But when he acknowledged that Rittenhouse’s rifle’s barrel was longer than 16 inches, the minimum barrel length allowed under state law, Schroeder dismissed the charge. Rittenhouse attorneys Mark Richards and Corey Chirafsi pointed to an exception in the law that they said allows minors to possess shotguns and rifles as long as they’re not short-barreled.Īssistant District Attorney James Kraus argued that the exception renders the state’s prohibition on minors possessing dangerous weapons meaningless. Hours before closing arguments began on Monday, Judge Bruce Schroeder granted a defense motion to toss out the weapons charge. Though the charge was only a misdemeanor - punishable by a maximum nine months in jail - it might have offered the jury a way to convict Rittenhouse of a lesser crime if they were persuaded by his self-defense claims but agreed with prosecutors that he made a poor decision to carry a rifle on the streets of Kenosha. WATCH: Analysis of the Rittenhouse verdict Rittenhouse was 17 at the time, and there was no dispute that he was armed the night of the shootings with a Smith and Wesson AR-style semiautomatic rifle strapped to his chest. That jury never got to consider the gun possession charge - one that at one time had seemed a slam-dunk for the prosecution. A jury deliberated about 3 1/2 days before finding Rittenhouse not guilty on Friday of five felony charges, including a murder charge that could have carried a life in prison sentence. Rittenhouse shot three men, killing two of them, with an AR-15-style rifle during a chaotic protest against police brutality in Kenosha last year. (AP) - Prosecutors in Kyle Rittenhouse’s murder trial may have lost their best chance at convicting the Illinois man of something when the judge threw out a charge that Rittenhouse was a minor in possession of a dangerous weapon.
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