Prosecutors in a case arising from the 2021 fatal shooting on the set of the movie Rust claim that the weapons supervisor on the production was drinking and smoking marijuana in the evenings during filming – and she was likely hungover when she loaded a live bullet into the revolver that actor Alec Baldwin used.
The accusation was made in a response to a request by attorneys for the gun handler Hannah Gutierrez-Reed to have involuntary manslaughter charges against her dismissed, as her defense condemned what they said were “character assassination” tactics in a mishandled case.
But prosecutors in Santa Fe, New Mexico, also said Gutierrez-Reed has a history of reckless conduct at work, arguing that it would be in the public interest for her to “finally be held accountable”.
Witnesses in the case will testify Gutierrez-Reed was “drinking heavily and smoking marijuana in the evenings during the shooting of Rust”, a new court motion said, adding it’s “likely … [she] was hungover when she inserted a live bullet into a gun that she knew was going to be used at some point by an actor”, according to the Santa Fe New Mexican.
But an attorney for Gutierrez-Reed accused prosecutors of having a weak case and therefore resorting to disguise that. “The prosecution has abandoned the idea of doing justice and getting to the actual truth apparently,” Jason Bowles, the attorney for Gutierrez-Reed, said.
Separately, prosecutors said they will make a decision within 60 days whether to re-charge Baldwin in connection with the October 2021 shooting death of the cinematographer Halyna Hutchins. The actor had been pointing a gun at the cinematographer during a rehearsal when it went off, killing her and wounding the film’s director, Joel Souza.
A charge of involuntary manslaughter against Baldwin was dropped in April after prosecutors cited new evidence about the revolver used in the fatal incident and the need for more time to investigate.
Claims of political motivation are swirling. The New Mexico district attorney who charged Baldwin was forced to step down from the case in March.
Lawyers for Gutierrez-Reed now say the charge against her is “tainted by improper political motives”.
Her attorneys also claim that testing of the revolver involved in the shooting amounts to destruction of evidence. But it remains unclear how live rounds ever made it on to the Rust set and into the gun.
The Associated Press contributed reporting
