Kyle Rittenhouse, the young man accused of murdering two protesters in the US, cries during his trial

Kyle Rittenhouse, a young American tried for the death of two people on the sidelines of anti-racist demonstrations, in 2020 in Kenosha, burst into tears on Wednesday before the members of the jury, while assuring that he had not “done anything wrong”.

“I just defended myself”, assured Kyle Rittenhouse on the eighth day of his trial in this northern city of the United States. “I didn’t want to kill, I just wanted to stop people from attacking me.”

In August 2020, when United Statess was going through a huge anti-racist mobilization, Kenosha broke out because the white police had seriously injured a young black man, Jacob Blake, during an attempted arrest.

On the third night of rioting, Kyle Rittenhouse, then 17, took to the city streets equipped with an AR-15 semiautomatic rifle.

In confusing circumstances, he opened fire, killing two people and wounding one.

“The plan was to provide first aid,” he testified. “I was not part of any field”.

“But why did he need a weapon?” asked prosecutor Thomas Binger during the hearing. “To be able to protect myself in case they attacked me”, replied Rittenhouse.

Dressed in a blue suit and tie, the young man struggled to appear as a calm and responsible citizen, driven to shoot by violent rioters who pursued him.

The prosecutor, for his part, pointed out his deviations from the law: Rittenhouse was driving without a license, he had asked a friend to buy him his rifle because he was too young to do so and on the night of the tragedy he had violated the current curfew in Kenosha.

Accused of murder, Rittenhouse pleads not guilty.

In the process, he appears free, after his supporters paid the bail of two million dollars.

The young man is currently a reference in certain right-wing circles for whom the great mobilization against police violence in the boreal summer of 2020 was the work of “anti-fascists” or “anarchists”.

On the contrary, on the left he embodies the excesses of the culture of weapons and self-defense.

His trial, which has attracted great interest in the United States, is expected to last a few more days.