Jury to decide fate of US teen

Jury in the US state of Wisconsin has been sent out to deliberate in the case of Kyle written, teenager fatally shot to during process, Kenosha last year.

You might remember some of these images from them. Kind of written our city had travelled to the area to protect people’s property during riots which erupted after police shot and black man, Jacob Lake. Prosecution laying out closing arguments you mentioned Susan Rosen, first person shot and killed.

They have to convince you that Joseph Rosenbaum was going to take that gun and use it on the defendant because they know you can’t claim self defence against an unarmed man like this.

You lose the right to self defence when you’re the one who brought the gun when you’re the one creating the damage danger when you’re the one provoking other people

to a condition that is outside the courthouse prosecution.

I said he was acting like a hero in a western film. What was the defence argument?

For the defence This is a clear case of self defence. They say that car written House knew this gun because he was being ambushed by and I quote what the defence that is a crazy person and just to let you know .

the jury has now retired to consider his verdict. There are 18 jurors, but they were whittled down to 12. So there are six alternate jurors who will be on standby. They need to be but it’s 12 jurors that will deliver a call written out the same as we heard there from the prosecution.

They presented a strong argument as a defence for the prosecution. Congress now was an armed vigilante who inserted himself into a very volatile situation in Kenosha town but he’s not from and was instigated the only killings that happened,

whereas the defence say that he was ambushed as I mentioned, it’s you know, ultimately it’s the the 12 jurors that will decide what the verdict is if he is convicted of the most serious charge.

He could face live behind jail. As you can imagine, the case has been so politically divisive. There are already protesters outside on the Court steps and the governor here has ordered the National Guard to be on standby in case any protests turned violent.

Just talk us through the events of that evening last October, because Rittenhouse has actually travelled to the area from elsewhere.

That’s right he is from a town in the neighbouring state of Illinois.

and Kenosha was undergoing its third night of unrest and that unrest had been sparked by the shooting of a local black man here named Jacob flake. He was shot seven times in the back by a white police officer Carl Rittenhouse.

His defence is that he came over to help that he was asked to be here to provide security. There was a series of confrontation and it led to the shooting of three men.

Two of them were killed and one was seriously injured and he came over with a military style rifle and there was a controversial moment yesterday when the judge dismissed that charge against him.

Under Wisconsin law, it is illegal for under 18 year olds to carry that social rifle but there are some exceptions and that exception was applied to it now so there’s five charges now that the jury has to consider against them and also Rittenhouse had said he disappeared or been at other protests and acted as a First Aider which was presumably part of defence of his self defence.

That’s right. He said that he came with a Medicare that was challenged by the prosecution during the trial as well. But as I mentioned, this is a politically divisive case. You hear that phrase a lot you know so much in America is just sort of full along party lines.

But there’s many groups are invested in in what the verdict could mean so the conservative groups who have largely embraced car Rittenhouse, he is this patriot who took a stand against lawlessness and they worry that if he is convicted, what that might mean for the right to defend yourself the right to own guns.

Whereas for the more liberal groups, they look at courage now in the face of a gun culture that’s out of control in this country and they are worried that if he is cleared, and he can’t be retried for this crime again,

they worry that that could potentially give a green light to people in the future people to pick up a gun and come to a volatile protest and not face any consequences. And also the judge in his case has even talked about the political division.

He in His something yesterday said to the jurors don’t pay attention to what the current president or the former president has to say about this trial. The then president is now whereas Joe Biden when he was a presidential candidate