Kyle Rittenhouse found not guilty on all charges

[daly 501]

3 hours ago, horsefly said:

So Rittenhouse psychically knew this man had "strangled" his brother twice, or are we simply to assume that all skateboarders have strangled their brothers twice and therefore can be shot? FFS!

Obviously not, shows the mentality of the person and how dangerous he is to go to PRiSON (not jail), a big difference in the USA for strangling his brother twice. He had chased and knocked Rittenhouse over with his skateboard so who knows what the outcome would have been.  
Hopefully you will never be in the position of being on the ground and having a thug about to crack your head open

[littleyellowbirdie 2,542]

4 hours ago, keelansgrandad said:

Not so my friend. It wasn't self defence because there is a scale of self defence. Necessary force etc. It was about the state of Rittenhouse's mind at the time. Was he in imminent danger. The word danger would depend on what the alleged attacker was planning on doing. But it still came down to Rittenhouse, despite every other piece of evidence presented on his intent, telling the court he believed he was in danger. It doesn't even matter that he was illegally carrying an assault weapon.

Jurisprudence at its narrowest.

I agree that it's very narrow, 

Edited November 26, 2021 by littleyellowbirdie

[horsefly 4,297]

3 hours ago, daly said:

Obviously not, shows the mentality of the person and how dangerous he is to go to PRiSON (not jail), a big difference in the USA for strangling his brother twice. He had chased and knocked Rittenhouse over with his skateboard so who knows what the outcome would have been.  
Hopefully you will never be in the position of being on the ground and having a thug about to crack your head open

Or hopefully not in the position of being a protester faced with an immature teenager armed with an illegal AR-15 about to shoot several rounds of ammunition into my body. Guess I'd rather face someone armed with a skateboard than someone armed with a lethal semi-automatic military weapon.

[Indy 3,297]

13 minutes ago, horsefly said:

Or hopefully not in the position of being a protester faced with an immature teenager armed with an illegal AR-15 about to shoot several rounds of ammunition into my body. Guess I'd rather face someone armed with a skateboard than someone armed with a lethal semi-automatic military weapon.

Good job it’s not a bike! You’re going to need a tank if confronted with an aggressor with a bike! Jesus what planet justifies a 17 year old who is illegally armed shooting and killing someone with skateboard!

[horsefly 4,297]

1 minute ago, Indy said:

Good job it’s not a bike! You’re going to need a tank if confronted with an aggressor with a bike! Jesus what planet justifies a 17 year old who is illegally armed shooting and killing someone with skateboard!

Frankly, it's probably beyond comprehension. You've got to be possessed of some real hateful motivations to want to defend such a thing.

[Indy 3,297]

Let’s see who’s happy if they’re 17 year old son went 20 miles into a inflamed situation with an illegal rifle and killed three people, would you really think it OK? Or what if it was your son peacefully protesting which goes into a bit of a inflamed riotous situation who gets shot by a 17 year old? Would you be happy if your son had a skateboard and was shot confronting this looney? I don’t get how anyone can actually stand up for him……..like I said legally he’s got away with it, but morally those involved need to take a long hard look at the outcome.

[Fen Canary 811]

6 hours ago, keelansgrandad said:

Not so my friend. It wasn't self defence because there is a scale of self defence. Necessary force etc. It was about the state of Rittenhouse's mind at the time. Was he in imminent danger. The word danger would depend on what the alleged attacker was planning on doing. But it still came down to Rittenhouse, despite every other piece of evidence presented on his intent, telling the court he believed he was in danger. It doesn't even matter that he was illegally carrying an assault weapon.

Jurisprudence at its narrowest.

Let’s split the three shootings down.

The first man shooting involved the defendant being chased by two men, one of which was armed and fired a gun in the air and the second who had threatened to kill the defendant earlier in the day if he caught him alone.

The second involved a man physically attacking him on the ground with a skateboard.

The third involved another armed man, who admitted in court that the defendant didn’t fire until he pointed the gun at his head.

In all three situations I’d say the defendant was in serious danger.

We can argue about whether he should have gone in the first place, though the fact he had a bag full of medical supplies and had spent the previous days clearing up graffiti implies he was more naive than dangerous. But that same argument also applies to the men shot, if they hadn’t been involved in a rioting mob who were breaking a curfew they wouldn’t have been there either.

The correct verdict was reached, as it was in the case of the 3 men convicted for shooting the black jogger

[littleyellowbirdie 2,542]

8 hours ago, horsefly said:

You have yet again ignored the point made time and time again that the Judge in this PARTICULAR case directed the jury that all they had to be convinced of was that Rittenhouse FELT he was in danger of his life. Given that it would be impossible for the jury (or anyone) to contradict Rittenhouse's claim that he did indeed feel like that, KG's point that this amounted to a get-out-of-jail-free card is entirely accurate.

I haven't ignored it. What the judge said to the jury was how it is worded in Wisconsin law.

Juries are lay people and it's perfectly normal for judges to highlight key legal points that are key in making a judgement. There was no doubt whatsoever that Rittenhouse killed the two men and badly injured the third, so whether the jury found the self-defence argument credible was the central point.

What it boils down to is whether the jury believed Rittenhouse's claim based on the other evidence supporting his claim, and they did, but had any of the evidence supporting it not been there then they could easily have dismissed the self-defence argument. 

Edited November 26, 2021 by littleyellowbirdie

[Indy 3,297]

4 minutes ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

I haven't ignored it. What the judge said to the jury was how it is worded in Wisconsin law.

Juries are lay people and it's perfectly normal for judges to highlight key legal points that are key in making a judgement. There was no doubt whatsoever that Rittenhouse killed the two men and badly injured the third, so whether the jury found the self-defence argument credible was the central point.

What it boils down to is whether the jury believed Rittenhouse's claim based on the other evidence supporting his claim, and they did, but had any of the evidence supporting it not been there then they could easily have dismissed the self-defence argument. 

They had an initial confrontation where no shots were fired and Rittenhouse chose to flee. They chose to pusue Rittenhouse , did attack him and the armed one did aim his gun at him by his own testimony. I guess that's why the jury decided self-defence had to be allowed as plausible. 

Had Rittenhouse shot at the first altercation without first having tried to flee it may well have been a different story. This is why it's not a get out of jail free card. 

Indeed, I believe the jury is made up from a selection process where the prosecution and defence can veto each juror till the 12 are selected. As I keep saying the law has been served and fine if that’s the verdict it’s done, but my question is about his mindset, to take an illegal gun into an inflamed situation where he has no reason to be knowing it might inflame the situation and knowing it could lead to him shooting someone, has to be considered what his own motive was! Now he’s got away with killing three people how will that move his mindset in the future? He’s a dangerous person who I’m glad isn’t living in Norfolk.

[horsefly 4,297]

12 minutes ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

I haven't ignored it. What the judge said to the jury was how it is worded in Wisconsin law.

And still you fail to address KG's point. 

[horsefly 4,297]

10 minutes ago, Indy said:

Indeed, I believe the jury is made up from a selection process where the prosecution and defence can veto each juror till the 12 are selected. As I keep saying the law has been served and fine if that’s the verdict it’s done, but my question is about his mindset, to take an illegal gun into an inflamed situation where he has no reason to be knowing it might inflame the situation and knowing it could lead to him shooting someone, has to be considered what his own motive was! Now he’s got away with killing three people how will that move his mindset in the future? He’s a dangerous person who I’m glad isn’t living in Norfolk.

We shouldn't forget either that Rittenhouse was in breach of a City 8pm curfew that evening (another reason why he should not have been there).

[littleyellowbirdie 2,542]

2 hours ago, horsefly said:

We shouldn't forget either that Rittenhouse was in breach of a City 8pm curfew that evening (another reason why he should not have been there).

So was everybody else. 

[littleyellowbirdie 2,542]

2 hours ago, Indy said:

Indeed, I believe the jury is made up from a selection process where the prosecution and defence can veto each juror till the 12 are selected. As I keep saying the law has been served and fine if that’s the verdict it’s done, but my question is about his mindset, to take an illegal gun into an inflamed situation where he has no reason to be knowing it might inflame the situation and knowing it could lead to him shooting someone, has to be considered what his own motive was! Now he’s got away with killing three people how will that move his mindset in the future? He’s a dangerous person who I’m glad isn’t living in Norfolk.

Last night, a Scottish mate recounted when he was in Texas and he heard a story of another Scot who'd got lost, so knocked on somebody's door to ask for directions. The house owner opened the door, shot him, and killed him. The house owner then pled he was in fear for his life and was acquitted.

Kyle Rittenhouse is just one 17-year old gun nut in a culture full of gun nuts. Kyle had a big gun, but protesters had guns as well. From the perspective of people who live in societies where gun ownership is very rare, then it's easy to cast Rittenhouse as a cold-blooded killer, but personally I think he was just a silly boy out of his depth with a really big gun who got scared in a country where killing people because you're scared is not only acceptable, but actually encouraged as best practise among large swathes of the population. America badly needs to take a good hard look at itself, but only Americans can make that happen. 

 

[horsefly 4,297]

8 hours ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

So was everybody else. 

Indeed! It was for the police to deal with that issue NOT a 17 year-old carrying an illegal weapon who was also illegally in breach of the curfew. 

[Yellow Fever 3,767]

9 hours ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

Last night, a Scottish mate recounted when he was in Texas and he heard a story of another Scot who'd got lost, so knocked on somebody's door to ask for directions. The house owner opened the door, shot him, and killed him. The house owner then pled he was in fear for his life and was acquitted.

Kyle Rittenhouse is just one 17-year old gun nut in a culture full of gun nuts. Kyle had a big gun, but protesters had guns as well. From the perspective of people who live in societies where gun ownership is very rare, then it's easy to cast Rittenhouse as a cold-blooded killer, but personally I think he was just a silly boy out of his depth with a really big gun who got scared in a country where killing people because you're scared is not only acceptable, but actually encouraged as best practise among large swathes of the population. America badly needs to take a good hard look at itself, but only Americans can make that happen. 

 

Many of us who have lived and worked in the USA can tell similar stories.

Houses in leafy suburbs will often have little signs in the garden to defer burglars - armed response security. Equally there are similar iconic stories of people being shot just being neighbourly to check if somebody is all right or delivery drivers! Don't turn up unexpected!

I myself when much younger recall being in Burbank and taking a walk in the local suburbs (I used to get many a weekend to twiddle my thumbs) and getting many a stare (nobody walked it seems so I must of stood out - a jogger may be OK). I would advise against it today.

I was also shocked (and for me that takes some doing) driving a couple of years back west of Charlotte (an idle day spent on the 'blue ridge') at the number of ammunition shops  - as common it seems as book makers here. After all WV isn't NM or AZ.

With the current 'open carry' and NRA inspired gun laws most of the states are going to hell in a hand cart and quite quickly. Rittenhouse is the symptom not the cause.

 

Edited November 27, 2021 by Yellow Fever

[PurpleCanary 5,557]

This has been fun. I got into this because I knew the similar Arbery case was coming to a conclusion and tried to see if the Rittenhouse case could offer guidance as to the Georgia trial. And looking at the two has been instructive, and puzzling.  Where we seem to be at is this:

A defendant who kills and then claims self-defence needs only to say they felt in fear of being killed themselves. And for the circumstances of the incident to be such as to make that claim plausible. But plausible to whom? To the defendant, in their mind, acting in extreme circumstances, or plausible to an objective observer?

The prosecution, by contrast, has a far higher bar to surmount to disprove self-defence. It has to prove beyond reasonable doubt a negative that is in someone’s mind - that the defendant didn’t fear for their life. As near impossible as it can get, legally. Its only valid attack is to say the circumstances didn’t make the claim plausible, with plausible being an elastic term.

As I understand it this interpretation applies to simple cases where someone is threatened – say as with a homeowner who shoots dead burglars who have broken in – but also to the Rittenhouse and Arbery cases, where the threatening armed aggressor finds their unarmed victim fights back to defend themselves in some way, and particularly by trying to grab the aggressor’s gun.

Not only is the interpretation the same, that the armed aggressor who has started the confrontation can then claim they feared for their life, and so were justified in killing their intended victim, but there is also no legal duty on them to back away from the confrontation as soon as they see their victim trying to turn the tables on them. They are entitled to keep the confrontation going, and that cannot be held against them in court.

On the face of it, morally speaking, that is totally crazy. That the same defence and level of proof or disproof should be available to someone justifiably defending themselves and perhaps their family, but also available to someone whose original aggressive actions – and their refusal then to defuse the situation by backing down - have caused the unnecessary death of their intended victim.

I imagine, leaving morality aside, the legal problem is drafting an interpretation that could clearly differentiate between what one might loosely term justified and unjustified self-defence.

The other, specific, puzzling aspect concerns the verdicts by the juries as far as Rittenhouse shooting dead the unarmed Rosenbaum and Travis McMichael killing the unarmed Arbery. The basic facts seem very similar. In both cases the defendants said they feared for their life because their intended victim was trying to grab their gun. If one of those defences was plausible the other would seem equally so.

Yet Rittenhouse was acquitted and McMichael was found guilty. In the latter case there was the argument that McMichael claimed to be making a citizen’s arrest when he had no legal right to, and so the self-defence claim was invalid anyway. And no two juries are the same, but it is hard to avoid the feeling that in these cases the two very different backgrounds played a part, with different moral judgments being made both on the respective victims and the respective killers.
 

[Yellow Fever 3,767]

3 minutes ago, PurpleCanary said:

Yet Rittenhouse was acquitted and McMichael was found guilty. In the latter case there was the argument that McMichael claimed to be making a citizen’s arrest when he had no legal right to, and so the self-defence claim was invalid anyway. And no two juries are the same, but it is hard to avoid the feeling that in these cases the two very different backgrounds played a part, with different moral judgments being made both on the respective victims and the respective killers.
 

Yes - we even see that in some of the posts here that 'defend' Rittenhouse's actions in the context of the 'riot' and his lame excuses to be there (simply if hadn't gone there with a rifle it wouldn't have happened).

I wonder what 'self-defence' or 'citizens arrest' or 'disarming a dangerous individual' claims those sadly deceased would also make as to the actions vs Rittenhouse? 

[littleyellowbirdie 2,542]

40 minutes ago, PurpleCanary said:

This has been fun. I got into this because I knew the similar Arbery case was coming to a conclusion and tried to see if the Rittenhouse case could offer guidance as to the Georgia trial. And looking at the two has been instructive, and puzzling.  Where we seem to be at is this:

A defendant who kills and then claims self-defence needs only to say they felt in fear of being killed themselves. And for the circumstances of the incident to be such as to make that claim plausible. But plausible to whom? To the defendant, in their mind, acting in extreme circumstances, or plausible to an objective observer?

The prosecution, by contrast, has a far higher bar to surmount to disprove self-defence. It has to prove beyond reasonable doubt a negative that is in someone’s mind - that the defendant didn’t fear for their life. As near impossible as it can get, legally. Its only valid attack is to say the circumstances didn’t make the claim plausible, with plausible being an elastic term.

As I understand it this interpretation applies to simple cases where someone is threatened – say as with a homeowner who shoots dead burglars who have broken in – but also to the Rittenhouse and Arbery cases, where the threatening armed aggressor finds their unarmed victim fights back to defend themselves in some way, and particularly by trying to grab the aggressor’s gun.

Not only is the interpretation the same, that the armed aggressor who has started the confrontation can then claim they feared for their life, and so were justified in killing their intended victim, but there is also no legal duty on them to back away from the confrontation as soon as they see their victim trying to turn the tables on them. They are entitled to keep the confrontation going, and that cannot be held against them in court.

On the face of it, morally speaking, that is totally crazy. That the same defence and level of proof or disproof should be available to someone justifiably defending themselves and perhaps their family, but also available to someone whose original aggressive actions – and their refusal then to defuse the situation by backing down - have caused the unnecessary death of their intended victim.

I imagine, leaving morality aside, the legal problem is drafting an interpretation that could clearly differentiate between what one might loosely term justified and unjustified self-defence.

The other, specific, puzzling aspect concerns the verdicts by the juries as far as Rittenhouse shooting dead the unarmed Rosenbaum and Travis McMichael killing the unarmed Arbery. The basic facts seem very similar. In both cases the defendants said they feared for their life because their intended victim was trying to grab their gun. If one of those defences was plausible the other would seem equally so.

Yet Rittenhouse was acquitted and McMichael was found guilty. In the latter case there was the argument that McMichael claimed to be making a citizen’s arrest when he had no legal right to, and so the self-defence claim was invalid anyway. And no two juries are the same, but it is hard to avoid the feeling that in these cases the two very different backgrounds played a part, with different moral judgments being made both on the respective victims and the respective killers.
 

You can't really make a direct comparison between Arbery and Rittenhouse because you're dealing with different states with different state legal systems. This is deemed a big enough deal that there are different bar exams between states. Some states have a unified bar exam, but Wisconsin and Georgia aren't on the list. 

[keelansgrandad 6,679]

15 hours ago, Fen Canary said:

Let’s split the three shootings down.

The first man shooting involved the defendant being chased by two men, one of which was armed and fired a gun in the air and the second who had threatened to kill the defendant earlier in the day if he caught him alone.

The second involved a man physically attacking him on the ground with a skateboard.

The third involved another armed man, who admitted in court that the defendant didn’t fire until he pointed the gun at his head.

In all three situations I’d say the defendant was in serious danger.

We can argue about whether he should have gone in the first place, though the fact he had a bag full of medical supplies and had spent the previous days clearing up graffiti implies he was more naive than dangerous. But that same argument also applies to the men shot, if they hadn’t been involved in a rioting mob who were breaking a curfew they wouldn’t have been there either.

The correct verdict was reached, as it was in the case of the 3 men convicted for shooting the black jogger

You are correct. We can argue about this forever.

As an example. Chris Kyle, the "American Sniper" is revered in many quarters for what he did in Iraq. Others find him a cold killer after what, he alleges himself, he did to looters in New Orleans during Katrina.

From reading about him, I have an opinion of a man who enjoyed shooting people. Because he could. Not who they were but just where they were at the time. Clint Eastwood obviously thinks the man is a charming, brave patriot who was angered by attacks on the US.

 

[PurpleCanary 5,557]

29 minutes ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

You can't really make a direct comparison between Arbery and Rittenhouse because you're dealing with different states with different state legal systems. This is deemed a big enough deal that there are different bar exams between states. Some states have a unified bar exam, but Wisconsin and Georgia aren't on the list. 

But as I understand it the law on/interpretation of self-defence, even in cases of the aggressor being turned on, is the same in these two states. Not least because the two defences used the same argument. So a direct comparison of the law can be made.

[littleyellowbirdie 2,542]

 

1 minute ago, keelansgrandad said:

You are correct. We can argue about this forever.

As an example. Chris Kyle, the "American Sniper" is revered in many quarters for what he did in Iraq. Others find him a cold killer after what, he alleges himself, he did to looters in New Orleans during Katrina.

From reading about him, I have an opinion of a man who enjoyed shooting people. Because he could. Not who they were but just where they were at the time. Clint Eastwood obviously thinks the man is a charming, brave patriot who was angered by attacks on the US.

 

As someone else pointed out, Chris Kyle was a product of the society he grew up in. You might as well start reading biographies of prominent figures in the Taliban and judging their characters according to your own values. 

[Barbe bleu 822]

1 hour ago, PurpleCanary said:

..

A defendant who kills and then claims self-defence needs only to say they felt in fear of being killed themselves. And for the circumstances of the incident to be such as to make that claim plausible. But plausible to whom? To the defendant, in their mind, acting in extreme circumstances, or plausible to an objective observer?

...

Not only is the interpretation the same, that the armed aggressor who has started the confrontation can then claim they feared for their life, and so were justified in killing their intended victim, but there is also no legal duty on them to back away from the confrontation as soon as they see their victim trying to turn the tables on them. They are entitled to keep the confrontation going, and that cannot be held against them in court.

On the face of it, morally speaking, that is totally crazy. That the same defence and level of proof or disproof should be available to someone justifiably defending themselves and perhaps their family, but also available to someone whose original aggressive actions – and their refusal then to defuse the situation by backing down - have caused the unnecessary death of their intended victim.

...

The other, specific, puzzling aspect concerns the verdicts by the juries as far as Rittenhouse shooting dead the unarmed Rosenbaum and Travis McMichael killing the unarmed Arbery. The basic facts seem very similar. In both cases the defendants said they feared for their life because their intended victim was trying to grab their gun. If one of those defences was plausible the other would seem equally so.

Yet Rittenhouse was acquitted and McMichael was found guilty. In the latter case there was the argument that McMichael claimed to be making a citizen’s arrest when he had no legal right to, and so the self-defence claim was invalid anyway. And no two juries are the same, but it is hard to avoid the feeling that in these cases the two very different backgrounds played a part, with different moral judgments being made both on the respective victims and the respective killers.
 

 the jury instructions and the wisconsin criminal code. They certainly deal with the questions of 'reasonable to whom' and self defence claims after provocation. 

https://www.wgtd.org/news/rittenhouse-jury-instructions-released

https://law.justia.com/codes/wisconsin/2019/chapter-939/section-939-48/

 

Interestingly, and to add balance to claims that as a general rule US law heavily favours the killer, 2 of the 3 Georgia defendants were convicted of 'felony murder' charges. There is a campaign to reform the nearest UK equivalent, 'joint enterprise murder' to make convictions like these very difficult to establish.

 

[keelansgrandad 6,679]

3 minutes ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

 

As someone else pointed out, Chris Kyle was a product of the society he grew up in. You might as well start reading biographies of prominent figures in the Taliban and judging their characters according to your own values. 

I am not sure what you are getting at there. I judged it on the facts presented to me. But maybe my upbringing, values and believes would always see him differently to others.

Just like a jury.

[littleyellowbirdie 2,542]

5 minutes ago, keelansgrandad said:

I am not sure what you are getting at there. I judged it on the facts presented to me. But maybe my upbringing, values and believes would always see him differently to others.

Just like a jury.

You judged it on facts according to your values that are a product of a society that hardly has guns at all,  while largely dismissing or gainsaying the actual legal system and laws that are relevant to the case.

Also, you could never be a jurist in this trial unless you happen to be a US citizen in Wisconsin, which is why your own judgement is almost completely unlike a jury. 

Edited November 27, 2021 by littleyellowbirdie

[keelansgrandad 6,679]

3 minutes ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

You judged it on facts according to your values that are a product of a society that hardly has guns at all,  while largely dismissing or gainsaying the actual legal system and laws that are relevant to the case.

Also, you could never be a jurist in this trial unless you happen to be a US citizen in Wisconsin, which is why your own judgement is almost completely unlike a jury. 

How's that? I judged Kyle on when he left the military but went to New Orleans to shoot looters. It seems to me, his judgement was blurred by the fact that after killing, his total says 320 the military 160, so many people, from distance in so many cases, he was conditioned to taking life if he thought, according to his values, it was the right thing to do. I have a son in the military who has taken life. Not with a rifle but with an LMG. So probably any number of killings. That was his chosen profession and he followed orders as well as protecting the lives of his men. But he finds it upsetting still and never wants to talk about once he got it out of his system.

Its not a matter of where you live. I don't see your point about me not being a jurist. The good people of Wisconsin, the original swing state, gave their verdict, which you acknowledge was based on the narrowest jurisprudence. That does not mean those jurors did not believe, as I do, that he was guilty of premeditated murder. But that wasn't the choice they were offered.

I don't know what they discussed in the jury room or what they thought. Maybe one will write a book soon and tell us.

[Indy 3,297]

12 hours ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

Last night, a Scottish mate recounted when he was in Texas and he heard a story of another Scot who'd got lost, so knocked on somebody's door to ask for directions. The house owner opened the door, shot him, and killed him. The house owner then pled he was in fear for his life and was acquitted.

Kyle Rittenhouse is just one 17-year old gun nut in a culture full of gun nuts. Kyle had a big gun, but protesters had guns as well. From the perspective of people who live in societies where gun ownership is very rare, then it's easy to cast Rittenhouse as a cold-blooded killer, but personally I think he was just a silly boy out of his depth with a really big gun who got scared in a country where killing people because you're scared is not only acceptable, but actually encouraged as best practise among large swathes of the population. America badly needs to take a good hard look at itself, but only Americans can make that happen. 

 

I totally agree, the curfew was there for a reason and at no point have I said the victims, I’ve not questioned the outcome, but I cannot say I think he’s blameless as some on here are making out and actually defending him! He’s killed three people and he had no reason to end off, he shouldn’t have been anywhere near there and certainly not taken an illegal weapon into that area. 

 

p

[PurpleCanary 5,557]

On 20/11/2021 at 12:15, PurpleCanary said:

I haven't got into this because others have made any arguments I might have had. But this seems a valid concern, not least because, as I posted, under Wisconsin law someone, such as a gun-totting vigilante, claiming self-defence is assumed to be innocent unless the prosecution can prove otherwise beyond a reasonable doubt.

What I assume this comes from is a frontier mentality from a time long ago when home-owners might face all kinds of threats and could not rely on outside help to protect them. Quite outdated now. And the whole of US gun law is based on the entirely anachronistic idea that the possession of weapons is necessary for the creation of an armed militia.

In my research I came across this, from May this year, which is at a tangent to whether the law on self-defence is outdated, but indicates that some US laws - or their interpretations - may well be outdated, having been formed in a lawless time. Too late for the Arbery case to consider of course:

About a year after the shooting death of Ahmaud Arbery became national news, and nearly 15 months after he was shot while jogging down a street, Georgia has repealed the vague law being used to defend the men charged with murder in his killing.

Republican Gov. Brian Kemp signed the overhaul he championed at the Georgia Capitol on Monday, alongside a bipartisan group of state lawmakers as well as Arbery's mother, Wanda Cooper-Jones, and sister, Jasmine Arbery.

At the ceremony, Kemp said, "This bill makes Georgia the first state in the country to repeal its citizen's arrest statute. Today we are replacing a Civil War-era law, ripe for abuse, with language that balances the sacred right to self-defense of a person and property with our shared responsibility to root out injustice and set our state on a better path forward," he said.

The law, which allowed any citizen to "arrest" another if a crime was committed "within his immediate knowledge," has been replaced with specific language to provide for citizen detainment in specific circumstances, including shopkeepers who witness shoplifters and restaurant owners and employees who witness "dine and dash" customers.

The men accused in Arbery's killing have said they thought Arbery had committed a burglary when they chased him through a neighborhood near Brunswick, though no evidence of that crime has emerged.

[littleyellowbirdie 2,542]

32 minutes ago, Indy said:

I totally agree, the curfew was there for a reason and at no point have I said the victims, I’ve not questioned the outcome, but I cannot say I think he’s blameless as some on here are making out and actually defending him! He’s killed three people and he had no reason to end off, he shouldn’t have been anywhere near there and certainly not taken an illegal weapon into that area. 

 

p

Premeditated murder would require that he'd singled out these people as specific targets through personal acquaintance. If you mean intentional homicide, then that's what he was charged with and I guess you're entitled to your opinion, for what it's worth. 

[Indy 3,297]

1 minute ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

Premeditated murder would require that he'd singled out these people as specific targets through personal acquaintance. If you mean intentional homicide, then that's what he was charged with and I guess you're entitled to your opinion, for what it's worth. 

No I’ve not mentioned anything other than he’s killed three people, that’s a fact, what you want to categorise it as is up to you!

[littleyellowbirdie 2,542]

4 hours ago, Indy said:

No I’ve not mentioned anything other than he’s killed three people, that’s a fact, what you want to categorise it as is up to you!

Sorry, I tapped quote on the wrong person. Was meant for kg.