Kyle Rittenhouse, 18, is scheduled for a pre-trial hearing on Friday in the fatal shooting of Joseph Rosenbaum, 36, and Anthony Huber, 26, and injury of Gaige Grosskreutz, 27. Court is scheduled for 10:30 a.m. CT / 11:30 a.m ET. You can watch in the player above.
The case is a conservative cause célèbre. As seen on video, Rittenhouse, then 17, opened fire in a nighttime confrontation with protesters amid the police shooting of local man Jacob Blake.
[Warning: Video is disturbing.]
He maintains he was protecting himself. His actions, prosecutors said, were illegal. They charged with him counts including first-degree reckless homicide and first-degree intentional homicide. Rittenhouse–an Illinois resident who said he was in Wisconsin for lifeguard work and showed up to the scene with a rifle–and other armed conservatives have been criticized, accused of looking for trouble at the Blake protests. Rittenhouse was too young to buy the firearm.
“I feel I had to protect myself,” he told The Washington Post in an interview last year. “I would have died that night if I didn’t.”
Jury selection is scheduled to begin November 1.