‘His word is final.’ Judge in trial is viewed as tough jurist

Schroeder, 75, has come under scrutiny many times during his nearly 40 years on the bench: From a 2018 sentence — thrown out on appeal — requiring a convicted shoplifter to tell store managers she was on supervision for retail theft to ordering AIDS tests for sex workers in the late 1980s.

“He has a reputation for doing what he believes is the right thing and being an independent thinker,” said William Lynch, a retired attorney who served on the board of the ACLU of Wisconsin at the time of Schroeder ruling about the AIDS tests.

“And it’s his courtroom. He doesn’t like to be pushed around by either party. So he has a strong sense of his own his bearing in the courtroom.”

CNN has sought comment from Schroeder.

On cross-examination, Schroeder twice asked the jury to leave the room before admonishing prosecutor Thomas Binger for his line of questioning.

Defense attorney Mark Richards threatened to call for a mistrial with prejudice.

“This is ridiculous,” Schroeder told Binger at one point.

Defense lawyers and Schroeder took issue with Binger’s questions about Rittenhouse’s silence after his arrest — a right guaranteed under the Fifth Amendment.

“I was astonished when you began … by commenting on the defendant’s post-arrest silence,” Schroeder told the prosecutor.

Schroeder called it “a grave constitutional violation for you to talk about the defendant’s silence.”

“You’re right on the borderline, and you may be over, but it better stop,” the judge said.

Binger said he believed Rittenhouse’s testimony opened the door for the questioning but Schroeder was adamant and again spoke sharply to the prosecutor. Schroeder told Binger he should have asked the court for permission first and said the evidence would not be allowed.

“Don’t get brazen with me,” Schroeder said. “You know very well that an attorney can’t go into these types of areas when the judge has already ruled without asking outside the presence of the jury to do so, so don’t give me that.”

‘I just killed somebody’

The Rittenhouse case may be Schroeder’s highest profile trial yet.

Video from the protests showed Rittenhouse, wearing a green T-shirt and a backward baseball cap and carrying an AR-15-style rifle, walking the streets with a group of armed men.

Rittenhouse shot Rosenbaum after the protester threw an object that appeared to be a plastic bag at him.

As Rosenbaum lay on the ground, the complaint said, Rittenhouse ran away. He called a friend and said, “I just killed somebody.” Pursued by protesters, he tripped and fell to the ground.

While on the ground, Rittenhouse shot Huber, who appeared to hit him with a skateboard, according to the complaint, and then shot a third protester approaching him, Grosskreutz, in the right arm. Grosskreutz was holding a handgun but had his hands up, the complaint said.

After the shooting, Rittenhouse walked by police with his hands up, bystander videos showed. He turned himself in at his local police department the morning after the shooting. 

The debate over labeling the victims

Last month, the court considered whether defense attorneys would be allowed to refer to Huber, Rosenbaum and Grosskreutz as arsonists, rioters or looters for their behavior during the chaotic demonstrations.

“I don’t think I’m inclined toward prior restraint,” Schroeder said.

Binger argued the judge had set a “double standard” because of his rule against the use of the word “victims.”

“If I were to count the number of times that you’ve admonished me not to call someone a victim during a trial, it would be in the thousands,” Binger said.

“The word ‘victim’ is a loaded, loaded word. And I think ‘alleged victim’ is a cousin to it,” Schroeder countered.

“I think it’s the exact same issue,” Binger told the judge. “The terms that I’m identifying here, such as ‘rioters,’ ‘looters,’ ‘arsonists,’ are as loaded, if not more loaded, than the term ‘victim.'”

Binger argued that any behavior Rosenbaum, Huber or Grosskreutz may have engaged in that could lead jurors to believe they were arsonists, rioters or looters wasn’t witnessed by Rittenhouse and shouldn’t be part of his defense.

“He can’t argue self-defense against things he’s not aware of,” Binger said. “These other acts are strictly designed to attack the reputation of these individuals.”

A defense attorney argued that Rittenhouse’s actions should be weighed against the overall “lawlessness” of that night.

CNN legal analyst Areva Martin called Schroeder’s decision “incomprehensible.” She noted that allowing the use of the words “rioters” and “looters” suggested the victims “deserve what they got. They deserve to be shot and even deserved to die.”

One motion involved a video taken two weeks before the Kenosha shooting that showed Rittenhouse talking about an AR rifle and wanting to shoot people he believed were looting a CVS store.

A seasoned southeast Wisconsin attorney who has appeared before Schroeder many times described the judge as “someone who has studied the Constitution and the enumerated rights for criminal defendants and… respects the right of the defense to put on a defense.”

“He’s a super old school guy,” said the attorney, who asked not to named because he still appears before Schroeder.

“And that doesn’t mean that he’s old. I mean he’s 75 years old, which is older than most judges, but he’s just an old school guy. He still operates his courtroom like it’s 1980.”

‘He’s going to give you a fair trial’

In the late 1980s, Schroeder drew scrutiny after ordering a convicted child molester who also engaged in prostitution to get an AIDS test, according to attorney John Anthony Ward, who represented the man.

“We objected on privacy grounds,” Ward said.

Schroeder started ordering convicted sex workers to submit to AIDS tests over concerns they were spreading the virus.

Ward does not view Schroeder as a jurist who is favorable to the rights of defendants.

“Judge Schroeder is not a pro-defense judge,” he said. “He’s a very tough judge… But he’s going to give you a fair trial.”

New trial ordered in high-profile case

Schroeder allowed into a evidence a letter Julie Jensen gave a neighbor accusing her husband should anything happen to her. The defense maintained that Julie Jensen was depressed, killed herself and framed her husband.

The letter, read in court, said in part: “I pray I’m wrong + nothing happens … but I am suspicious of Mark’s suspicious behaviors + fear for my early demise.”

Schroeder, before announcing his sentence, told the defendant: “Your crime is so enormous, so monstrous, so unspeakably cruel that it overcomes all other considerations.”

The court’s opinion said the letter is considered inadmissible “hearsay” evidence that violated Jensen’s Sixth Amendment right to confront witnesses against him. Schroeder had ruled the letter was a “dying declaration,” or evidence of her state of mind at the time of her death.

Jensen awaits a new trial.

The dramatic six-week trial in 2008, nearly a decade after Julie Jensen was found dead in bed, was one of Schroeder’s highest profile cases. It too made national headlines.

“He is not someone who is going to be intimidated by the involvement of the press, or the attention that the case is receiving,” the Wisconsin attorney who asked not to be identified said of Schroeder.

“He’s not going to change his rulings because of publicity or because he wants a certain outcome. At this point in his career, he is who he is.”

‘That’s just his style’

In another case, the state Court of Appeals in May vacated a condition of supervision that Schroeder imposed on a woman convicted of shoplifting in 2018.

The condition was that “upon entering any place that sells goods to the public, she notify management at the service desk that she is on supervision for retail theft.”

The appellate court noted that the judge told the woman the condition was “going to embarrass you, of course.” And, while people are no longer put in stocks, “embarrassment does have a valuable place in deterring criminality,” Schroeder told the woman.

“We are not persuaded that embarrassing or humiliating defendants with a state-imposed broad public notification requirement promotes their rehabilitation,” the higher court said. The appellate judges also noted that the condition could adversely impact the woman’s children.

“I would say his overall career as a trial judge I have found to be one which I find fair to the defense in the presentation of evidence and at a trial,” Kenosha defense attorney Terry Rose said of Schroeder.

“I don’t support the idea of announcing one is a shoplifter before you go in a store. That I’m opposed to absolutely,” Rose said. “I think he will be a good judge in this trial and be able to do what is correct under the law and maintain control over the courtroom, giving the defendant the opportunity to present his best defense.”

Schroeder will be 80 when his current terms ends in 2026.

The Wisconsin defense attorney who asked not to be identified noted that Schroeder’s sharp tongue and sometimes combative manner have “mellowed” over the years.

“He barks some and, for younger lawyers, they are very sensitive to that sort of thing. ‘Oh, the judge yelled at me.’ ” the attorney said.

“Like, toughen up, buttercup. This is felony court. Older lawyers are like, ‘Okay, he yelled at me. And then I saw him in the hallway and he asked me how my son’s basketball game was.’ That’s just his style.”