Kyle Rittenhouse trial: Drone video shows 1st shooting at close range

Prosecutors have portrayed Kyle Rittenhouse as the instigator of the bloodshed that night. His lawyers have argued that he acted in self-defense.

The jury at Kyle Rittenhouse’s murder trial Tuesday watched drone video that showed Rittenhouse wheeling around and shooting Joseph Rosenbaum at close range during a night of turbulent protests on the streets of Kenosha.

The video, zoomed in and slowed down by a forensic imaging specialist, was played as the prosecution’s case appeared to be winding down after a week of testimony in which some of its own witnesses often bolstered Rittenhouse’s claim of self-defense.

The footage showed Rosenbaum following Rittenhouse before Rittenhouse suddenly spins around and fires his rifle at him. Rosenbaum falls, and Rittenhouse runs around a car.

James Armstrong, the specialist, said the state crime lab did not receive the video until Sunday, nearly a week into the trial.

It was the clearest video yet of the fatal shooting in August 2020 that set in motion the bloodshed that followed moments later: Rittenhouse, then 17, killed Anthony Huber, a 26-year-old protester seen on bystander video hitting Rittenhouse with a skateboard. Rittenhouse then wounded Gaige Grosskreutz, a protester and volunteer medic.

Kenosha Detective Ben Antaramian testified that at some point in their investigation, authorities learned someone had recorded drone video. The video had played on a Fox News segment.

Prosecutors received a low-resolution copy earlier in their investigation but weren’t given a high-definition one until Friday.

Rittenhouse, now 18 and a former police youth cadet from Antioch, Illinois, had gone to Kenosha with an AR-style semi-automatic rifle and a medical kit in what he said was an effort to safeguard property from the sometimes-violent demonstrations that broke out over the shooting of Jacob Blake, a Black man, by a white Kenosha police officer.