With the case headed to the jury, Kenosha awaits verdict in the Kyle Rittenhouse trial
Bill Glauber
KENOSHA - Vijay Rao follows the Kyle Rittenhouse trial from behind the cash register of the gas station he owns in the city's Uptown neighborhood.
"I get the message from the customers," Rao said. "Every day they say something different."
Now, like everyone else in this community, Rao is bracing for a decision that could come at any time.
Kenosha, which has endured so much since August 2020 — the shooting of Jacob Blake, the nights of unrest, property destruction and bloodshed — waits for a jury to decide Rittenhouse's fate. The 18-year-old from Antioch, Illinois, is charged with killing two people and wounding a third.
Lawyers made final arguments in the trial Monday, with the jury set to start deliberations at 9 a.m. Tuesday.
Like others in this community, who only want to get on with their lives and their livelihoods, Rao has a lot riding on the reaction to the jury's decision.
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During the 2020 unrest, Rao's gas station was battered, the building left with sheets of plywood covering glass windows that had been bashed out.
It took him almost six months to rebuild, he said. Now, he has plans to expand.
"It should be calm," Rao said. "It's a beautiful city. It has to be calm, otherwise, no one will want to stay in this town."
On Monday, the main focus was at the Kenosha County Courthouse. There were several small demonstrations on the steps while inside the crowded courtroom, the lawyers took turns, making their best case to the jurors.
The Missouri couple that made national headlines in 2020 for brandishing guns at Black Lives Matters protesters in St. Louis, showed up to support Rittenhouse, claiming he was being subjected to a “political prosecution.”
We think the evidence is strong that he (Rittenhouse) acted in self-defense,” Mark McCloskey said, standing alongside his wife Patricia outside the courthouse. “We hope that the jury finds him not guilty on all counts.”
Meanwhile, media was camped out on the Civic Center square, bright lights and television cameras at the ready for correspondents to deliver their stand-ups.
Law enforcement officials remain confident that whatever verdict is rendered, they'll be prepared.
Gov. Tony Evers has put 500 Wisconsin National Guard troops on standby if needed to help "hundreds of officers from volunteering law enforcement agencies."
"As of now we really don’t have a lot of intel suggesting we’re going to have an issue down here," said Sgt. David Wright, public information officer for the Kenosha County Sheriff's Department. "We’ve been working in contact with our local, state and federal law enforcement partners to ensure the safety of our community."
Wright noted Kenosha County Sheriff David Beth has neither declared an emergency nor requested the National Guard.
"I’m sure it will be very nice to have that in place if we do need it," Wright said. "But we’re not anticipating to have any issues down here. Everyone who has been down here has been very cordial and not really showing any signs of aggression or anything like that."
'I want things to be back to normal'
On a brisk, late autumn day, the streets were quiet in the downtown business area and in Uptown.
"I want it to be done with. I want things to be back to normal," said one local defense attorney.
A middle-aged African-American woman, rushing to get her daughter to work, remained upbeat.
"God is blessing our city," she said. "We're going to get better as Kenoshans."
Shaya Griffin, a member of the Kenosha Common Council, said: "I'm waiting just like everyone else is waiting on this verdict."
At Canna Vita CBD, sales associate Aidan Kiely said he wasn't "super-worried" about the decision, whichever way it should go.
"The timing is way different," he said, comparing current events surrounding the trial to the summer of 2020, when the Blake shooting occurred in the middle of the country's reckoning on policing.
"No one wants to be out when it's this cold out," he added.
Kiely, who has been following the trial, suggested that Rittenhouse stands a good chance of acquittal on the most serious of charges.
He worries that such a decision might "embolden" those people "who walk around with guns and stuff."
Kenosha Common Council member Anthony Kennedy remains outraged by the incident.
"The defendant killed two people and shot a third person," Kennedy said. "If I had done that I would not have gotten off that street alive."
He said whatever decision is reached, commentators will have their talking points about the Second Amendment, the so-called "good guy with a gun stopping something from happening," and other issues.
But Kenosha, he said, will have to move forward.
"We have some work to do," he said. "Everything in Kenosha is not bad, but everything in Kenosha is not great either," he said.
"There are some things that are happening as a result of the Jacob Blake incident," he said as the city wrestles with issues of race, economic opportunity and policing. "There are some very important questions being asked. We should never be afraid of the hard questions."