Opening statements are set to begin Tuesday in the trial of Kyle Rittenhouse, the teenager who fatally shot two men and injured a third during protests against police brutality in Wisconsin last year.
Rittenhouse, 18, faces seven charges, including homicide for fatally shooting Joseph Rosenbaum, 36, and Anthony Huber, 26, and attempted homicide for wounding Gaige Grosskreutz, 27.
A jury of 20 people — 11 women and nine men — was seated Monday.
Rittenhouse, who was armed with an AR-15-style rifle, opened fire on the three men during unrest in Kenosha on Aug. 25, 2020, following the police shooting a few days earlier of Jacob Blake, a black man who was left paralyzed from the waist down.
Prosecutors will seek to prove that Rittenhouse, an aspiring police officer, traveled to Kenosha from his hometown of Antioch, Illinois, seeking conflict.
The defense is expected to argue that Rittenhouse fired in self-defense after the men attacked him.
Judge Bruce Schroeder said the televised trial is expected to last just over two weeks.
Schroeder repeatedly stressed on Monday that jurors must reach a verdict solely on what they hear in the courtroom, cautioning, “This is not a political trial.”
“It was mentioned by both political campaigns and the presidential campaign last year, in some instances very, very imprudently,” he said.
He told the jurors that inaccurate information has been shared by people who “don’t know what you’re going to know.”
“Those of you who are selected for this jury, who are going to hear for yourselves the real evidence in this case,” he said.
If convicted of the top charge of intentional homicide, Rittenhouse faces a mandatory sentence of life in prison.
With Post wires
