17-year-old taken into custody and charged with intentional homicide after cops allegedly allowed him to flee the scene of the shooting.
Kyle Rittenhouse traveled to Wisconsin to participate in the unrest and was a supporter of Blue Lives Matter (Facebook)
During another night of mayhem on the burning streets of an American city, two people were shot dead and a third injured. The violent disorder unfolded in Kenosha, Wisconsin amid ongoing protests over the police shooting of a Black man, Jacob Blake.
Most remarkably, whatever view you take of the rioting and looting, the shooter was allowed to walk calmly away from the scene late Tuesday night without the police appearing to make any effort to take him into custody.
On Wednesday, the long arm of the law did finally catch up with him.
The young man seen in various videos carrying a rifle and shooting at protesters has now been identified as Kyle Rittenhouse. He is only 17-years old and from Illinois. According to his social media profile, he was a supporter of the “Blue Lives Matter” movement, which backs the police; and he was said to have been recruited to the Wisconsin militia via Facebook.
Sheriff David Beth said one victim was shot in the head and the other in the chest. A third person was also shot, but the wounds were not believed to life-threatening.
According to witness accounts and video footage, police let Rittenhouse walk past them with a rifle over his shoulder as members of the crowd were yelling for him to be arrested because he had shot people.
Sherriff Beth would not say for certain whether Rittenhouse was part of a militia that has begun patrolling the streets of Kenosha on recent nights.
The armed men claim that they are defending local businesses, many of which have been attacked and set on fire by rioters.
Protest groups, including Black Lives Matter, and others counter that the militia have white supremacist leanings and are there to prevent peaceful protests, rather than to simply protect businesses.
The FBI said Wednesday that it is assisting in the case involving Rittenhouse.
Wisconsin Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes, who is Black, said in an interview with the news program “Democracy Now!” that the shootings were not surprising and that white militias have been ignored for too long.
“How many times across this country do you see armed gunmen, protesting, walking into state Capitols, and everybody just thinks it’s OK?” Barnes said. “People treat that like it’s some kind of normal activity that people are walking around with assault rifles.”
Cellphone video of at least two of the shootings that was posted online shows a young man with a rifle jogging down the middle of a street as a crowd and some police officers follow him. Someone in the crowd can be heard asking, “What did he do?” and another person responds that the man had shot someone.
As of Wednesday, Rittenhouse’s arrest was already dividing social media. Some users argued that his actions amounted to an open and shut case of murder.
Others however, including supporters of the police, claimed that he acted in self-defense.
Undoubtedly, many more facts will emerge in due course about the horrific incident.
For now, the teen gunman faces his first court appearance on Friday.
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Interesting. He “participated in the unrest.” First of all, no 17 year old should feel the need to protect businesses and lives because the adults in the city should have been doing it. Instead, they allowed rioting, violence, burning businesses down without charging those individuals with anything. They also allowed grown men to attempt to beat up a 17 year old who felt the need to protect himself. So who are the real criminals here?