Floyd. And the Chauvin jury. This is what has been purchased by the Democrats’ wicked Brownshirt violence.
As intended.
We will have them regardless.
What it revealed to me was how many people on Twitter were vile and ignorant. It’s why I left it.
Totally agree. Same reason I left it.
I am more than fifty years older than “this poor kid”, so maybe I can be forgiven for asking, where were his parents? Did they just sit around with their thumbs up their [redacted]s while a minor takes an AR-15 into a riot situation?
There was a time that a you could count on somebody being on the jury that is sympathetic to a self-defense argument and certainly to take the decision making as very serious. Now, a jury is more likely to make a decision based on the desired political outcome. They don’t want Anti-fa commies burning down their house or their city–they don’t want to acquit a person the media has declared to be a “white supremacist”. The jury was supposed to be last defense of a free people from tyranny and the commie Left has ruined that now too.
He was given the rifle from what I understand. I am unclear as to what his parents knew.
It’s why I’m still there.