Man who bought gun for Kyle Rittenhouse pleads no contest

The man who bought an AR-15-style rifle for Kyle Rittenhouse pleaded no contest Monday to a reduced charge of contributing to the delinquency of a minor in a deal with prosecutors to avoid prison.

Kenosha County Circuit Judge Bruce Schroeder accepted Dominick Black's plea during a six-minute hearing. Assistant District Attorney Thomas Binger dropped two felony counts of intent to deliver a dangerous weapon to a minor as part of the deal.

Contributing to the delinquency of a minor is a misdemeanour punishable by up to nine months in jail, but Binger reduced the charge to a non-criminal citation. Under the deal, Black will pay a US$2,000 fine. Each felony count would have been punishable by up to six years in prison and a $10,000 fine.

Black was 18 and dating Rittenhouse's sister when he purchased an AR-15-style rifle for Rittenhouse in May 2020. Rittenhouse, of Antioch, Illinois, was 17 -- not old enough to purchase a firearm.

Three months later, in August 2020, Rittenhouse used the rifle to shoot Joseph Rosenbaum, Anthony Huber and Gaige Grosskreutz during a tumultuous night of protests in Kenosha over the shooting of a Black man, Jacob Blake, by a white police officer. Rosenbaum and Huber died of their wounds. Rittenhouse is white, as were all of the people he shot.