WATCH: Rittenhouse trial judge throws out gun possession charge

The judge in the Kyle Rittenhouse murder trial dismissed one charge -- possession of a dangerous weapon by a minor -- against the defendant.

Defense attorneys renewed a request to dismiss the possession charge, arguing that a portion of Wisconsin law limited the charge to short-barreled shotgun or rifles. Judge Bruce Schroeder dismissed the charge after Assistant District Attorney James Kraus acknowledged that Rittenhouse’s rifle wasn’t a short-barreled weapon.

But Kraus argued that reading the law in question to allow minors to carry any weapon except a short-barrelled rifle or short-barrelled shotgun would basically negate its prohibition on minors carrying weapons.

“I believe that this … essentially swallows the entire statue,” Kraus said.

Schroeder said that prosecutors could have turned to a state appeals court to clarify the statute before acknowledging that he himself had not issued a ruling on the statue that would have resulted in prosecutors going to the appeals court.

“I think it ought to have been mighty clear that I had big problems with this statute,” Schroeder said. “I made no bones about that from the beginning. And there always was access to the court of appeals all along here. Well, I guess that’s not fair for me to say because I was sitting on it. So shame on me.”

On Aug. 25, 2020, Rittenhouse, then 17, went to Kenosha, Wisconsin, armed with an AR-style semi-automatic weapon. Rittenhouse, who lived in nearby Antioch, Illinois, and his lawyers have argued that he was at the demonstrations against racial injustice in the city to protect property from protesters. There had been days of unrest in Kenosha after a white officer shot Jacob Blake, a 29-year-old Black man who was paralyzed after the shooting.

Rittenhouse faces five felony charges. If convicted of the most serious charge -- first-degree intentional homicide -- he faces a mandatory sentence of life in prison. Rittenhouse has pleaded not guilty to all charges.

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