The Charlie Kirk Show - Analyzing the New 'Trial of the Century' with Alan Dershowitz & Self-Defense Expert Andrew Branca

00:00:00.000 Hey, everybody.

00:00:00.000 Today on the Charlie Kirk Show, we have two amazing defense attorneys, Alan Dershowitz and Andrew Branca from Self-Defense, Lawofself Defense.com, to go over the Kyle Rittenhouse trial and the implications of it as we await a verdict.

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00:04:16.000 With us right now is Alan Dershowitz, who I think needs no introduction and does a great job on a variety of different topics.

00:04:25.000 And we've had Alan on the show before.

00:04:27.000 Professor Dershowitz, thank you so much for joining the program.

00:04:31.000 My question is, what's your take on the Kyle Rittenhouse drama?

00:04:35.000 And kind of, I read an article that said you believe he should be acquitted.

00:04:39.000 Please, the floor is yours.

00:04:40.000 Well, not only do I think he should be acquitted, but I don't think he got a fair trial.

00:04:44.000 Whether he's acquitted or convicted, the media has put not a thumb on the scale, but an elbow on the scale.

00:04:51.000 They have told everybody, particularly CNN, New Yorker Magazine, MSNBC, they've already told the public, this guy is a white supremacist, a vigilante. 0.95

00:05:03.000 He's no good. 0.98

00:05:05.000 This will send a terrible, terrible message and a precedent.

00:05:09.000 They have basically tried to take the self-defense issue away from the jury and broaden the crime into him being there at all.

00:05:18.000 He never should have been there.

00:05:19.000 He never should have had a gun.

00:05:20.000 He never should have confronted any of these other people.

00:05:24.000 But that's not what he's charged with.

00:05:26.000 He's charged with murdering two people and attempting to murder another.

00:05:29.000 His defense is self-defense.

00:05:31.000 And the issue should be limited to the minutes leading up to the shootings and the moments after the shootings.

00:05:39.000 He should not be put on trial for his activities that whole day.

00:05:43.000 Whether we like or don't like what he did that whole day, and I don't like it.

00:05:47.000 I wish he hadn't come.

00:05:48.000 I wish he hadn't brought his gun.

00:05:50.000 But that's not what he's on trial for.

00:05:52.000 And so the jury has been distracted, I think, from the focus by the prosecution's case and by the outside influences of the media.

00:06:02.000 Yeah.

00:06:03.000 And so right now the jury is deliberating or they're arguing over many different kind of technical aspects or issues of evidence being provided.

00:06:11.000 You know, Professor Dershowitz, you are the expert on this.

00:06:14.000 Have you ever seen a prosecution act like this prosecution did, especially in regards to potentially challenging the Fifth Amendment rights of Kyle, the defendant?

00:06:26.000 Do you think that was an intentional tactic to try to trigger a mistrial?

00:06:30.000 What's your take on that with all of your experience?

00:06:33.000 Tragically, I've seen this happen over and over again.

00:06:36.000 Prosecutors constantly violate the Constitution and judges let them get away with it.

00:06:41.000 This judge has been criticized because he hasn't let them get away with it.

00:06:44.000 If the shoe were on the other foot, if this were a Black Lives protester who had killed and was being charged and was claiming self-defense, the hard left media would be taking exactly the opposite view.

00:06:55.000 They'd be praising the judge, et cetera.

00:06:57.000 So this is clearly a violation of the Constitution, what the prosecution did.

00:07:04.000 And I said from day one, because this case is going badly for the prosecution, they may win.

00:07:09.000 Can't predict the outcome of the case, but because they thought the case was going badly, they may have deliberately tried to get a mistrial without prejudice so that they could start all over again and do a better job.

00:07:21.000 The same thing happened in the O.J. Simpson case.

00:07:23.000 When the O.J. Simpson case wasn't going well, the prosecution tried to get rid of jurors and go below the 12 numbers in order to do it again.

00:07:33.000 I actually argued that aspect of the case went to LA and prevented them from doing that.

00:07:39.000 But prosecutors will do that from time to time.

00:07:42.000 That's a kind of a learning curve for a lot of us that are watching from the outside and kind of not as much in the legal world.

00:07:49.000 So can you explain to our audience the difference between a potential motion for dismissal of prejudice or a mistrial?

00:07:56.000 Would a motion for dismissal with prejudice mean that Kyle could never be retried again?

00:08:01.000 Is that correct?

00:08:02.000 That's right.

00:08:03.000 With prejudice.

00:08:04.000 And if the prosecution deliberately created a mistrial in order to get a second shot, the law is they don't get the second shot.

00:08:14.000 It's dismissed with prejudice.

00:08:16.000 He can never be tried again.

00:08:17.000 He's free.

00:08:18.000 On the other hand, if it's an ordinary mistrial, it just means you start all over again, you pick 12 different jurors, maybe a different judge, and you present the evidence.

00:08:27.000 You don't present some of the evidence that backfired the way the prosecution would like not to present the evidence of the man who is the alleged victim of attempted murder.

00:08:38.000 So there is a big difference between dismissal with prejudice and dismissal without prejudice.

00:08:44.000 So Professor, I'd love to get your take on Kyle himself taking the stand.

00:08:47.000 That's unusual.

00:08:49.000 Talk about when does a defense do that?

00:08:52.000 And do you think that was wise in this case?

00:08:55.000 It was wise in this case.

00:08:56.000 Of course, if he ends up losing, people will say it was not wise in this case, but I would have done the same thing as a very experienced defense counsel.

00:09:04.000 You can't win a self-defense case without the defendant looking the jury in the eye and saying, look, I feared for my life.

00:09:12.000 If you were in this situation, you would have done the same thing.

00:09:15.000 And Rittenhouse, I think, presented himself quite effectively.

00:09:20.000 Of course, the hard left media, Don Lemon and others, said it was crocodile tears, you know, it's white privilege.

00:09:28.000 You name all the clichés that run around these days.

00:09:32.000 But I think it was necessary for him to take the stand.

00:09:34.000 He also doesn't have a criminal record, and they didn't open the door to questioning him.

00:09:42.000 The other people, the people who were shot, had criminal records.

00:09:46.000 But of course, that doesn't come in unless the defendant essentially knew about their dangerousness and their criminal record, which he didn't.

00:09:54.000 Right.

00:09:54.000 And so one thing that is floating around is the potential for jury intimidation.

00:09:59.000 There's been some activists that say we know who these jurors are, we know their identities.

00:10:04.000 First, how common is that?

00:10:05.000 And if that is happening, what is the path forward then?

00:10:09.000 Does the case get dismissed?

00:10:11.000 I'm not quite sure on that in that regard.

00:10:13.000 Well, it's a horrible situation.

00:10:15.000 It started in the deep south when jurors were intimidated into convicting innocent African Americans, or in one case, an innocent Jew, Leo Frank, because of crowd pressures.

00:10:29.000 It happened in the famous case of Shepard versus Maxwell, which led to the TV series, The Fugitive.

00:10:36.000 It's happened over and over again.

00:10:38.000 But in modern times, in recent times, the pressure comes from the hard left.

00:10:44.000 Today in Georgia, we're seeing dozens, maybe hundreds of black ministers putting pressure, praying that the jury convicts.

00:10:54.000 And if the jury hears about that, it can't help but influence the outcome of the case.

00:10:59.000 And that's not right.

00:11:00.000 Maxine Waters threatened violence, essentially, if there were anything less than a murder verdict in the George Floyd's case.

00:11:12.000 So we're seeing the mob hijacking the justice system all over the United States today.

00:11:19.000 And it's happening on both sides, much more the hard left trying to hijack the juries in cases where they think that conviction is appropriate.

00:11:29.000 That shouldn't be allowed to happen.

00:11:31.000 From what I understand, the jury is not being sequestered.

00:11:34.000 Is that normal?

00:11:35.000 And in modern America now, with everyone having a smartphone, is it even realistic to act as if the jury's not going to be able to hear everything else that's happening?

00:11:44.000 No, the jury should have been sequestered in this case, certainly during deliberations.

00:11:49.000 Juries, I think, have to be sequestered more than they used to be sequestered because, as you say, of modern media, and it's very hard to insulate jurors from what's going on outside.

00:12:01.000 It's not enough to tell jurors, don't talk about it when you get home with your wife or your children.

00:12:05.000 Don't watch television.

00:12:07.000 We know that juries don't always obey those orders.

00:12:11.000 Yeah, and so you mentioned something I think that's really important, which is a troubling new trend that if enough people protest or demand it, it's as if there is this extra pressure outside of the courtroom.

00:12:22.000 You call it the mob.

00:12:23.000 I think that's appropriate.

00:12:25.000 And we're seeing that now in Rittenhouse, but also, as you say, in the Ahmad Arbery case as well.

00:12:31.000 Professor, have you personally dealt with that?

00:12:34.000 I'm sure in the OJ trial, there were some issues with that.

00:12:39.000 How do we break away from that?

00:12:41.000 Because that would be the end of the kind of constitutional order that both you and I admire and we want to protect.

00:12:47.000 If you just get enough protesters in the streets or threaten violence, then justice as we know it is done.

00:12:53.000 It is.

00:12:53.000 And the worst example of it is the Office of Potter case in Minneapolis.

00:12:58.000 This was an officer with 20-something years of experience, perfect record.

00:13:03.000 She made a tragic mistake.

00:13:04.000 She pulled out a gun instead of a taser and shot to death a young man who should have been tased. 0.94

00:13:10.000 He was perfectly appropriate target for tasing.

00:13:12.000 She made a mistake.

00:13:13.000 She should not have been charged with any crime whatsoever.

00:13:16.000 A mistake is not a crime.

00:13:18.000 But because of mob pressure, she was indicted.

00:13:21.000 Now mob pressure wants to increase the charges from manslaughter to murder.

00:13:26.000 That's the worst example I've seen of how mob pressures influence the charging process.

00:13:32.000 But I also think in the George Floyd case, that mob pressures may very well have had an influence on the verdict in that case.

00:13:42.000 Well, and it's just for anyone that wants a fair hearing in court, it's a scary set of circumstances to think that the prosecution can be influenced by outside forces to go to higher charges and more aggressive charges, and then the jury can as well.

00:13:58.000 Our system has to have some sort of additional measures in place, as you mentioned, sequestration of jury or some set of circumstances because I'm...

00:14:09.000 We're moving trials outside of the urban areas to more isolated rural areas where the influence isn't as great or as direct or as dramatic.

00:14:20.000 I think that has to be done.

00:14:22.000 Look, people have a right under the First Amendment to protest.

00:14:25.000 People even have the right to pray for a guilty verdict.

00:14:28.000 But what they don't have the right to do is to try to influence the jurors, either directly or indirectly.

00:14:34.000 And we see that happening.

00:14:35.000 Is there any doubt that the pastors who are praying for a guilty verdict hope that the jury will hear them and listen to their prayers?

00:14:44.000 Yeah, they're praying to God, to be sure, but they have two audiences.

00:14:48.000 God, on the one hand, fortunately will not intervene in this case and in others, and the jurors who will decide the fate of the defendant.

00:14:58.000 I think those defendants in that case in Georgia are horrible.

00:15:02.000 And what they did was inexcusable, but they're entitled to a fair trial.

00:15:06.000 And a fair trial means not having the jury hear from pastors who are praying for a guilty verdict.

00:15:13.000 Well, and Professor, you have been so consistent on this for years.

00:15:17.000 And, you know, as someone who would be more on the liberal side, you know, and me on the more conservative side, I think we have this agreement that if we just kind of shred the Constitution, it's regardless of your political affiliation, we're going to go in a direction we don't want to go.

00:15:30.000 And it's cost me.

00:15:32.000 It's lost me a lot of friends on the left.

00:15:35.000 It's cost me institutions in New York like the 92nd Street Y, which have banned me and won't allow me to speak.

00:15:42.000 When you stick to your principles and you don't choose sides politically, you pay a heavy cost.

00:15:47.000 I'm actually writing a book on that subject called The Price of Principle.

00:15:52.000 How expensive it is to stick to your principles in an age of partisan division.

00:15:58.000 And I'm hated by the right, some people on the extreme right as well, because I have an op-ed yesterday condemning former National Security Advisor Flynn for saying that we need one religion in this country.

00:16:11.000 And so I condemn the right and the left equally when they try to violate the Constitution.

00:16:16.000 The Price of Principle.

00:16:17.000 I think that's going to be a book.

00:16:18.000 I encourage everyone.

00:16:19.000 I don't know if it's available for pre-order or not, Professor, but if I encourage people to go buy it.

00:16:24.000 Thank you so much for joining us.

00:16:26.000 Your insight is so deeply appreciated.

00:16:28.000 And I just want to commend you for your clarity and your bravery.

00:16:32.000 It's very needed in these times.

00:16:33.000 So thank you so much, Professor.

00:16:34.000 Great to see you.

00:16:35.000 Thank you for having me on.

00:16:37.000 I appreciate it.

00:16:37.000 Thank you.

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00:17:37.000 With us is an expert and someone who is terrific and came highly recommended from the wonderful Jack Pesobic is Andrew Branca from lawofselfdefense.com.

00:17:49.000 Andrew, welcome to the Charlie Kirk Show.

00:17:51.000 You have been terrific explaining this case.

00:17:55.000 What has been your greatest frustration in how the media has covered the Rittenhouse case from your perspective and knowing the law as it pertains to self-defense?

00:18:06.000 Well, of course, the media is largely a propaganda arm of the political left in America.

00:18:10.000 So with all these politicized cases, they rapidly develop a false narrative about what happened, a narrative that, if it were true, would outrage anybody.

00:18:19.000 But it's not true.

00:18:20.000 They do this with Zimmerman.

00:18:21.000 They do this with Jacob Blake.

00:18:22.000 They do this with George Floyd.

00:18:24.000 They do this with, and now the Kyle Rittenhouse case.

00:18:26.000 And unfortunately, you know, normal human beings only know what they perceive in their environment.

00:18:33.000 They only know the information that's presented to them.

00:18:35.000 And if all they see is the news media propaganda, well, that's what they're going to believe.

00:18:41.000 So people believe, for example, that Jacob Blake was shot in the back seven times for no good reason when, in fact, he was armed with a knife and getting into a car with children in it, being non-compliant with lawful arrest.

00:18:52.000 And people, for some reason, believe that Kyle Rittenhouse was an active shooter who shot a bunch of black people at a protest.

00:18:57.000 None of that ever happened.

00:18:59.000 Kyle Rittenhouse never shot anyone who wasn't actively attacking him with deadly force.

00:19:04.000 But you see people on Twitter over the course of this trial shocked to discover that what they thought had happened with Kyle Rittenhouse was not at all true.

00:19:13.000 And unfortunately, the power of the media to effectively brainwash the American population is tremendously powerful.

00:19:22.000 Well, I agree with that.

00:19:23.000 And so let's go through the facts and circumstances.

00:19:26.000 I am by no means a legal expert, but the first video I saw of Kyle Rittenhouse, I said, how on earth is this even going to charge us?

00:19:32.000 How is he indicted around that?

00:19:34.000 And so just walk us through.

00:19:36.000 What does the law say when it comes to self-defense?

00:19:39.000 And what argument did the prosecution make that to try to possibly say that Kyle had a premeditated intent?

00:19:50.000 That's essentially the standard that they had to try to meet here.

00:19:54.000 Well, intent in a killing can form in an instant.

00:19:57.000 So it doesn't necessarily mean need to be premeditated in the sense we might think of from TV shows and movies where someone has a plan and purchases items and rope and duct tape and all this.

00:20:07.000 That's not required to have criminal intent for a murder.

00:20:10.000 It can happen in a moment.

00:20:11.000 The difficulty for the prosecution here was that there was literally no evidence inconsistent with lawful self-defense in a case where the state, like they do in every self-defense case, has to disprove self-defense beyond a reasonable doubt, which is a very high threshold.

00:20:26.000 So what you expect to see when the state presents their witnesses is an accumulation to a mountain level of evidence that this was not self-defense.

00:20:34.000 They didn't have anything like that for any of the use of force charges against Kyle.

00:20:39.000 So they tried to do a backdoor attack.

00:20:42.000 They tried to say that Kyle provoked the attacks against him.

00:20:44.000 Because if you do that, then they don't have to worry about the self-defense claim because someone who provokes a fight cannot claim self-defense.

00:20:51.000 They're ineligible to claim self-defense.

00:20:53.000 The only evidence they had of this provocation was this drone video that if you've seen it, doesn't look like much under the best of circumstances.

00:21:04.000 Plus, the version they provided the defense was 1 16th the resolution of what they ended up showing to the jury.

00:21:11.000 So the defense had only this low resolution version for a few days because it showed up from the evidence ferry on the prosecution's doorstep in the middle of the trial.

00:21:24.000 And they didn't have the high resolution version until after the evidence was closed.

00:21:28.000 So in other words, they didn't have it to prep their client for his testimony on the witness stand.

00:21:34.000 And so there's a motion to, I want to make sure I get my language right.

00:21:40.000 You would know this better.

00:21:41.000 There's a motion to dismiss with prejudice.

00:21:43.000 Is that right?

00:21:44.000 That is currently under consideration.

00:21:48.000 There's actually two because they filed one motion to dismiss with prejudice after prosecutor Binger inappropriately referenced Kyle's assertion of his Fifth Amendment right to silence in front of the jury, as well as referenced evidence that the judge had ruled excluded from the court.

00:22:09.000 And he did this intentionally.

00:22:11.000 I mean, he knew he was not permitted.

00:22:12.000 They had discussed it just that morning in court that the judge had not changed his rulings on any of this.

00:22:18.000 And he mentioned it in front of the jury anyway.

00:22:19.000 So that was the basis for the first motion for a mistrial with prejudice.

00:22:24.000 And for folks who don't know, a normal mistrial, the trial is dissolved, but the prosecutor is completely free to bring the defendant back again.

00:22:33.000 And this is not harmful to the prosecution.

00:22:35.000 They spend their day in court anyway.

00:22:37.000 They're getting paid anyway.

00:22:38.000 They have the same amount of resources every day.

00:22:41.000 But for the criminal defendant, it's catastrophic because just think about the resources you'll put into not spending the rest of your life in prison.

00:22:49.000 Well, you spend those resources in your first trial.

00:22:52.000 And when it comes back for a second trial, a retrial, you don't have those resources anymore.

00:22:57.000 Your first lawyer's got paid.

00:22:58.000 They're not giving that money back.

00:23:00.000 So what you want as a defendant is not just a mistrial, but a mistrial with prejudice.

00:23:04.000 The prejudice part means the prosecutor is not free to bring the case again.

00:23:09.000 So they had that first motion for a mistrial with prejudice, and then they discovered just this past Friday after the evidence had closed that they had not, in fact, received the same resolution video as was in the prosecution's possession.

00:23:22.000 So they've now added that as another reason why they should have a mistrial with prejudice and filed a new motion, including the drone video resolution issued just this past Monday.

00:23:33.000 So if that's the case, then that would, in my personal opinion, feed into this narrative that maybe the prosecution is trying to trigger a mistrial without prejudice.

00:23:43.000 Do you think that's the same?

00:23:44.000 And that's what that's what the defense is arguing.

00:23:48.000 I mean, we can't see into the prosecution's mind, right?

00:23:51.000 But what we do know is that their case is terrible.

00:23:54.000 And there have been previous cases in Wisconsin courts where prosecutors have done this, where they've had a losing case and they decided, you know what, we're just going to deliberately throw the case.

00:24:04.000 So it goes away and then we'll try them again.

00:24:07.000 And maybe we'll get a better jury the second time around, or maybe we'll get a more amenable judge the second time around.

00:24:12.000 And of course, that's a terrible injustice to allow that to happen.

00:24:16.000 So the conditions that have to be met is not just that the prosecutor engaged in misconduct, but that he did so intentionally for the purpose of throwing the trial so you can get another shot.

00:24:26.000 And I think the judge is onto it, though.

00:24:28.000 I mean, if you read carefully into what the judge says, I don't really know what you're up to here.

00:24:32.000 He was almost implying that, you know, I'm not going to let you throw this thing.

00:24:37.000 Do you think that that could be there?

00:24:40.000 The judge talks a lot and you might make reasonable inferences from the things he says.

00:24:45.000 I mean, he's shouted at the prosecution.

00:24:47.000 He's told them he doesn't believe they're acting in good faith, which means, of course, he believes they're acting in bad faith.

00:24:52.000 I mean, those are the only two options.

00:24:54.000 But then he doesn't do anything.

00:24:55.000 I mean, he doesn't follow through and hold them accountable.

00:24:58.000 Certainly, if they provided this drone footage in a lower resolution, knowing they were doing that, I mean, that's an explicit Brady violation of a violation of the prosecution's duty under the U.S. Constitution to provide the defense with the evidence that's going to be used against them.

00:25:13.000 And that should lead to a malicious prosecution case against these prosecutors.

00:25:18.000 They should pierce their normal prosecutorial immunity.

00:25:21.000 But we don't know if it was intentional.

00:25:23.000 It could have been accidental.

00:25:24.000 You know, they put it in a Dropbox.

00:25:26.000 And I'm not a technology-savvy guy, but I hear that you put a big file in Dropbox, sometimes it shrinks it, compresses it, results in a lower resolution without the person who put it there knowing.

00:25:35.000 So it's possible the drone video resolution issue was unintentional.

00:25:40.000 We really don't know.

00:25:41.000 But even if it was unintentional, it puts the defendant in such a bad position in combination with the other acts by the prosecutor that we know were intentional that I really don't see any other recourse but a mistrial with prejudice in this case.

00:25:58.000 Yeah, with prejudice means that he couldn't be retried again.

00:26:02.000 So my other question, though, and I'm kind of still learning on the fly with this alongside the audience, how is it that the prosecution just add charges as we go along?

00:26:14.000 As if they're second degree, first degree.

00:26:16.000 Aren't those different arguments that need to be presented to the jury?

00:26:20.000 Yeah, they're really not.

00:26:21.000 So this is very normal in criminal cases.

00:26:23.000 You'll have a high-level charge, and the high-level charge is often an aggravated form of a lower charge.

00:26:30.000 So for example, with these recklessness charges, they're claiming not only was he reckless, but he had utter disregard for human life.

00:26:36.000 That's an additional element that turns second degree recklessness into first degree recklessness.

00:26:41.000 Well, they charged him with first degree, but it's possible the jury could look at the evidence and say, well, you know, we don't see utter disregard for human life here, so it's not first degree, but we do see the other parts of it.

00:26:50.000 And that is what qualifies as second degree.

00:26:53.000 So it's called a lesser included offense.

00:26:55.000 And in the law, when you have a client that is charged with a higher level offense, you're on notice.

00:27:00.000 You know what the lesser includeds are.

00:27:01.000 You know you're going to have to defend against those two.

00:27:04.000 So this was not a surprise to the defense that they were going to be facing these lesser included charges.

00:27:09.000 This is a normal part of the process.

00:27:11.000 Yeah, I just found it to be interesting because I suppose the arguments have to be a little bit, I mean, you obviously tried to go after the one that could land you in life in prison, right?

00:27:20.000 But did you see the defense also trying to simultaneously, you know, defend against those charges as well?

00:27:26.000 And just a few of them.

00:27:28.000 I mean, it's a very complicated fact pattern case because there's so many people involved and so many different uses of force and they're under slightly different circumstances.

00:27:38.000 So there were some cases where the lesser included just it wasn't reasonable under the under the facts of that particular case.

00:27:45.000 And they pushed back on those and the judge pretty much accepted that.

00:27:48.000 But for the most part, the lesser included got in.

00:27:52.000 The only way for the lesser included not to get in really is if the state doesn't want them.

00:27:56.000 So the state can say, we want only the highest level charge.

00:27:59.000 We're going, you know, we're placing all our chips on that highest level charge.

00:28:03.000 And we don't want the jury to have an opportunity to only convict on the lesser offense.

00:28:09.000 We want everything or we want nothing.

00:28:10.000 But they didn't do that here.

00:28:11.000 That's what they do for Timothy McVeigh or Eric Rudolph, right?

00:28:14.000 That's what they do for Charles Manson.

00:28:16.000 They don't do that for cases like this.

00:28:18.000 They try to hedge their bets here because a lot, you know, if it's Eric Rudolph, they don't want him to get off with a reckless endangerment for the centennial bombing, right?

00:28:26.000 And what it tells you is that they, you know, they don't have confidence in their highest level charge, right?

00:28:30.000 If they did, they would just go for that one.

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00:30:45.000 I want to ask you about the future of self-defense and how it's more broadly under attack.

00:30:50.000 I'm really interested in that topic, and I know our audience is as well.

00:30:53.000 Andrew, I want you to listen.

00:30:55.000 I want to just listen for a second here to what's happening in the courtroom, and you could tell us what's happening because I'm sort of confused.

00:31:02.000 I'm sure our audience is as well.

00:31:07.000 Actually, what I would propose is making the courtroom the jury room, clearing out the courtroom, looking for checking for any devices that would be recording the deliberations.

00:31:17.000 We can either give them all the exhibits and instruct them to only watch the numbers that we agree on or that are allowed, or we can put them on a separate drive, the exhibits that they've requested or that they'll be allowed to see, and they can essentially have access to all the screens here, and they can play it and do it as they see fit.

00:31:38.000 Now, so normally the distinction of it being privately, no one is with them, but these concerns about giving them unlimited access to the video.

00:31:47.000 Got it.

00:31:47.000 So that's what we're watching.

00:31:48.000 All right.

00:31:48.000 So, okay.

00:31:49.000 So, and is that normal in a proceeding, kind of the back and forth?

00:31:52.000 Well, this, this should already have, everyone knew there was going to be video evidence here.

00:31:56.000 I don't know why these procedures weren't defined beforehand.

00:31:58.000 They're doing this in the middle of deliberations.

00:32:00.000 I mean, I don't understand how this was allowed to happen, frankly.

00:32:06.000 But there are real problems with some of the video.

00:32:08.000 I mean, some of the video, when shown in court as evidence, the prosecution had to mute and unmute because they were saying militia in it.

00:32:14.000 Militia was not something that was supposed to be presented to the jury.

00:32:18.000 So you can't just give the jurors the original videos and let them watch whatever they want because some of that was objected to and the objections sustained.

00:32:25.000 And of course, we have the whole issue with the drone video now, where it's being contested that the defense was not even not ever given the high-definition drone video until after the evidence was closed.

00:32:36.000 So it feels just like a, it's like JV prosecutors, quite honestly, is what this feels like, with way too much power on a national stage.

00:32:43.000 But maybe intentional.

00:32:46.000 So all these mistakes they're making happen to go in the state's favor.

00:32:50.000 Is that a coincidence?

00:32:51.000 Yeah, that's well, that's a good question.

00:32:54.000 Lawofselfdefense.com.

00:32:56.000 We have three minutes remaining.

00:32:57.000 Andrew, I want to ask you, what do you think is the current threat to self-defense?

00:33:02.000 My current opinion is that if they can't confiscate your guns, they're going to criminalize your ability to protect yourself.

00:33:08.000 Are you seeing a disturbing increase in baseless prosecutions against people that want to protect themselves?

00:33:14.000 Yes, what they do is even if they know they can't convict you because your use of force was so clearly within the bounds of lawful self-defense, they use the process as the punishment.

00:33:23.000 They bring you to trial anyway because we have no effective probable cause threshold here.

00:33:28.000 The prosecution can bring anybody they want to trial and then they destroy you through the expense and time and risk of the trial process.

00:33:35.000 Folks, no matter how innocent you are, if you're put in front of a jury, there's a 10% chance you can get convicted.

00:33:41.000 So innocent people go to jail.

00:33:43.000 And even if you're acquitted, if you've killed someone in self-defense and you're on trial for murder or manslaughter, it's easy to burn through $200,000 before you even get to trial.

00:33:52.000 So if you don't have that kind of money sitting around just in case you're compelled to defend yourself or your family, that's what they'll do to you.

00:33:58.000 Well, and so we also saw this with the McCloskey case, right?

00:34:02.000 Which is where they even come outside their home.

00:34:04.000 They didn't even fire away.

00:34:05.000 They didn't even fire around, yet people are breaking in.

00:34:08.000 So you have a great organization, law firm, lawofselfdefense.com.

00:34:13.000 You have a promo where people can get it to learn how to defend themselves.

00:34:17.000 Just kind of what's your wisdom to our audience is obviously a firearm owning audience.

00:34:22.000 Sure.

00:34:23.000 People have to really know the law, don't they?

00:34:25.000 Because it's not as simple as just being able to, you know, it's as simple as being able to defend yourself, but I think there's some things people have to know.

00:34:33.000 It's not complicated.

00:34:34.000 Self-defense law is very straightforward, but there's a lot of bad information out there and people are misled.

00:34:38.000 And if you make a mistake and you violate those boundaries, you are just guilty.

00:34:43.000 So, people really need to know where those limits are.

00:34:45.000 And like I said, there's always a risk of conviction.

00:34:47.000 So, think hard about what fights you're willing to get into.

00:34:51.000 Think about, make sure the juice is worth the squeeze, that the risks are worth the stakes.

00:34:56.000 Well, I appreciate the work you're doing.

00:34:58.000 It's incredibly important.

00:34:59.000 You guys can get it at, you guys can check it out, lawofselfdefense.com.

00:35:03.000 And if you know anyone that's involved in any of these cases, because I know personally a couple of people that are, you know, they defend themselves during Floyd Apalooza last summer, and they're getting caught up in a lot of different things, right?

00:35:14.000 It wasn't lethal, right?

00:35:16.000 But it was just self-defense of, you know, fist fights or whatever, baseball bat stuff.

00:35:20.000 And then they got charged, even though they defended themselves.

00:35:23.000 And so it's important that, you know, you continue to get the message out.

00:35:27.000 We'd love to have you back on once this, you know, the verdict comes because I'm immensely curious.

00:35:31.000 This is one of the most high-profile self-defense cases, as you said, since George Zimmerman, in my personal opinion, especially all the implications.

00:35:37.000 Thank you so much, lawofselfdefense.com.

00:35:39.000 Deeply appreciate it.

00:35:40.000 Thanks so much for listening, everybody.

00:35:42.000 We will see you in Phoenix, Arizona.

00:35:44.000 Email us your thoughts.

00:35:44.000 As always, freedom at charliekirk.com.

00:35:46.000 And if you want to support us, it's charliekirk.com/slash support.

00:35:50.000 Thank you so much for listening, everybody.

00:35:52.000 God bless.

00:35:53.000 Speak to you soon.

00:35:56.000 For more on many of these stories and news you can trust, go to CharlieKirk. com.

The Charlie Kirk Show - November 17, 2021

Analyzing the New 'Trial of the Century' with Alan Dershowitz & Self-Defense Expert Andrew Branca

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