Legal experts: 'The prosecution really delivered' in Rittenhouse closing arguments
November 16, 2021
Speaking with CNN's John Berman on Tuesday morning, two legal experts expressed surprise at the strong closing argument presented by the prosecutor in the Kyle Rittenhouse case and said the jury may not let the young man who pleaded self-defense after killing two BLM protesters off the hook.
With the jury to be winnowed down from 18 to 12 via a lottery on Tuesday, Brooklyn Law School Assistant Professor Alexis Hoag told the "New Day" host: "The prosecution really delivered."
"I think they used the weekend well to bring their narrative together," Hoag continued. "What they did was deliver a compelling story arc, that's what jurors want to hear. They want the evidence, they want the witnesses to make some sort of sense."
"Their overarching narrative was you had this person coming in from outside, not defending their own property, not defending their own family, nor their home, bringing a gun, looking for a fight," she continued. "Then they peppered it with the highlights of evidence jurors saw, reinforcing repeatedly their storyline and the story arc. We saw the drone footage. We saw it when Rittenhouse shot, initially, Mr. Rosenbaum. He was on the ground, he wasn't lunging or attacking. Of course, that was the defense's characterization, so the prosecution actually really delivered."
CNN legal analyst Joey Jackson agreed.
"I was quite impressed with what the prosecution did, they brought it together," he explained. "They explained a narrative, and that narrative was compelling as to guilt."
"Prior to going into closings, I was saying, 'Wow, it looks like defense will run away,' now, they really tightened it up. Two things would very much concern me as a defense attorney and have me not sleeping well tonight. One of those issues relates to provocation, right? In the event the jury buys the argument that Rittenhouse provoked this, thereby, he loses the privilege of self-defense. You were a guy who came in from out of out of town: you brought your gun, you had no business of being here, you thought you were a police officer -- you weren't."
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