Alec Baldwin charged with involuntary manslaughter after fatal shooting on Rust set
Special prosecutors dismissed an involuntary manslaughter charge against Baldwin in April, but now a new charge has been brought forward
A grand jury has indicted Alec Baldwin on an involuntary manslaughter charge in a 2021 fatal shooting during a rehearsal on a movie set in New Mexico.
Special prosecutors brought the case before a grand jury in Santa Fe this week, months after receiving a new analysis of the gun that was used.
Baldwin, the lead actor and a co-producer on the Western movie Rust, was pointing a gun at cinematographer Halyna Hutchins during a rehearsal on a movie set outside Santa Fe in October 2021 when the gun went off, killing her and wounding director Joel Souza.
Baldwin has said he pulled back the hammer, but not the trigger, and the gun fired.
Judges recently agreed to put on hold several civil lawsuits seeking compensation from Baldwin and producers of Rust after prosecutors said they would present charges to a grand jury.
Special prosecutors dismissed an involuntary manslaughter charge against Baldwin in April, saying they were informed the gun might have been modified before the shooting and malfunctioned.
They later pivoted and began weighing whether to refile a charge against Baldwin after receiving a new analysis of the gun.
The analysis from experts in ballistics and forensic testing relied on replacement parts to reassemble the gun fired by Baldwin, after parts of the pistol were broken during testing by the FBI.
The report examined the gun and markings it left on a spent cartridge to conclude that the trigger had to have been pulled or depressed.
The analysis stated that although Baldwin repeatedly denied pulling the trigger, “given the tests, findings and observations reported here, the trigger had to be pulled or depressed sufficiently to release the fully cocked or retracted hammer of the evidence revolver.”
The weapons supervisor on the movie set, Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, has pleaded not guilty to involuntary manslaughter and evidence tampering in the case.
Her trial is scheduled to begin in February.
The 2021 shooting resulted in a series of civil lawsuits, including wrongful death claims filed by members of Hutchins’ family, centered on accusations that the defendants were lax with safety standards.
Baldwin and other defendants have disputed those allegations.
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