Live updates: Kyle Rittenhouse's murder trial enters closing arguments
This post was originally published on this site
Kyle Rittenhouse’s murder trial has entered its third week and jurors are preparing for closing arguments and instructions from Judge Bruce Schroeder. Schroeder began proceedings on Monday by claiming he was worried that he would bore jurors with reading the self-defense instruction for each count it applies to despite the fact that it’s a necessary component of instructing the jury.
The instructions, which are 36 pages long, have already changed as Schroeder grilled the prosecution over the six counts Rittenhouse faced. The sixth count—possession of a dangerous weapon by a person under 18—was thrown out over Schroeder’s criticisms of the Wisconsin law. Schroeder claimed it was poorly written and that the size of the barrel of the gun Rittenhouse possessed meant that he did not violate the law despite being in possession of the gun when he was 17. The count is considered a misdemeanor and carries a sentence of up to nine months in prison and a $10,000 fine.
Rittenhouse is accused of shooting three men with a Smith & Wesson AR-15 style .223 while allegedly protecting a car lot in Kenosha, Wisconsin, as protests unfolded over the police shooting of Jacob Blake last August. Rittenhouse killed Joseph Rosenbaum and Anthony Huber and injured Gaige Grosskreutz.
Pixels have come back to haunt Schroeder as he lectured the prosecution about enlarging images.
Schroeder admitted that he didn’t “want to be meddling and comment on the evidence” but claimed that he had “common sense” enough to be skeptical of zooming in on a photo, which he continues to maintain somehow adds in pixels that alter the original image. This is absolutely not the case, yet Schroeder evoked the Daubert standard, which allows a party to raise a motion to exclude expert testimony or evidence deemed inadmissible.
He continued lecturing the prosecution that if his baseless theory somehow was borne out, it would bode terribly for them.