Alec Baldwin looms large in ‘Rust’ armorer trial

[March 07, 2024]  By Andrew Hay

(Reuters) -In a Santa Fe, New Mexico, courthouse jurors last week watched video of actor Alec Baldwin rushing from a shack and blazing away with his Colt .45 "Peacemaker" revolver until he runs out of rounds.

"One more, one more, one more, right away, let's reload," Baldwin tells Hannah Gutierrez, the chief weapons handler on the set of the movie "Rust", saying she should have had a second gun already loaded. After just three hours of deliberations Wednesday, jurors convicted Gutierrez of involuntary manslaughter.

Prosecutors had charged that Gutierrez rushed the handling of weapons, while failing to tell Baldwin, who was acting, not to point a gun at people or pull the trigger after a take.

Prosecutors used videos taken on the set to portray a breakdown of movie-industry firearm safety during the filming of "Rust." The chaos was the backbone of the case over the 2021 death of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins.

While setting up a scene, a video showed, Baldwin pointed a revolver at Hutchins; the weapon fired and fatally struck the cinematographer with a live round that had been mistakenly loaded by Gutierrez.

Even as Gutierrez stood trial, witnesses - including people who worked with her on "Rust" and firearms experts - touched on Baldwin's role in the shooting. Some of the testimony suggested he was negligent and held a disproportionate amount of power on a set where he was a producer, writer and lead actor.

In one video, for instance, Baldwin shouts an expletive and fires a last round after a crew member yells "cut", breaking with movie set conventions and standards.

State prosecutors - and even Baldwin's defense lawyers - will undoubtedly lean on some of the evidence introduced in the case against Gutierrez when Baldwin faces a July 10 manslaughter trial over Hutchins death, legal experts said.

On several occasions, Gutierrez's defense lawyers asked witnesses whether Baldwin and veteran first assistant director Dave Halls prevented the rookie armorer from performing her weapons safety duties.

"He's basically instructing the armorer how to do their job," testified Bryan Carpenter, an expert in firearms safety on film sets who worked on around 100 films and TV episodes, after watching the Baldwin video clip. "Control is how we enforce gun safety."

Attorney Jason Bowles asked Carpenter whether any armorer could have told Baldwin what to do.

"It would be a difficult situation," Carpenter testified.

Actor Alec Baldwin appears in court in the Manhattan borough of New York City, New York, U.S., January 23, 2019. Alex Tabak/Pool via REUTERS/File Photo

DIFFERING TESTIMONIES

Crew members, including Ross Addagio, who operated a camera dolly on the set, expressed similar concerns about Baldwin's powerful role on the low-budget film.

"I don't recall anybody standing up to Mr. Baldwin on the set of Rust," testified Addagio, who also described Gutierrez as less "professional and serious" than other armorers he worked with.

Baldwin has said he was only a creative producer on the movie, rather than managing on-set operations, and as an actor he was not responsible for gun safety. He said he was directed to point his revolver at the camera when it fired the round.

Under cross examination by defense attorneys, "Rust" set stills photographer Karen Kuehn said Baldwin was the most powerful producer on set. She described him as the "boss" and said she did not see anyone say "no" to him.

Baldwin's lawyers did not immediately respond to a request for comment. But legal experts said they, too, may take some beneficial testimony from the current trial.

Halls, the first assistant director who has already been convicted in the case, defended Baldwin, saying he behaved like many other actors caught up in the adrenalin of filming.

"There was never any Mr Baldwin rushing anyone," said Halls.

That sort of testimony will likely find its way into Baldwin's case, said Stephen Aarons, a Santa Fe criminal defense lawyer.

"Baldwin's crew will use some of this stuff and repeat it at his trial," said Aarons.

State prosecutor Kari Morrissey on Wednesday used a moment of her closing argument in Gutierrez's case to the set the stage for the upcoming trial of Baldwin.

“Alec Baldwin’s conduct and his lack of gun safety inside that church on that day is something he’s going to have to answer for another day,” Morrissey told jurors.

Jury deliberations in the Gutierrez case started on Wednesday afternoon.

(Reporting By Andrew Hay; editing by Paul Thomasch and Aurora Elis)

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