Involuntary manslaughter charges against Alec Baldwin were dropped last April, but a grand jury’s findings have led them to be refiled against the actor for the shooting that killed cinematographer Halyna Hutchins on the set of the Western film Rust.
In October 2021, Baldwin was holding the gun and rehearsing a scene when a live round of ammunition that had been placed inside the prop went off and struck Hutchins’s upper body, then the shoulder of writer-director Joel Souza. Hutchins died later that day from the wound.
Baldwin has denied pulling the trigger, and initial investigative findings suggested that the gun had been altered prior to the incident, which led to the withdrawal of charges against him. But further expert studies of the weapon indicated that the gun was not modified in a way that would have made it possible for it to go off without the involvement of the person holding it. “The forensic testing of the gun concluded with certainty that the trigger of the gun had to have been pulled for the gun to go off,” special prosecutor Kari T. Morrissey told The New York Times in October 2023, when it was announced that a grand jury would be convened.
Baldwin was first charged with involuntary manslaughter in the case in January 2023, along with prop armorer Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, who oversaw the weapons and bullets on the set. Dave Halls, the first assistant director on the set, a role typically responsible for managing safety, accepted a plea bargain for the charge of negligent use of a deadly weapon, receiving a suspended sentence and six months of probation.
The trial for Gutierrez-Reed, who also faces an evidence tampering charge, is set for February. It’s not clear when a trial for Baldwin will take place, but the actor’s attorneys, Luke Nikas and Alex Spiro, issued a statement saying: “We look forward to our day in court.”
Developing…
Anthony Breznican
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