FAlmost two and a half years after Alec Baldwin fatally shot a camerawoman while filming the western “Rust,” the criminal trial against weapons master Hannah Gutierrez-Reed began in the American state of New Mexico. On Wednesday, the Santa Fe court questioned the first of the approximately 70 people who will be potential members of the twelve-person jury to decide on the involuntary manslaughter charge against the twenty-six-year-old in the next two weeks. Many questions from the prosecution on the first day of the trial focused on whether the potential jurors had followed American media coverage of the case.
The public prosecutor's office filed charges against Gutierrez-Reed after the film's leading actor and producer, 65-year-old Baldwin, pointed a revolver in the direction of camerawoman Halyna Hutchins during a rehearsal scene at the end of October 2021. When a shot was fired, the forty-two-year-old collapsed, fatally injured. The director Joel Souza was treated in hospital after a gunshot wound. Gutierrez-Reed had previously loaded the handgun. Baldwin, who is also facing a criminal trial for manslaughter, later told the police that he had turned on the tap. However, he repeatedly rejected the accusation that he had subsequently pulled the trigger.
More live ammunition found on set
While Souza and assistant director David Halls, who handed Baldwin the revolver before the fatal shot, are on the witness list with another 40 people, Baldwin is not expected to testify in Gutierrez-Reed's criminal trial. However, observers expect the Golden Globe winner and his lawyers to follow the trial to gain insight into the prosecution's strategy for the case against Baldwin. The actor and producer is expected to appear in court in the summer.
After Hutchins' death, law enforcement confiscated six more rounds of live ammunition at the Bonanza film ranch near Santa Fe. Officers found some of the cartridges in a box of blank cartridges. They also discovered live cartridges in actor Jensen Ackles' gun belt and Baldwin's bandolier. It remains unclear where the ammunition banned on film sets came from. Prosecutors believe Gutierrez-Reed unknowingly brought her to the filming. The weapon master also has to answer in court for manipulating evidence.
During the investigation on the film set, she is said to have asked an acquaintance to hide a bag of cocaine for her. Gutierrez-Reed, the daughter of well-known stuntman and gun master Thell Reed, had allegedly spent the evening before the fatal shooting in the hot tub of an Albuquerque hotel with alcohol, marijuana and cocaine. Last week, Chief Judge Mary Marlowe Sommer decided to allow text messages about Gutierrez-Reed's drug use into evidence. If found guilty, the weapons master could face up to 18 months in prison.
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