The "Rust" armorer who last month was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter in the deadly shooting of Halyna Hutchins, the film's cinematographer, is scheduled to be sentenced today in a New Mexico state court. Hannah Gutierrez-Reed faces up to 18 months in prison for her part in the 2021 tragedy that several experts have since characterized as a preventable incident, where actor Alec Baldwin discharged live rounds from a prop gun on the movie set during a rehearsal.
Last month, a jury convicted Gutierrez-Reed on the involuntary manslaughter charge, brought against her by the state of New Mexico in the wake of the "Rust" shooting. The 27-year-old former weapons supervisor on the Western film could also receive a fine for as much as $5,000, along with prison time, at the sentencing hearing in Sante Fe. She had originally been charged with a second felony count by the state for evidence tampering but was acquitted at the trial.
Authorities took Gutierrez-Reed into custody once the verdicts were read. Her defense blamed the film's management for the shooting, arguing that serious safety issues existed on the "Rust" set that were outside of her purview. Her defense attorneys zeroed in on the fact that the movie's primary ammunition supplier had apparently not been investigated.
Gutierrez-Reed, the daughter of an established Hollywood armorer, had previously pleaded not guilty to both charges. After the jury delivered its verdicts on March 6, Gutierrez-Reed's attorney, Jason Bowles, told CBS News that he planned to appeal "a number of issues that occurred in the trial." But subsequent case filings show that the defense's attempts to secure a new trial with her release, and, then, her conditional release, in the aftermath of the conviction were quickly denied by the state.
Prosecutors had throughout the trial painted Gutierrez-Reed as careless and irresponsible, with the aim of convincing jurors that her negligence and "willful disregard" for the safety of others ultimately endangered her "Rust" colleagues and caused Hutchins' death. The state sought the maximum prison sentence for Gutierrez-Reed's manslaughter conviction as prosecutors said she appeared not to display any signs of remorse over the fatal incident in court.
Additional documents filed in the case reference at least one more felony charge related to weapons handling against Gutierrez-Reed in New Mexico, which is still pending, for allegedly "intentionally hiding a firearm from security at a local bar to get the firearm into the bar" after her arrival in the state for filming. Prosecutors said she went on to record a selfie video in the bar restroom boasting about her successful ruse and flashing "a nickel-plated semi-automatic pistol" toward the camera. The state has also accused her of possessing cocaine while working as the firearms expert on "Rust," which is considered a felony, too, in New Mexico.
The allegation involving illegal substance use was presented as evidence during Gutierrez-Reed's trial earlier this year. The trial itself ran slightly over two weeks and mainly centered around the origins of six live bullets that were found on the set of "Rust" as investigators began their probe into the shooting on Oct. 21, 2021. That day, Baldwin was rehearsing a scene for "Rust," to be filmed at some unspecified future time, with Hutchins and Joel Souza, the film's writer and director.
Their rehearsal happened on set at the Bonanza Creek Ranch, a popular filming location for Western movies on the outskirts of Santa Fe, and primarily focused on Baldwin drawing a .45-caliber revolver from a holster, while in character, and pointing the gun in the direction of Hutchins and Souza as they watched the scene unfold from behind a monitor. On one draw, the weapon fired and discharged live bullets, one of which passed through Hutchins before striking Souza. Hutchins was pronounced dead at an area hospital less than two hours later. Souza was injured but survived.
The revolver should never have contained live ammunition, according to industry-wide regulations and union guidelines governing the use of firearms on film sets, and the Santa Fe district attorney's office had said in their initial probable cause statement that evidence indicated the scene Baldwin was rehearsing should not have even required the use of blanks. Inert dummy rounds would have sufficed instead, the statement alleged, and cited expert weapons consultants who noted that a plastic or replica gun should have been used during the rehearsal.
It was Gutierrez-Reed's responsibility to manage the weapons being used on the "Rust" set, including the gun that discharged and fatally hit Hutchins, the district attorney's office said. But there are conflicting accounts as to how exactly live ammunition could have ended up in the revolver. The probable cause statement at first alleged that Gutierrez-Reed had loaded the .45 prior to taking a lunch break on Oct. 21, stored it, and retrieved it after lunch before handing it off, without performing the necessary safety checks, to the first assistant director, David Halls.
Halls already served six months of unsupervised parole for negligent use of a firearm, after pleading no contest and admitting that he improperly handled the weapon that fired on the film set. He gave emotional testimony in court during Gutierrez-Reed's trial, saying that she had twice handed over the revolver to Baldwin during the Oct. 21 rehearsal — first, without any ammunition, and a second time, with five dummy rounds and one live bullet.
Gutierrez-Reed said in a statement released through her attorneys in November 2021 that she did complete a proper safety check on the .45 revolver prior to handing it over and did not know how live ammunition wound up inside the gun.
"No one could have anticipated or thought that someone would introduce live rounds into this set," the statement read. Gutierrez-Reed also said that she had instructed actors involved in "Rust" not to point guns at other people on set.
Baldwin has insisted that he pulled back the hammer of the revolver during that Oct. 21 rehearsal, but did not pull the trigger. Since the shooting, the actor has settled a lawsuit with Hutchins' family, filed one against several members of the "Rust" crew, including Gutierrez-Reed, for negligence, and pleaded not guilty to a charge against him for involuntary manslaughter. That case has not yet gone to trial.
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