Recreated by victim’s family, how Baldwin fired fatal shot
THE family of a cinematographer shot dead by Alec Baldwin on a film set have recreated the incident in a video.
Halyna Hutchins, 42, was killed last October when the gun Baldwin used during a rehearsal for a scene fired a real bullet.
Her family is now suing the actor and the movie’s producers for wrongful death.
To support their case, lawyers have produced a 3D animated recreation of the shooting, which happened during a rehearsal in a church for a western called Rust.
The video shows a computer-generated avatar, representing Baldwin, accepting
the gun from assistant director David Halls, pointing it in the direction of Mrs Hutchins and firing.
The cinematographer then collapses to the ground and clutches her chest in the animation, which also shows the bullet in the chamber was live and not a ‘dummy’.
A lawsuit was filed in the name of Mrs Hutchins’ husband Matthew and their nineyear-old son Andros earlier this week.
In the documents, lawyers claim ‘reckless conduct and costcutting measures’ were to blame for her death on the set of the film, where director Joel Souza was also wounded. Mrs Hutchins was airlifted to a hospital, where she died.
Baldwin, 63, seemed to be relatively unfazed by the lawsuit, sharing a video on Instagram of a sign that read ‘Everything is going to be alright’.
He has maintained that he was pointing the gun at Mrs Hutchins at her instruction and that it went off without him pulling the trigger during the rehearsal at the Bonanza Creek Ranch near Santa Fe, New Mexico.
But the family’s attorney, Brian Panish, claimed that he had turned down training for the kind of gun draw he was attempting when he shot her.
He said industry standards call for a rubber or similar prop gun in that kind of scene.
The civil lawsuit, which is the first directly tied to one of the two people shot, is seeking ‘substantial’ damages, including punitive damages.
In January Baldwin turned over his mobile phone to authorities in his home state of New York. They gathered information from the phone then gave it to investigators in Santa Fe County. The investigators have said it is too soon to decide whether anyone will be charged, but Baldwin has said he does not believe he will face criminal charges.
The film’s script supervisor and its lead camera operator, both of whom were standing a few feet away when Mrs Hutchins was shot, have each filed a lawsuit over the trauma they went through.
And the film’s armourer, Hannah Gutierrez Reed, filed a lawsuit saying an ammunition supplier created dangerous conditions by including live rounds in a box that was supposed to include only dummy rounds.
In December, Baldwin said he felt incredible sadness over the shooting – but not guilt. ‘Someone is responsible for what happened, and I can’t say who that is, but it’s not me,’ he said. ‘I didn’t pull the trigger.’
‘Costcutting measures’