Southern Poverty Law Center senior fellow Eric Ward said Friday, after Kyle Rittenhouse was found not guilty on all charges brought against him for the shootings that killed two men and injured a third, that the defendant was an "armed vigilante," and attributed the violence that engulfed Kenosha, WI during August 2020 to law enforcement.
Rittenhouse was acquitted Friday of first-degree reckless homicide, first-degree recklessly endangering safety, first-degree intentional homicide and attempted first-degree intentional homicide after he had been on trial for shooting and killing Joseph Rosenbaum and Anthony Huber, and injuring Gaige Grosskreutz during an August 2020 riot in Kenosha, Wisconsin.
"One cannot cast blame upon the irresponsible actions of individuals without acknowledging the catastrophic failure of local law enforcement to uphold the public good," Ward said in a statement, according to a press release obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation.
"Law enforcement unwillingness to uphold its mission of non-politicized policing led to a volatile environment where an armed vigilante was allowed to parade a weapon, engage racial justice protestors and depart the scene freely after having discharged a weapon that took the lives of two individuals and injured a third," he continued.
Ward also alleged that "biased policing" resulted in a "lack of accountability," which he claims signaled a tolerance of political violence. He further stated that Rittenhouse was able to leave the place in which the shootings occurred without intervention because of the "political bias of law enforcement."
SPLC, which tracks anti-government extremist groups, has previously been called out for describing mainstream conservative organizations like Alliance Defending Freedom and the Family Research Council as "hate groups."