Kyle Rittenhouse trial

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You mean the one where Alex managed to make the problems worse?

Last edited by DW_a_mom on 17 Nov 2021, 5:31 am, edited 3 times in total.

i never bullied you or anybody else. standing up or expressing oneself is not the same as bullying.

It's ever so much fun to watch you act like you know what you're talking about.

This practice is legal, common, and not "withholding evidence".

Withholding evidence would be if the defense didn't know the video existed at all, and the prosecutor never entered it in the first place. The fact that it was entered as evidence, and that a complete copy was provided to the defense, regardless of the quality, the evidence was clearly not "withheld", and was also properly disclosed, since the defense was both made aware of it, AND provided a copy of it.

Legally speaking, if you request a document, and you do not specify the manner in which it is delivered, I absolutely can reduce it's size and send it over email. If you are unsatisfied with the quality, and feel that it would benefit you to have better quality, then you have the right to ask if a better quality copy is available, at which point, it can and will be provided. If you do NOT ask, the other party is not obligated to provide it. Knowing how to competently phrase a request of document form is a skill in and of itself. If all you ask for is "copies of the files", I can make whatever crappy copies I want, as long as they're complete, accurate, and legible - even if they're of "lesser quality" than the originals. This is a common practice that happens all the time, and is quite legal.

At worst, this MIGHT be failure to disclose, but that's for the judge to decide, should the motion be made. The judge can just as fairly decide that the defense dropped the ball by failing to follow up if they felt that a higher quality video would have beneficial, but didn't bother to ask. The judge would likely want to know how the reduced quality objectively damaged their case, too.

Ps, It's "defense", not "defence". But I digress. I yield the floor to the "Leegul Ekspurt".

Your description sounds accurate to me. I hadn't wanted to bother will all the evidentiary procedure rules, but I was a little surprised by Brictoria's seeming complete acceptance of statements made in a legal document filed by the defense team. Readers need to remember the US has an adversarial legal system, meaning that each side will present arguments specifically skewed to their own agenda, that may or may not be an accurate interpretation of the law. They can't completely blow smoke in these arguments, but they aren't bound to an objective or accurate rendering, either. There are tactics and strategies that involve quite a lot of game play, and good lawyers never take what the other side does at face value.

Maybe this will help you:

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brady_disclosure
Along with:

Source: https://dictionary.thelaw.com/brady-material/
and

Source: https://dictionary.thelaw.com/exculpatory-evidence/

Unlike the person you were replying to (who has an unfortunate habit of jumping into threads to post misinformation, pretending to be knowledgable whilst never providing evidence to support this - I've found their posts generally aren't worth the time or effort to read, based on their history of deliberately inaccurate posts - not to mention their racist remarks in an older thread, where they claimed that all "Black" americans are either unintelligent or must be lazy), I actually do research for myself before posting... In this instance, a high resolution video showing the defendant would count as exculpatory evidence. The fact a lower resolution version existed (or was created) would not alter the fact that the higher resolution version would still be required to be turned over (confirmed by at least a dozen lawtube members - at least 2 former prosecutors included).

What do you think could be seen in the higher resolution that couldn’t be seen in the lower?

I don’t base my responses on the person posting, but on the content they posted. I do believe, based on my professional experiences here in the US, that their summary captures the gist of practice in the US, although maybe not to the full extent described.

My point that you can’t simply trust a defense statement stands, and that is all you had previously posted (or, at least, that I had caught of what you previously posted).

Given you have now provided more, I will look into the question in more detail before commenting further.

If you had been watching the trial, you would have seen the prosecution zooming in onr portions of the video and claiming it showed something - The higher resolution the source image, the easier it is to prove\disprove something (in this case whether Mr Rittenhouse pointed his gun at someone immediately prior to being pursued by Mr Rosenbaum), whilst in a lower resolution version, the defence would lack the ability to defend against such a claim, lacking the same quality images to work with.

In this trial, it wasn't until the defence had rested their case (relying on the evidence supplied to them) that the prosecution introduced "zoomed" portions of the footage in their "rebuttal" portion, to which the defence were unable to counter, and did not have an opportunity to analyse before it was produced - This denied the defence team an opportunity to present evidence in support of their case, as the version they had of the footage did not show what the prosecution then claimed was present in the zoomed version.

For example, in the footage the defence had, the people in the area being focused on were around 10 pixels high - magnify that and you get little useful information. In the prosecution's version, on the other hand, they were around 40 pixels high, allowing a much better level of "detail", and the ability to zoom in to a much better degree while still being able to identify possible details. the defence team spent time analysing, magnifying, etc. the video and determined there was nothing there that was either supportive of their case, or which could "put a hole in it", and so were not able to prepare a defence against claims (true or not) which derived from what was contained in the higher resolution video.

Acts such as occurred here are what (in other cases) can cause innocent people to go to jail...

Consider it from an objective stance (ignoring the reason for the case\other facts - pick a hypothetical situation) - Do you believe that a person should be provided all available evidence to try and prove their innocence (at the risk of freeing a guilty person), or should evidence with the potential to prove innocence be able to be withheld (at the risk of jailing a innocent person)?





I wouldn't trust anything from the person you originally replied to here, based on past experience of them jumping into a thread, making baseless (and\or racist) claims (with attached snide remarks) to try and send a thread off-topic, then running away.

I try to ensure what I post is as accurate as possible (providing quotes with links\sources where required) to allow others to either confirm what I am saying (maybe you've noticed this in past posts?), or to provide facts of which I was unaware of in order to help me correct any mistakes in my logic - I try to educate\inform with what I post, not misinform or "appeal to emotion".

Going back to the subject of "Brady material":

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brady_v._Maryland

In this particular case, the sole reason that "provocation" instructions were provided to the jury was based on the images extracted and zoomed from this high-resolution video, which (were a guilty verdict to be produced) would fit within the "there is a reasonable probability that his conviction or sentence would have been different had these materials been disclosed" given the defence team could have more apprpriately questioned the "expert" the prosecution provided to testify to the image (and who didn't seem to know much - The judge asked him at one point "what did he know?" - compared to the defence team's expert who explained in detail how the software he used worked with regards to digital images, as well as how alternative methods worked, to show the way the software he was using was reliable and explain why he used certain steps in it) as well as to show the jury during questioning that what was claimed to be shown in the footage may not have been what was claimed (switching his gun from right-handed to left-handed as required for the claim to be true, then back again) and what timeframe he would have had to do so.

If it wasn't for the high-resolution video (and images derived from it), the provocation instructions would not have been supplied (The judge was very close to not doing so), as can be seen towards the end of Thursday's trial footage [1]- The prosecution played the video multiple times for the judge, specifically requesting a 4k television to "make it easier to see" - Their video was 1920x844, which would roughly zoom to 2x on a 4k (4096 x 2160) screen, with the software built into the television "interpolating" the changes needed to produce a "clear" image. Had the footage supplied to the defence been used (480 x 212), the image would have been magnified 9x, and likely resulted in a blocky mess with little able to be discerned from it.

[1] The section(s) around James Armstrong in https://lawofselfdefense.com/rittenhouse-trial-day-8-the-prosecutions-last-desperate-lunge-for-evidence-of-guilt/ contain the video of both his "voir dire" as well as the judge being shown the video and Mr Armstrong's questioning before the jury. There is also an explanation of what occurred from a legal standpoint which makes up the text portion of the page. (The blog is by a lawyer with 30+ years experience who specialises in "use of force" cases (as well as being an occasional Guest Instructor and subject matter expert (SME) on self-defense law at the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s National Academy at Quantico and the Sig Sauer Academy, and writing a number of books on the subject))

Cool story bro, but spoliation of evidence falls within withholding. Intentionally altering evidence like changing a high resolution image to a low resolution image is tampering.

I haven't seen a lot of closing arguments, but I find the prosecution's closing argument to terrible. They said to the jury that Rittenhouse should have taken the beating and just accepted it and not have been a coward and shoot to defend himself from the beating. They said everyone takes a beating every now and then and they should just accept it, and not use a gun to defend themselves. Really?

But I find this to be really problematic. I mean imagine, if a woman shot some guys to defend herself from being raped for example, and the prosecution put her on trial, and said she should have just taken the beating and everyone takes a beating every now and then. This type of thing should be allowed like that in closing arguments, and I wonder if the judge could have and should have shut them down at that point.

Those were certainly some of the low points of it... if there were any "domestic violence" victims in the jury, that comment about taking a beating would likely have caused the prosecution (and by extension, their case) to have lost credibility with them.

I particularly "enjoyed" the prosecution's assertion that Mr Rittenhouse didn't have anything to fear from Mr Grosskreutz, as Mr Rittenhouse had a bigger gun than him, so he was therefore not at risk of serious injury\death...

Source: https://www.wisconsinrightnow.com/2021/11/16/maurice-freeland-jump-kick-man/

!

Cornflake wrote:

Don't mind me, just driving through - but I wanted to address these moderation-related comments. Pepe wrote: I have been talking about sanctimonious hatefests since before the last American election. I don't understand why it is allowed to continue. It reflects poorly on WP. Because being sanctimonious isn't a rule-break. I've said many times that we don't moderate the quality or veracity of posts, and if someone wants to post misinformed or uneducated nonsense they are free to do so. Such content reflects poorly on the poster, and the fact that they are allowed to post it without moderator intervention reflects positively on the moderation here; this material has always been permissible. This forum, along with others on WP, are considered adult-leaning areas (I mean age and life experience, not the more grubby aspects) - and where possible we would rather treat posters as adults, responsible for their content. Pepe wrote: There is a strong left-wing bias on this website. It has been a lot worse. But that simply reflects the broad political leanings of our members. Would you rather membership was permitted only after passing some sort of political affiliation examination? I certainly wouldn't. Brictoria wrote: Pepe wrote: I have been talking about sanctimonious hatefests since before the last American election. I don't understand why it is allowed to continue. It reflects poorly on WP. It doesn't just reflect upon WP... It also reflects upon those presenting (or endorsing) such views as well. Off Topic The only reason I can see for such actions to be permitted to continue would be that those with the power to prevent it either endorse the views themselves, or wish to "protect" those putting forward such views. Ah, bless you Brictoria. You appear to have missed the more obvious reason I addressed above. (any further commentary via PM, please)

Laws specify when deadly force can be used.

That's a danger if you want to use a gun for self-protection.

So, legally, sometimes, you have to take a beating.

Wisconsin self-defense laws requires ...
1. A reasonable person would use deadly force in this situation.
2. Only a necessary amount of deadly force may be used.
3. Deadly force may only be used if you're in risk of imminent death or great bodily harm.
4. If you provoke your attacker, then you must *exhaust all means of escape* before using deadly force.

https://docs.legis.wisconsin.gov/statut ... 939/iii/48

In general, self-defense law requires the response to match the level of the threat in question.  In other words, a person can only employ as much force as required to remove the threat.

• If the threat itself involves deadly force, the person defending themselves can use deadly force to counteract the threat.  Rittenhouse was not being threatened with deadly force by Joseph Rosenbaum when he shot Rosenbaum 4times with an AR-15 rifle.

• If the threat involves only minor force and the person claiming self-defense uses force that could cause grievous bodily harm or death, the claim of self-defense will fail.  This is the case with Kyle Rittenhouse, who used a military-style assault rifle to shoot an unarmed man to death.

Section 505 of California’s Criminal Jury Instructions outlines what a defendant must establish in order to successfully argue self-defense.  A defendant will be considered to have acted in self-defense, and therefore will not be guilty of a violent crime, if they can prove:

• They reasonably believed that they (or someone else) was in imminent danger of being harmed;

• They reasonably believed that the imminent use or force was necessary to defend against that danger; and

• They only used the amount of force that was reasonably necessary to defend against that danger.