Teenager accused of shooting protesters extradited from Illinois to Wisconsin
31 October 2020, 03:14
Defence lawyers had sought to persuade Judge Paul Novak to block their client’s transfer.
A 17-year-old accused in the fatal shooting of two demonstrators has been extradited to Wisconsin just hours after an Illinois court judge ordered he should face homicide charges across the state border.
Christopher Covelli, a spokesman for Illinois’ Lake County Sheriff’s Office, on Friday told the Associated Press that deputies picked up Kyle Rittenhouse immediately after Judge Paul Novak issued the ruling at the courthouse in Waukegan.
The deputies then drove him five miles to the Illinois-Wisconsin border, where Mr Covelli said Rittenhouse was turned over to Kenosha County sheriff deputies at the state line.
Rittenhouse’s attorneys argued he acted in self-defence on August 25 when he opened fire during unrest after the shooting of a black man by a white police officer in Kenosha.
They said the charges are politically motivated and that extraditing the teenager would violate his constitutional rights.
Lake County prosecutors have said those arguments were irrelevant on the question of extradition and that it is the role of a Wisconsin judge, not one in Illinois, to decide whether there are sufficient grounds for charges.
In Wisconsin, Rittenhouse faces first-degree intentional homicide for fatally shooting two protesters, which carries a life prison sentence.
He is also charged with attempted intentional homicide in the wounding of a third protester.
