Kyle Rittenhouse makes first in-person court appearance in Kenosha, Wis., shooting
The November trial of Kyle Rittenhouse, an Illinois man charged with killing two people during chaotic protests that followed the police shooting of Jacob Blake last year in Wisconsin, will take up to two weeks, attorneys said Friday.
Prosecutors and Rittenhouse’s attorneys confirmed with Kenosha County Circuit Judge Bruce Schroeder during a 10-minute status conference that the trial will begin Nov. 1. Both sides said they don’t expect the proceeding to last the full two weeks.
In a sign of the intense publicity surrounding the case, they also told the judge they plan to send questionnaires to prospective jurors to ask them about their background and beliefs. The questionnaires can help attorneys decide whom to strike from the pool. Attorneys in the trial of Derek Chauvin, a former police officer who was convicted of killing George Floyd in Minneapolis, used such questionnaires.
Schroeder said he wants to see the questionnaires by Aug. 1.
Rittenhouse appeared in person in the courtroom for the first time since he was arrested last year; COVID-19 protocols forced him to appear via video at previous proceedings. He sat at the defense table dressed in a blue suit, blue tie and a black surgical face mask. He said nothing.
Prosecutors say Rittenhouse shot and killed two people and wounded a third in August after traveling from his home in Antioch, Ill., to Kenosha. He was 17 at the time. The city was in the midst of several nights of sometimes violent demonstrations after Officer Rusten Sheskey, who is white, shot Blake, who is Black, several times in the back, leaving him paralyzed from the waist down.
Rittenhouse and his attorneys have said he went to Kenosha to protect businesses. Video shows Rittenhouse, armed with an assault-style rifle, shooting Joseph Rosenbaum, Anthony Huber and Gaige Grosskreutz. Rosenbaum and Huber died.
Cellphone footage shows Rittenhouse, who is white, walking past police lines with his hands up and his rifle still slung over his shoulder even as protesters screamed that he had just shot people.
A white police officer from Wisconsin who was investigated and cleared for shooting and injuring a Black man during a domestic dispute has returned from administrative leave.
He turned himself in to police in Antioch several hours later, maintaining that the three men attacked him and that he fired in self-defense.
He has since become a polarizing figure in the national conversation over police brutality and racism. Conservatives have held him up as a symbol for gun rights and praised him for pushing back against anti-police protesters, going so far as to raise $2 million to cover his bail. Others contend that Rittenhouse escalated tensions by walking around the protest with a rifle.
His attorney, Mark Richards, said in court documents that Rittenhouse and his family have moved to an undisclosed location because they’ve received multiple threats.
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