Kyle Rittenhouse Arraignment

Kyle Rittenhouse, 17, is scheduled for an arraignment on Tuesday in his controversial murder case in Kenosha County, Wisconsin.

The defendant’s case falls right on a politically charged cultural fissure. He shot and killed two men—Anthony Huber, 26, and Joseph Rosenbaum, 36–during his confrontation with apparent protesters of the police shooting of local man Jacob Blake, 29.

Law&Crime is naming the defendant because he is being charged as an adult and has publicly spoken about the case. His attorneys plan on asserting a self-defense claim, but authorities say Rittenhouse’s actions justify prosecution on two counts of first-degree reckless homicide and other charges. An Illinois resident, Rittenhouse told The Washington Post he was in the area working as a lifeguard while on furlough from the YMCA. He was among people–usually conservatives and so-called militiamen–who went to Kenosha during the protests in an ostensible attempt to protect local property amid rioting and looting.

Conservatives took Rittenhouse’s case as a cause célèbre, with a number going out of their way to raise money for his legal defense and $2 million bail.

Critics tend to maintain that the “militia” and Rittenhouse were just “looking for trouble.”
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