Prosecutors Make Decision in Case of Rittenhouse Friend Who Bought Gun

By Abby Liebing January 11, 2022 at 12:49pm

Dominick Black, who purchased the gun Kyle Rittenhouse used to shoot three people, two of them fatally, during rioting in Kenosha, Wisconsin, in 2020, has made a plea deal and is no longer facing felony charges, CNN reported Monday.

Under the deal, Black will plead guilty to a reduced charge of contributing to the delinquency of a child and pay a $2,000 fine, the report said.

Contributing to the delinquency of a minor is a misdemeanor that is punishable by up to nine months in jail. However, Kenosha County Assistant District Attorney Thomas Binger reduced the charge to the violation of a noncriminal county ordinance, The Associated Press reported.

As part of the deal, Binger also dropped two felony counts of intent to deliver a dangerous weapon to a minor, the AP reported. Black had been charged with those two counts in 2020, and each would have been punishable by up to six years in prions as well as a $10,000 fine.

Prosecutors said Black, who was 18 at the time, bought an AR-15-style rifle for Rittenhouse since he was only 17 and could not buy it himself, WISN-TV in Milwaukee reported.

Black was dating Rittenhouse’s sister at the time he purchased the firearm, the AP reported.

He testified during Rittenhouse’s criminal trial that he bought the rifle in May 2020 so that he and Rittenhouse could target shoot and hunt.

It was three months later, during a riot following the police shooting of Jacob Blake, that Rittenhouse used the gun to shoot Joseph Rosenbaum, Anthony Huber and Gaige Grosskreutz. Rosenbaum and Huber died from their wounds.

But Rittenhouse was acquitted of all the charges in November as the jury concluded that he acted in self-defense.

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Judge Bruce Schroeder accepted Black’s plea deal in a very short hearing Monday, the AP reported. Black was not present.

His attorney, Tony Cotton, said that he was glad “this nightmare behind him.”

“It was really a long road that he’s been down,” Cotton said, according to WISN.

Black cooperated with the prosecution during the Rittenhouse trial and agreed to testify against the teenager.

“In these circumstances, to go forward with these felony charges against Mr. Black, given the court’s legal ruling, as well as Mr. Black’s cooperation and the jury’s decision in the Rittenhouse case does not seem appropriate,” Binger said, according to WISN.

Felony charges dropped against man who bought Kyle Rittenhouse’s gun https://t.co/8A7gQ6UYkU pic.twitter.com/8GAFOlpujU

— New York Post (@nypost) January 11, 2022

Cotton told the AP via email that “justice was done.”

“The District Attorney’s Office did the right thing by agreeing to dismiss the felony charges against our client especially considering that a jury found Rittenhouse not guilty,” he said.

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