It’s just being reported that Alec Baldwin is being charged with involuntary manslaughter in the shooting of Halya Hutchins.
This news comes from the District Attorney who is pursing charges against up to four people, including Baldwin.
Here’s more from Fox News:
New Mexico First Judicial District Attorney Mary Carmack-Altwies announced charges in the death of Halyna Hutchins.
Alec Baldwin was charged with involuntary manslaughter, according to the district attorney. The armorer Hannah Gutierrez-Reed was also charged with involuntary manslaughter.
Before announcing the decision, the district attorney’s office spent time reviewing a comprehensive report submitted by the Santa Fe County Sheriff’s Office.
It’s been over a year since the cinematographer was killed on the New Mexico movie set.
Halyna died when a gun Alec Baldwin was holding fired, while practicing a scene on Oct. 21, 2021. The group had been rehearsing in a small church on the Bonanza Creek Ranch set.
The Santa Fe County Sheriff’s Department has spent the last year investigating how live rounds made it onto the movie set. Armorer Hannah Guiterrez-Reed and assistant director Dave Halls were the only other crew members believed to have handled the gun that fired on set.
“Never in a million years did Hannah think that live rounds could have been in the ‘dummy’ round box,” one of Guiterrez-Reed’s attorneys, Jason Bowles, said in a statement shared with Fox News shortly after the fatal accident. “Who put those in there and why is the central question.”
Halls allegedly handed Baldwin a .45 revolver, telling him that it was “cold,” or safe. Prior to that, Gutierrez-Reed spun the cylinder to show Halls what was in the gun, her lawyer said.
Baldwin has maintained that he did not pull the trigger of the gun – once during a prime-time interview shortly following the deadly shooting and again on a podcast episode. The actor originally said he had pulled the hammer of the gun back as far as he could and released it, but did not pull the trigger.
Carmack-Altwies named Baldwin specifically in her request for emergency funding to prosecute the case. The DA explained that she anticipated prosecuting up to four individuals –possibly including Baldwin.
“The ‘Rust’ prosecution could be potentially be prosecutions from one (1) to four (4) defendants,” Carmack-Altwies wrote in paperwork filed for an emergency grant. “One of the possible defendants is well-known movie actor Alec Baldwin.”
I never thought Baldwin would actually be prosecuted for this on any significant level, but he failed to check the gun that he was practicing with when he shot Hutchins.
It’s more than obvious that the shooting was an accident, but it will be interesting to see what evidence the DA provides in her case against Baldwin.