What a shit article, it literally skips the most important part and makes it seem like it was self-defense when it was planned. What happened is grossly misrepresented.
According to police, Kizer traveled armed from Milwaukee to Volar’s home in Kenosha in June 2018. She shot him twice in the head, set fire to his house and took his car.
He deserved it and it’s sketchy as hell they let him go when they busted him with home made kiddie porn. Regardless, it’s illegal to take matters into your own hands.
She can deserve both compensation for suffering and punishment for taking her own action. This is premeditated and she didn’t need to be there, but his actions clearly contributed negatively to her mental state.
If you want a society where premeditated extralegal violence is “good”, you can always go to Pakistan. That’s exactly what people who perform “honor killings” believe.
The developed world got rid of that when duels went out of fashion. The problem with killing someone to solve a problem is that it creates more problems. The person who died has friends, family, children, etc. who will not think your actions are justified. They will come for you and your family.
This is a category error. You wouldn’t say that “kicking is immoral,” or that “driving is immoral.” It just depends what you’re kicking and where you’re driving.
“Vigilantism” is the extrajudicial pursuit of justice. It involves breaking the law in some random corner of the world. However, none of that has any bearing on morality. The holocaust was legal. Slavery was legal. What the Supreme Court is doing now is legal. That has no bearing on whether it’s moral.
Why is vigilantism immoral but court systems, including corrupt ones, are not? Aren’t both simply a way to decide justice? What makes vigilantism inherently immoral compared to other justice systems?
Eta: “Laws are threats made by the dominant socioeconomic-ethnic group in a given nation. It’s just the promise of violence that’s enacted and the police are basically an occupying army. You know what I mean?” -Dimension20
I mean, it would be nice if all these f****** were actually scared of their victims.
I can’t say that just allowing vigilante outright is the right answer, but we could certainly afford to let her go like they let him go. Would be a nice use of a presidential pardon if it applies.
The article is about justice, not “legality.” The question is about the size of the gap (or in this case the gaping chasm) between what is legal in our society and what is moral.
Any rational agent in this woman’s circumstances should do what she did. I understand that doing the right thing is often illegal, which makes some people uncomfortable, but you know maybe that’s why the gap between justice and legality is so vast. That’s why our Supreme Court is a joke.
Any rational agent in this woman’s circumstances should do what she did.
I think that’s really the crux of the issue. She didn’t report him to the police but an other girl did and there was an ongoing investigation which she probably would of cemented if she came forward. Instead she resorted to what essentially is revenge killing and went out of her way to do it
I understand situation when taking things into your own hands is acceptable, like in self defense or when the law has really failed you and there isn’t any other option, but I don’t think this was one of those situations.
There is nothing moral about an ordinary citizen handing out a death sentence, without even trying to get help. Society has systems in place to dispense justice and I don’t even think a death sentence is moral in those cases. Not to mention this man was most likely going to prison, had a mountain of evidence against him and had been charged 12 days prior to the shooting.
This is the actual crux of the issue. Justice doesn’t recognize national borders, governing bodies, or laws. The very fact that we — as thinking, feeling creatures capable of suffering — allow a bureaucracy to monopolize violence and distribute justice on our behalf is a tenuous miracle (and a biiiig illusion).
We are entitled to justice. It’s an innate aspect of our rational nature (what Immanuel Kant called membership in the kingdom of ends). We permit a “justice system” to act on our behalf for the sake of practical efficiency, but that’s a tenuous contract, and when it fails to hold up its end of the bargain…
That’s the thing though, I dont’t think it had failed her. Not only was it in the process of dispensing justice, but it wasn’t even doing it at her request since it seems she never reported him. The justice system isn’t failing when it’s being ignored by the victim.
We are entitled to justice but that doesn’t entail killing folks on a whim when it feels justified. We have systems in place and we need to at least give them a chance before taking matters into our own hands.
I understand your point that not all forms of vigilantism are bad. For instance, I applaud the ordinary citizens that were fighting against the cartels in mexico a while back. I just think in this case it wasn’t justified.
We are entitled to justice but that doesn’t entail killing folks on a whim
I appreciate the conversation. I doubt we disagree on the fundamentals. However, I have to push back against this characterization. There was nothing whimsical about her decision or this guy’s culpability.
It’s also important not to conflate our ability to know something definitively (our epistemic confidence) with the truth.
If what she claims about this guy is true, then she is morally justified. If it’s not true, then she isn’t. Our uncertainty about the matter is a separate issue and regrettably not the subject of this litigation.
No you’re just running with the prosecution’s theory of the case.
The article gives her account, which was denied to her in court as a defense.
One night, when he wanted to have sex and she brushed him off, she said she fell to the ground and he jumped on top of her, trying to force off her clothes. She shot him twice in the head, and then, the police said, set his body on fire.
She put herself in a position where she needed to use it if that’s what happened. Going to the police or literally not going to his house and doing anything else would have offered her the same protection.
Guns are suppose to be a last resort, she used it as her first.
On top off that she burned down the house most likely to hide evidence and then lied about her part in the murder.
That’s funny because I was going to bring him up and decided not to. I think it’s insane he got off and what he did was very much murder as well, he knowingly and needlessly put himself in a dangerous situation as to warrant his use of a deadly weapon. There’s some similarities between the two cases in that regard imo.
he knowingly and needlessly put himself in a dangerous situation
That criticism applies to every single person present in Kenosha that evening.
A large percentage of the individuals present that evening were armed, some legally, some illegally, including Joshua Ziminski (who fired into the air just before Rosenbaum’s attack) and Gaige Grosskreutz (the fourth person to attempt to use deadly force on Rittenhouse that evening, and the one who instigated the second and third attacks). “Being armed” was not at all an unusual act in Kenosha that night.
Despite hundreds of hours of video having been captured that night, precisely none shows Rittenhouse instigating any sort of violence that night.
Are you actually asking why he was able to use self defense and she didn’t?
He was not threatening or instigating. When verbally provoked, he de-escalated by stepping away. He was legally present, just like every other participant. He was legally armed: state law has a specific exemption that allows older minors to carry rifles and shotguns. That fact always seems to get ignored, but it was that exemption that led the judge to dismiss that charge.
Many of the “protesters” (for example, Joshua Ziminski and Gaige Grosskreutz) were armed, some legally, some not. His decision to carry was not unusual.
Unlike many, including Joseph Rosenbaum, Rittenhouse was peaceably assembled; hours upon hours of video evidence shows he was not engaged in any sort of violent act, even after being occasionally verbally provoked. The worst you can say was that his presence in Kenosha that night wasn’t prudent, but that is true for everyone else who was there as well. You cannot reasonably argue that his presence was unusual, prohibited or that he was antagonizing; the video evidence conclusively demonstrates he was not. He was legally allowed to be where he was, and doing the things he was doing.
He was on camera, literally putting out fires set by arsonists, which is why one of those arsonists targeted him.
When physically attacked, he retreated, on multiple cameras and at a run, while being chased by an individual who had masked his face by tying his shirt over his head. Rittenhouse retreated until cornered. He was not obligated to retreat; he could have “Stood his ground”, but he elected to try to run away from the threat. He did not fire until that attacker had actually grabbed for his gun, which means he reasonably believed he faced a credible, criminal, imminent, threat of death or grievous bodily harm; that lethal force was necessary to stop that threat; and that he stopped using such force as soon as the threat had ended.
After stopping that first attack, he further retreated from numerous additional attackers, including a man he tried to viciously kick him in the head, a man who tried to hit him in the head with a skateboard, and a man who pointed a handgun at his head. He fired on all three, missing the second attacker, killing the third attacker. A fourth held up his hands, pointing a handgun away from Rittenhouse, and initially indicating he posed no threat to Rittenhouse. Rittenhouse held his fire, and began lowering his rifle. Only after the fourth attacker re-engaged, pointing his pistol at Rittenhouse, did Rittenhouse fire on him, wounding him, and ending his use of force as soon as that fourth attacker’s threat ended. He then continued to retreat, attempting to turn himself in to police, who directed him to leave. Again, all of this is on camera.
The fourth attacker - Gaige Grosskreutz - played a pivotal role in the second, third, and fourth attacks. He was live streaming. He is on camera talking with Rittenhouse as Rittenhouse ran from the the scene of the first attack. Rittenhouse is on camera, explaining that he was running to the police. Grosskreutz then, on camera, called for mob violence against Rittenhouse, instigating the second and third attack, while personally committing the fourth. He knew that Rittenhouse was trying to get to police, but he tried to kill him anyway.
The criticism of Rittenhouse rests on the assumption that he wasn’t allowed to carry a rifle in Kenosha that night. When we eliminate that assumption and start from the premise that he was allowed to be there, his behavior inoffensive and not unusual, his actions are a near-textbook example of self defense under extraordinary circumstances.
Kizer initially lost a ruling about introducing evidence that she had been trafficked. However, she won both of the appeals on that issue, and she was able to raise a “self defense” claim. Even her “confession” during police interrogation was thrown out: the state could not use it as evidence if it went to trial. She won every major ruling in her case, and set herself up with a fairly good legal defense.
So why did she lose her case? Because she quit. She refused to defend herself any further. She pleaded “guilty” rather than asking a jury to acquit her on the basis of temporary insanity from being trafficked. The law gave her ample opportunity to continue fighting, but she threw in the towel.
It is a travesty that prosecutors stacked charges on charges, threatening her with life in prison on the killing, and decades for arson and car theft. Accepting a plea deal fucked her over, and largely extinguished her ability to further appeal. But, ultimately, she gave up, pleaded guilty, and that’s all she wrote.
That’s not the important part. A jury can ignore all that. The law allows them to look at how she was victimized, and determine that her response was justified in light of the violence committed against her.
The important part didn’t happen when she killed him in 2018. The important part happened in May, 2024. From wiki:
On May 9, 2024, Kizer pled guilty to one felony count of second-degree reckless homicide, which carries a maximum sentence of 25 years in prison. On August 19, she was sentenced to 11 years in prison.[10]
It’s pretty hard for a jury to acquit her when she enters a “guilty” plea.
While a trial court did initially rule that way, that ruling was overturned on appeal, and she also won in the Wisconsin supreme court:
The Wisconsin Court of Appeals overturned the trial court in June 2021, holding that the trial court had erred in its interpretation of the affirmative defense law, that the affirmative defense applied to any offense, including violent crimes, committed as a “direct result” of trafficking, and that Kizer could present evidence in support of the affirmative defense at trial
…
In July 2022, the state supreme court upheld the appeals court’s decision overturning the trial court’s ruling that barred Kizer from raising the affirmative defense. In a 4-3 opinion, the Wisconsin Supreme Court held that the law provided trafficking victims with an affirmative defense to any offense, including violent crimes, committed as a direct result of the trafficking.
Furthermore, her confession was thrown out:
In October 2023, the trial court ruled that statements Kizer made during her interrogation by the police were not admissible because she did not receive a Miranda warning and her attorney was not present.[28]
She won on every issue she raised, yet she still decided to enter a guilty plea.
What a shit article, it literally skips the most important part and makes it seem like it was self-defense when it was planned. What happened is grossly misrepresented.
This is from https://somethingsbrewingcafe.ca/linkpost/460154/ :
He deserved it and it’s sketchy as hell they let him go when they busted him with home made kiddie porn. Regardless, it’s illegal to take matters into your own hands.
The fuck!?!
Ummm yea this girl deserves a pay day for doing their job for them not punishment.
She can deserve both compensation for suffering and punishment for taking her own action. This is premeditated and she didn’t need to be there, but his actions clearly contributed negatively to her mental state.
Her morally good action was premeditated? Unthinkable!
If you want a society where premeditated extralegal violence is “good”, you can always go to Pakistan. That’s exactly what people who perform “honor killings” believe.
The developed world got rid of that when duels went out of fashion. The problem with killing someone to solve a problem is that it creates more problems. The person who died has friends, family, children, etc. who will not think your actions are justified. They will come for you and your family.
Obviously you don’t have good morals. Vigilantism is immoral…
This is a category error. You wouldn’t say that “kicking is immoral,” or that “driving is immoral.” It just depends what you’re kicking and where you’re driving.
“Vigilantism” is the extrajudicial pursuit of justice. It involves breaking the law in some random corner of the world. However, none of that has any bearing on morality. The holocaust was legal. Slavery was legal. What the Supreme Court is doing now is legal. That has no bearing on whether it’s moral.
That is an insufficient definition of vigilantism.
deleted by creator
Why is vigilantism immoral but court systems, including corrupt ones, are not? Aren’t both simply a way to decide justice? What makes vigilantism inherently immoral compared to other justice systems?
Eta: “Laws are threats made by the dominant socioeconomic-ethnic group in a given nation. It’s just the promise of violence that’s enacted and the police are basically an occupying army. You know what I mean?” -Dimension20
I mean, it would be nice if all these f****** were actually scared of their victims.
I can’t say that just allowing vigilante outright is the right answer, but we could certainly afford to let her go like they let him go. Would be a nice use of a presidential pardon if it applies.
The article is about justice, not “legality.” The question is about the size of the gap (or in this case the gaping chasm) between what is legal in our society and what is moral.
Any rational agent in this woman’s circumstances should do what she did. I understand that doing the right thing is often illegal, which makes some people uncomfortable, but you know maybe that’s why the gap between justice and legality is so vast. That’s why our Supreme Court is a joke.
I think that’s really the crux of the issue. She didn’t report him to the police but an other girl did and there was an ongoing investigation which she probably would of cemented if she came forward. Instead she resorted to what essentially is revenge killing and went out of her way to do it
I understand situation when taking things into your own hands is acceptable, like in self defense or when the law has really failed you and there isn’t any other option, but I don’t think this was one of those situations.
There is nothing moral about an ordinary citizen handing out a death sentence, without even trying to get help. Society has systems in place to dispense justice and I don’t even think a death sentence is moral in those cases. Not to mention this man was most likely going to prison, had a mountain of evidence against him and had been charged 12 days prior to the shooting.
This is the actual crux of the issue. Justice doesn’t recognize national borders, governing bodies, or laws. The very fact that we — as thinking, feeling creatures capable of suffering — allow a bureaucracy to monopolize violence and distribute justice on our behalf is a tenuous miracle (and a biiiig illusion).
We are entitled to justice. It’s an innate aspect of our rational nature (what Immanuel Kant called membership in the kingdom of ends). We permit a “justice system” to act on our behalf for the sake of practical efficiency, but that’s a tenuous contract, and when it fails to hold up its end of the bargain…
That’s the thing though, I dont’t think it had failed her. Not only was it in the process of dispensing justice, but it wasn’t even doing it at her request since it seems she never reported him. The justice system isn’t failing when it’s being ignored by the victim.
We are entitled to justice but that doesn’t entail killing folks on a whim when it feels justified. We have systems in place and we need to at least give them a chance before taking matters into our own hands.
I understand your point that not all forms of vigilantism are bad. For instance, I applaud the ordinary citizens that were fighting against the cartels in mexico a while back. I just think in this case it wasn’t justified.
I appreciate the conversation. I doubt we disagree on the fundamentals. However, I have to push back against this characterization. There was nothing whimsical about her decision or this guy’s culpability.
It’s also important not to conflate our ability to know something definitively (our epistemic confidence) with the truth.
If what she claims about this guy is true, then she is morally justified. If it’s not true, then she isn’t. Our uncertainty about the matter is a separate issue and regrettably not the subject of this litigation.
She set fire to his house after killing him, putting neighbors and firefighter’s lives at risk.
Ok, except that. Don’t burn down the neighborhood.
deleted by creator
When the law and authorities fail to give you Justice, you go ahead and get it yourself. Just don’t get caught.
People don’t get let go with child porn. That’s a hard claim to swallow.
People are let go when they fully rape children, let alone for child porn, what are you even talking about?
https://www.rochesterfirst.com/crime/former-rpd-officer-will-be-sentenced-for-raping-an-underage-child/
https://reason.com/2024/06/12/40-percent-of-police-officers-convicted-of-child-sex-abuse-dont-get-prison-time-investigation-finds/
Is he a cop? We all know cops are not held to the same standards as normal people.
You know what don’t bother replying, I see by your profile you have issues and I’m no longer interested I anything you have to say.
You mean you lost and you want to quit. I accept your resignation and my win.
My profile has a lot of posts that are anti-trafficking and child marriage. You do seem like the type of person who would be bothered by that.
…what?
No you’re just running with the prosecution’s theory of the case.
The article gives her account, which was denied to her in court as a defense.
She first said another women shot him and she didn’t know him, then she said she didn’t remember, then finally the account you mentioned.
It was also a gun that she brought to his house, it’s hard to pretend it was just a lucky coincidence.
Hard to pretend someone in her situation might want protection? Really?
And if her story was that bad then a jury would see it. Removing her ability to use a self defence argument is just blatant rail roading.
She put herself in a position where she needed to use it if that’s what happened. Going to the police or literally not going to his house and doing anything else would have offered her the same protection.
Guns are suppose to be a last resort, she used it as her first.
On top off that she burned down the house most likely to hide evidence and then lied about her part in the murder.
So did Kyle Rittenhouse. In the exact same town. I wonder why he was able to use self defence and not her?
And he wasn’t a victim of sex trafficking either.
That’s funny because I was going to bring him up and decided not to. I think it’s insane he got off and what he did was very much murder as well, he knowingly and needlessly put himself in a dangerous situation as to warrant his use of a deadly weapon. There’s some similarities between the two cases in that regard imo.
That criticism applies to every single person present in Kenosha that evening.
A large percentage of the individuals present that evening were armed, some legally, some illegally, including Joshua Ziminski (who fired into the air just before Rosenbaum’s attack) and Gaige Grosskreutz (the fourth person to attempt to use deadly force on Rittenhouse that evening, and the one who instigated the second and third attacks). “Being armed” was not at all an unusual act in Kenosha that night.
Despite hundreds of hours of video having been captured that night, precisely none shows Rittenhouse instigating any sort of violence that night.
Are you actually asking why he was able to use self defense and she didn’t?
He was not threatening or instigating. When verbally provoked, he de-escalated by stepping away. He was legally present, just like every other participant. He was legally armed: state law has a specific exemption that allows older minors to carry rifles and shotguns. That fact always seems to get ignored, but it was that exemption that led the judge to dismiss that charge.
Many of the “protesters” (for example, Joshua Ziminski and Gaige Grosskreutz) were armed, some legally, some not. His decision to carry was not unusual.
Unlike many, including Joseph Rosenbaum, Rittenhouse was peaceably assembled; hours upon hours of video evidence shows he was not engaged in any sort of violent act, even after being occasionally verbally provoked. The worst you can say was that his presence in Kenosha that night wasn’t prudent, but that is true for everyone else who was there as well. You cannot reasonably argue that his presence was unusual, prohibited or that he was antagonizing; the video evidence conclusively demonstrates he was not. He was legally allowed to be where he was, and doing the things he was doing.
He was on camera, literally putting out fires set by arsonists, which is why one of those arsonists targeted him.
When physically attacked, he retreated, on multiple cameras and at a run, while being chased by an individual who had masked his face by tying his shirt over his head. Rittenhouse retreated until cornered. He was not obligated to retreat; he could have “Stood his ground”, but he elected to try to run away from the threat. He did not fire until that attacker had actually grabbed for his gun, which means he reasonably believed he faced a credible, criminal, imminent, threat of death or grievous bodily harm; that lethal force was necessary to stop that threat; and that he stopped using such force as soon as the threat had ended.
After stopping that first attack, he further retreated from numerous additional attackers, including a man he tried to viciously kick him in the head, a man who tried to hit him in the head with a skateboard, and a man who pointed a handgun at his head. He fired on all three, missing the second attacker, killing the third attacker. A fourth held up his hands, pointing a handgun away from Rittenhouse, and initially indicating he posed no threat to Rittenhouse. Rittenhouse held his fire, and began lowering his rifle. Only after the fourth attacker re-engaged, pointing his pistol at Rittenhouse, did Rittenhouse fire on him, wounding him, and ending his use of force as soon as that fourth attacker’s threat ended. He then continued to retreat, attempting to turn himself in to police, who directed him to leave. Again, all of this is on camera.
The fourth attacker - Gaige Grosskreutz - played a pivotal role in the second, third, and fourth attacks. He was live streaming. He is on camera talking with Rittenhouse as Rittenhouse ran from the the scene of the first attack. Rittenhouse is on camera, explaining that he was running to the police. Grosskreutz then, on camera, called for mob violence against Rittenhouse, instigating the second and third attack, while personally committing the fourth. He knew that Rittenhouse was trying to get to police, but he tried to kill him anyway.
The criticism of Rittenhouse rests on the assumption that he wasn’t allowed to carry a rifle in Kenosha that night. When we eliminate that assumption and start from the premise that he was allowed to be there, his behavior inoffensive and not unusual, his actions are a near-textbook example of self defense under extraordinary circumstances.
Kizer initially lost a ruling about introducing evidence that she had been trafficked. However, she won both of the appeals on that issue, and she was able to raise a “self defense” claim. Even her “confession” during police interrogation was thrown out: the state could not use it as evidence if it went to trial. She won every major ruling in her case, and set herself up with a fairly good legal defense.
So why did she lose her case? Because she quit. She refused to defend herself any further. She pleaded “guilty” rather than asking a jury to acquit her on the basis of temporary insanity from being trafficked. The law gave her ample opportunity to continue fighting, but she threw in the towel.
It is a travesty that prosecutors stacked charges on charges, threatening her with life in prison on the killing, and decades for arson and car theft. Accepting a plea deal fucked her over, and largely extinguished her ability to further appeal. But, ultimately, she gave up, pleaded guilty, and that’s all she wrote.
That’s not the important part. A jury can ignore all that. The law allows them to look at how she was victimized, and determine that her response was justified in light of the violence committed against her.
The important part didn’t happen when she killed him in 2018. The important part happened in May, 2024. From wiki:
It’s pretty hard for a jury to acquit her when she enters a “guilty” plea.
She pled guilty because she was denied a self defense argument. At which point they’re left with her admitting to shooting him with no legal reason.
No part of that comment is true.
While a trial court did initially rule that way, that ruling was overturned on appeal, and she also won in the Wisconsin supreme court:
…
Furthermore, her confession was thrown out:
She won on every issue she raised, yet she still decided to enter a guilty plea.