Baldwin trial hears actor broke ‘cardinal’ safety rules

SANTA FE, United States—Alec Baldwin was accused of violating basic gun safety rules and playing “make believe” with a deadly weapon, as the Hollywood star’s trial for involuntary manslaughter over a fatal shooting on the set of Western movie “Rust” began on Wednesday.

Baldwin was holding a prop revolver during the fateful rehearsal in October 2021 when it fired a live round, killing cinematographer Halyna Hutchins and wounding the movie’s director. He has said that he did not know the gun was loaded, and denies that he pulled the revolver’s trigger.

But in opening statements at the Santa Fe court, prosecutor Erlinda Ocampo Johnson painted a picture of a powerful movie star who acted in “a reckless manner” and “without due regard for the safety of others” on set.

Baldwin played “make believe with a real gun and violated the cardinal rules of firearm safety,” Johnson told the jury. She said

Baldwin had “requested to be assigned the biggest gun available” for the “Rust” scene, had failed to take a gun training session seriously, and regularly cocked and pointed the gun at people on set.

“Movie set safety rules require actors like the defendant to treat every firearm as though it’s loaded, to never point a firearm at another person, and to never put your finger on the trigger unless you’re prepared to shoot,” Johnson told the jury.

‘Gunfights in movies’

Baldwin, 66, could face up to 18 months in prison if found guilty. The actor appeared in the courtroom in the southwestern US state of New Mexico on Wednesday wearing a dark suit and tie, and chatted quietly with his wife Hilaria and brother Stephen before opening statements began.

His celebrity lawyer Alex Spiro, whose other clients include Elon Musk and Jay-Z, delivered a long opening statement rebutting the notion that normal gun safety rules apply to actors while performing roles.

“These cardinal rules? They’re not cardinal rules on a movie set,” said Spiro. “You’ve all seen gunfights in movies,” he told the jury, citing classics like “Platoon,” “Apocalypse Now” and “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.”

“The reason that can happen is because safety is ensured before the actor is handed the weapon,” he said.

Spiro focused blame on the movie’s safety officials, including armorer Hannah Gutierrez and first assistant director David Halls.

Gutierrez was convicted by the same court earlier this year and is serving an 18-month sentence. Halls pleaded guilty to negligence, under a deal to avoid prison. Live bullets are banned from movie sets.

FBI report

Hutchins, the victim, was originally from Ukraine, and her career as a Hollywood cinematographer was thriving when she was killed at the age of 42.

The tragedy occurred during a rehearsal in a small chapel on the Bonanza Creek Ranch, a historic location for Western movies, on a sunny afternoon midway through the filming of “Rust.”

Baldwin was preparing for a scene in which his character, a grizzled outlaw trapped in the church by two marshals, brandishes his Colt six-shooter. An earlier take of the scene was played on screens for jurors.

Spiro repeated that Baldwin was told the gun was “cold,” meaning it was not loaded.

An FBI report has contradicted part of Baldwin’s story, concluding that the revolver could not have fired without its trigger being pulled. Prosecutors say they will present witnesses, including the gun’s manufacturer, to support that finding.

Harrowing video

However, the FBI testing damaged the weapon and Spiro told jurors that Baldwin was robbed of a chance to disprove the report’s findings, even suggesting the damage was deliberate.

The first witnesses called by prosecutors were police officers who arrived early to the scene of the tragedy. The court saw footage from their lapel cameras, including harrowing video of some of Hutchins’s final moments.

Baldwin watched on with his arms crossed, fidgeting in his seat and occasionally glancing across at the jury. It is not yet known if Baldwin plans to take the stand in his defense.

Legal experts say it would be a risky move, exposing the allegedly temperamental actor to hostile cross-examination.

Spiro has already warned jurors that their feelings about Baldwin’s high-profile career—including his Donald Trump impersonations for “Saturday Night Live”—cannot cloud their judgment. The trial is scheduled to conclude on Friday.