Trial begins for Rust: More than two years after actor Alec Baldwin fatally shot cinematographer Helena Hutchins on the New Mexico set of the movie Rust, the trial of the film’s weapons handler began today. Armorer Hannah Gutierrez faces a maximum three years in jail if a jury finds her guilty of the charges of involuntary manslaughter and evidence of tampering, Baldwin himself pleading not guilty to his own charge of involuntary manslaughter.
Prosecutors right off the bat say Gutierrez, even in her own selfies from the set, failed to notice she had at least one live round mixed in the dummies. The prosecutor accusing her of negligence by failing to make those vital safety checks. The defendant acted negligently and without due caution, and that the decisions she made that day ultimately contributed to Ms, Hutchins’death.
Trial Begins of âRustâ Armorer in Alec Baldwin Shooting
we got a preview of that defense in opening statements today. And what her defense team really tried to do was establish two things. One, that she was overwhelmed and overworked on that movie set. And two, they tried to sort of spread the blame out to other people, including and maybe primarily to actor Alec Baldwin, saying that ultimately he was the one who had his finger on the trigger when the gun fired and also saying that Baldwin did not check the weapon and Baldwin did not or should not have pointed the weapon at another individual, which he ultimately did.
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They also blame the security supervisor who was in charge of security over the entire movie set, saying that sort of played fast and loose with safety, not performing the safety checks and providing people with safety training. They said that Gutierrez herself asked for more training and that she was ultimately denied. They also said that the production as a whole was rushed and that they prioritized speed over safety.
And that sort of trickled down, according to the defense, to Gutierrez herself, that she was given multiple tasks, multiple jobs. She could not focus primarily on her responsibilities as an armor and that she is being made a scapegoat, that she was 24 years old when this happened, she was a young woman, perhaps the person with the least amount of power on that set, and that she’s an easy target for blame.
Besides involuntary manslaughter, Miss Gutierrez is also charged with evidence tampering. Tell us more about that charge and how it plays into her possible negligence here.
According to the prosecution, Gutierrez passed off a bag of cocaine at some point after the shooting. She passed that off to another crew member. Gutierrez claims that the bag was never tested, that it was not cocaine, but the prosecution claims that it was, and that that was evidence in this incident.
Obviously, that is going to play into the prosecution trying to establish that she was abusing drugs and alcohol throughout the time, throughout her time on this movie set. And that is something that they’ll continue to try to establish through witness testimony over the next several days and couple of weeks throughout this trial.
