Earlier today I wrote about Jacob Blake and the changing story about him, and now I’m going to update the news on Kyle Rittenhouse.
You know, Rittenhouse – that “white supremacist” 17-year-old who crossed state lines to roam around Kenosha looking for some peaceful demonstrators to shoot down in cold blood? That Kyle Rittenhouse, who was almost instantaneously charged with murder by the stalwart Kenosha DA?
As you probably are aware, what I’ve written in the above paragraph was the general narrative in the MSM and leftist social media at the outset, despite the evidence from multiple videos and eye-witnesses that Rittenhouse was acting in self-defense. However, strangely and uncharacteristically, the New York Times has given an indication, through study of the videos and a timeline, that self-defense was really what was going on that night in Kenosha. That’s how clear it must be.
Now we have a statement by Rittenhouse’s lawyers, and quite a statement it is. The facts they describe further change the story. Some excerpts:
After Kyle finished his work that day as a community lifeguard in Kenosha, he wanted to help clean up some of the damage, so he and a friend went to the local public high school to remove graffiti by rioters. Later in the day, they received information about a call for help from a local business owner, whose downtown Kenosha auto dealership was largely destroyed by mob violence. The business owner needed help to protect what he had left of his life’s work, including two nearby mechanic’s shops. Kyle and a friend armed themselves with rifles due to the deadly violence gripping Kenosha and many other American cities, and headed to the business premises. The weapons were in Wisconsin and never crossed state lines.
That is new information: that Rittenhouse worked in Kenosha, the request from the business owner, and the fact that the weapon didn’t cross state lines.
More:
Later that night, substantially after the city’s 8:00 p.m. curfew expired without consequence, the police finally started to attempt to disperse a group of rioters. In doing so, they maneuvered a mass of individuals down the street towards the auto shops. Kyle and others on the premises were verbally threatened and taunted multiple times as the rioters passed by, but Kyle never reacted. His intent was not to incite violence, but simply to deter property damage and use his training to provide first aid to injured community members.
After the crowd passed the premises and Kyle believed the threat of further destruction had passed, he became increasingly concerned with the injured protestors and bystanders congregating at a nearby gas station with no immediate access to medical assistance or help from law enforcement. Kyle headed in that direction with a first aid kit. He sought out injured persons, rendered aid, and tried to guide people to others who could assist to the extent he could do so amid the chaos.
So he was medically assisting injured people – I assume with the knowledge based on his lifeguard training.
Next, how he got separated and attacked by the mob:
By the final time Kyle returned to the gas station and confirmed there were no more injured individuals who needed assistance, police had advanced their formation and blocked what would have been his path back to the mechanic’s shop. Kyle then complied with the police instructions not to go back there. Kyle returned to the gas station until he learned of a need to help protect the second mechanic’s shop further down the street where property destruction was imminent with no police were nearby.
As Kyle proceeded towards the second mechanic’s shop, he was accosted by multiple rioters who recognized that he had been attempting to protect a business the mob wanted to destroy. This outraged the rioters and created a mob now determined to hurt Kyle. They began chasing him down…
The rest is as we already learned, and supports a legal self-defense argument. The following statement describes the first incident, the one that was not fully caught on video but for which there were eyewitnesses who described the same thing (I can’t find a link right now to the eyewitness, but I saw him interviewed recently on Tucker Carlson):
Kyle attempted to get away, but he could not do so quickly enough. Upon the sound of a gunshot behind him, Kyle turned and was immediately faced with an attacker lunging towards him and reaching for his rifle. He reacted instantaneously and justifiably with his weapon to protect himself, firing and striking the attacker.
Don’t try to take a rifle away from someone. Especially if you’ve been chasing and threatening the person, who might just come to the conclusion that you are about to grab his rifle and kill him with it.
The endgame:
Kyle stopped to ensure care for the wounded attacker but faced a growing mob gesturing towards him. He realized he needed to flee for his safety and his survival. Another attacker struck Kyle from behind as he fled down the street. Kyle turned as the mob pressed in on him and he fell to the ground. One attacker kicked Kyle on the ground while he was on the ground. Yet another bashed him over the head with a skateboard. Several rioters tried to disarm Kyle. In fear for his life and concerned the crowd would either continue to shoot at him or even use his own weapon against him, Kyle had no choice but to fire multiple rounds towards his immediate attackers, striking two, including one armed attacker. The rest of the mob began to disperse upon hearing the additional gunshots.
All of this conforms both to the available video and to the eyewitness descriptions I’ve read, and so it’s very credible. And of course, it goes completely against most of the initial reports and the story the left told around them on social media.
There’s much more to the lawyers’ statement and it’s well worth reading. I’ll just excerpt a short bit:
Kyle did nothing wrong. He exercised his God-given, Constitutional, common law and statutory law right to self-defense.
However, in a reactionary rush to appease the divisive, destructive forces currently roiling this country, prosecutors in Kenosha did not engage in any meaningful analysis of the facts, or any in-depth review of available video footage…[T]hey immediately saw him as a convenient target who they could use as a scapegoat to distract from the Jacob Blake shooting and the government’s abject failure to ensure basic law and order to citizens. Within 24-36 hours, he was charged with multiple homicide counts…
Pierce Bainbridge founder John Pierce praised Kyle’s strength and resilience. “A 17-year old child should not have to take up arms in America to protect life and property. That is the job of state and local governments. However, those governments have failed, and law-abiding citizens have no choice but to protect their own communities as their forefathers did at Lexington and Concord in 1775. Kyle is not a racist or a white supremacist. He is a brave, patriotic, compassionate law-abiding American who loves his country and his community. He did nothing wrong. He defended himself, which is a fundamental right of all Americans given by God and protected by law. He is now in the crosshairs of institutional forces that are much more powerful than him. But he will stand up to them and fight not only for himself, but for all Americans and their beloved Constitution. We will never leave his side until he is victorious in that fight.”
That is quite a statement. But I think the facts back up what has been said there.
[NOTE: At the link to the lawyers’ statement, there’s also information about how to donate to Rittenhouse’s defense.
Here’s some information about the DA who charged Rittenhouse. He has a history of prosecuting self-defense cases.]