Alec Baldwin, it appears, can’t catch a break.
Baldwin and his influencer wife, Hilaria Baldwin, had just settled into the revelry of a mostly positive news cycle, celebrating last week’s birth of their latest baby, their seventh, a 6-pound, 13-ounce daughter named Ilaria Caterina.
But on Monday, the couple were hit with the alarming news that the actor could be criminally charged in the fatal 2021 shooting of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins on the set of his Western film, “Rust.”
Despite Baldwin’s insistence that Hutchins’ death was an accident and that he wasn’t responsible, as well as his belief that he would never be prosecuted, authorities in Santa Fe, New Mexico, say the opposite is possible.
The Santa Fe Sheriff’s Office is preparing to release its final investigative report on the October 2021 shooting, and Santa Fe District Attorney Mary Carmack-Altwies said her office could file charges against four people, including 64-year-old Baldwin, the Los Angeles Times said, citing a report in the Santa Fe New Mexican.
Carmack-Altwies’ intentions were revealed in a letter that she sent to the state’s finance board, the Los Angeles Times said. The letter said that prosecutors are considering charges, including homicide as well as gun violations, against four individuals. While Carmack-Altwies did not identify who might be charged, the letter indicated that one of the possible defendants could be “well known movie actor Baldwin,” the New York Post reported. She said her office was making an emergency request for more than $600,000 to cover the potential cost of four separate jury trials.
During a finance board meeting on Tuesday, Carmack-Altwies also said her office has been awaiting FBI reports, phones, phone reports and interviews for “the last year” but the final report from the sheriff’s office is expected within a week, the New York Post said, citing a report from KOB 4.
Once the report is received, Carmack-Altwies’ office would be ready to move forward with criminal charges against those involved, if it decides to go forward, KOB 4 reported.
Hutchins was killed and director Joel Souza was wounded on the set of the low-budget Western when they and Baldwin were rehearsing a gunfight scene. Baldwin has said he was told by a crew member that the replica Pietta Colt .45 he was handed was safe to use because it held no live rounds, but somehow, a live round made it into the gun.
Baldwin said he was demonstrating a “cross-draw” for Hutchins and Souza, and the gun fired.
Baldwin told ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos that he aimed the gun towards Hutchins, but only at her direction, as she was setting up a camera angle. The actor also controversially insisted that he didn’t pull the trigger, but a recent FBI forensic report concluded the firearm couldn’t have gone off unless someone pulled the trigger, the New York Post said.
Since the shooting, Baldwin has faced a string of bad news. As the star and producer of “Rust,” Baldwin has been named as a plaintiff in several wrongful death lawsuits. He also told CNN in August that he had lost out on five jobs in the wake of the shooting.
“I got fired from another job yesterday,” Baldwin told CNN. “There I was all set to go to a movie, jump on a plane … I’ve been talking with these guys for months and they told me yesterday we don’t want to do the film with you because of this.”
In addition to Baldwin’s “Rust” woes, the often combative actor is being sued by the sisters and widow of a U.S. Marine killed in Afghanistan for $25 million. They allege he exposed them to social media hatred after Baldwin learned one of the women was at the Capitol on Jan. 6 of last year.
For Baldwin, he’s often said he couldn’t have survived the tragedy of Hutchins’ death without the help of his family, which includes his growing brood of young children. Five months after the shooting, he and Hilaria Baldwin announced a “huge surprise” — that Hilaria Baldwin was pregnant with their seventh baby together.
The couple already are parents to Carmen, 9, Rafael, 7, Leonardo, 5, Romeo, 4, Eduardo, 2, and Lucia, 18 months. Baldwin also has a 26-year-old daughter, Ireland, from his first marriage to Kim Basinger.
“After many ups and downs over the past few years, we have an exciting up and a huge surprise: another Baldwinito is coming this fall,” Hilaria Baldwin captioned a March 29 Instagram video, Us Weekly reported. “Our new baby is a very bright spot in our lives. A blessing and a gift during such uncertain times.”
On Saturday, Hilaria posted a photo of her and her newborn daughter Ilaria. “We are so excited to introduce you to our tiny dream come true,” she said.
The “ups and downs” Hilaria Baldwin referred to in March could include her being outed in late 2020 in a scandal related to her Spanish heritage scandal.
People on the internet and published reports found that Hilaria Baldwin, born and reared in Boston as Hillary Hayward-Thomas, had spent more than a decade leading her fans, journalists, including from Spanish-language publications, and even the United Nations to believe that she was a glamorous “half-Spanish” immigrant.
Hillaria Baldwin also has become a polarizing figure for her regular, frequent social media posts of photos and videos of her young children. Experts in public relations and the mom influencer industry have said that images of the Baldwin children are crucial to Hilaria Baldwin’s brand. Crisis P.R. experts have also said that the couple may have been posting happy family photos of their children over the past year to garner sympathy for Baldwin in the wake of Hutchins’ death.
Already, the couple’s daughter has become a new feature in the couple’s Instagram posts. As news was breaking Monday morning that New Mexico authorities may seek criminal charges against her husband, Hilaria Baldwin was back on Instagram story, pumping out new photos of her children and her new baby.
Hilaria Baldwin shared a photo of her fifth and sixth children in a stroller, saying “Bringing baby home is magical, and it’s always a transition that we all feel. I’m still trying to balance new mom again. With breastfeeding. Healing. And hustling to make sure all my children feel that I am there to be the best mama I can be.”
Eric Schiffer, a Los Angeles-based expert, told this news organization last year that Hilaria and Alec Baldwin seem to be angling for sympathy by emphasizing their role as harried but dedicated parents, trying to keep life normal amid a horrific tragedy. But Schiffer said that such messaging comes across as “narcissistic” and “callous,” given that Hutchins was killed, and her son, then 9, lost his mother.
