‘Killer’ vigilante a HS dropout obsessed with cops, firearms
The teenage vigilante charged with opening fire on protesters in Kenosha, Wis. — killing two and wounding a third — was a bullied high-school dropout who became obsessed with cops and guns.
Kyle Rittenhouse, 17, who was arrested in his hometown of Antioch, Ill., on Wednesday, now faces two homicide charges and an attempted-murder charge as he awaits extradition back to Wisconsin.
The teen had long played out his obsession with guns and law-enforcement on social media. His Facebook profile photo showed him posing with a high-powered rifle, framed by a superimposed banner reading, “Duty. Honor. Courage. Blue Lives Matter,” according to reports. His mother posted a photo of Rittenhouse decked out in a blue police cadet uniform and badge — from his participation in a Grayslake, Ill., Police Department youth cadet program, The Washington Post reported on Thursday.
Rittenhouse’s page has since been removed by Facebook.
On his 16th birthday, he called for donations to Humanize the Badge, a nonprofit that promised to “forge stronger relationships between law enforcement officers and the communities they serve,” CNN said.
Rittenhouse had answered the online call on Tuesday for armed vigilantes to flock to Kenosha to protect businesses from “evil thugs” who had rioted in the city since Sunday’s police shooting of Jacob Blake.
A local militia group known as the Kenosha Guard had put out an invitation called Armed Citizens to Protect Our Lives and Property on its sincedeleted Facebook page.
Kenosha resident Ray Roberts, who is black, said that the vigilantes poured into the city and that men from “rural areas got in big trucks loaded up with guns and flags and got into town.”
“You would see them driving into town after curfew and cops not stopping them,” Roberts told The Associated Press.
Armed with a semiautomatic rifle, Rittenhouse was among them and was seen on video hours before the deadly shootings telling the Daily Caller, “Part of my job is to protect people.”
Shortly before midnight Tuesday, Rittenhouse opened fire against protesters after getting surrounded outside a service station, according to reports and video.
Jason Rosenbaum, 36, of Kenosha, was fatally shot in the head outside the shop. Rittenhouse then is seen making a phone call before running off.
Other video shows Rittenhouse then running down a street with protesters in pursuit, stumbling to the ground before Anthony Huber, 26, appears to try to hit him with a skateboard and another man delivers a flying kick in his direction.
Squeezing off shots as he rolled on the ground, Rittenhouse fatally struck
Huber and wounded Gaige Grosskreutz, also 26.
Photos from the scene appear to show Grosskreutz holding a pistol in his right hand as he nurses a gunshot wound on the same arm.
In another video, Rittenhouse approaches a convoy of police vehicles with his hands raised — but the cops motor past him toward protestors, allowing him to flee.
At a press conference on Thursday, Kenosha County Sheriff David Beth appeared to downplay the shootings, saying that Tuesday night was “not quite so peaceful but it wasn’t too bad” compared to the day before.
The American Civil Liberties Union on Thursday called for “the immediate resignation” of Kenosha’s top law-enforcement officials.
Meanwhile, lawyers for Rittenhouse issued their first statement.
“Kyle will have excellent legal representation,” attorney L. Lin Wood tweeted on Thursday, adding that he would be working with the firm of Pierce Bainbridge. “We will obtain justice for Kyle.”