Loose and Boxed Ammunition Found at Scene of Alec Baldwin Shooting

Court papers did not specify what kind of ammunition detectives recovered from a movie set where the actor had fatally shot a cinematographer with a gun he was told did not contain live rounds.



Alec Baldwin was told the gun he was rehearsing with contained no live rounds when it discharged on a movie set, killing the cinematographer. He spoke on the phone outside the Santa Fe County Sherriff’s Office on Thursday after speaking with investigators. Credit...Jim Weber/Santa Fe New Mexican, via Associated Press


By Julia Jacobs and Graham Bowley
Oct. 25, 2021


Detectives found three revolvers, spent casings and ammunition — in boxes, loose and in a fanny pack — when they searched the New Mexico film set where the actor Alec Baldwin fatally shot a cinematographer last week with a gun he had been told did not contain any live rounds, according to an inventory of the items seized that was released on Monday.

The new details emerged four days after Mr. Baldwin shot the cinematographer, Halyna Hutchins, while rehearsing a scene in which he draws a revolver from his holster and points it at the camera, according to an affidavit used to obtain the warrant to search the set. The inventory, filed in Santa Fe County Magistrate Court, did not specify what kind of ammunition was seized, and whether it included regular bullets, blank cartridges or dummies.

Taken together, the guns, ammunition and blood from the scene where the movie “Rust” was being filmed did not answer the central question of how Ms. Hutchins was killed with a gun that was not supposed to contain live ammunition.

Mike Tristano, a veteran professional armorer based in Los Angeles, said the inventory was vague and gave scant information about the type of guns or bullets found. But he did point to the reference to loose ammunition and spent casings as unusual. Typically, ammunition would be kept in a clearly labeled box, he said. “The fact that there is loose ammunition and casings raises questions about the organization of the armory department,” he said.

According to an interview with the movie’s director, Joel Souza, used in an affidavit released on Sunday by the Santa Fe County sheriff’s department, Mr. Baldwin had been sitting in a wooden pew in a set depicting a church, explaining how he would draw the gun, when it suddenly discharged. Mr. Souza told a detective that he remembered Ms. Hutchins grabbing her midsection and starting to stumble backward before noticing that he was bleeding from his shoulder.

Reid Russell, a cameraman who was present at the scene, told a detective he remembered Ms. Hutchins saying that she “couldn’t feel her legs.”

The details, from Detective Joel Cano, provide a chilling account of the fatal shooting on a production set that had been beset by accidental gun discharges and labor disputes between producers and crew members.

What Happened on the Set of “Rust”

What We Know: After the actor Alec Baldwin discharged a gun that was being used as a prop on the set of the movie “Rust,” killing the film’s director of photography and wounding the director, Hollywood was in a state of shock. Here is what we know about the episode.

Remembering the Victim: Friends of Halyna Hutchins, the cinematographer who died in the shooting, described her as a spirited and talented woman who was proud of her Ukrainian heritage.
Safety Measures: Real firearms are routinely used while cameras are rolling.

  Here is how crews minimize the risks and ensure safety.

Other Accidents on Set: Deaths and injuries on movie and television sets have occurred with some regularity over the last decades, this partial list of set accidents shows.

The exact safety protocol that played out before the shooting on Thursday remained unclear. Mr. Souza said in the affidavit that typically, firearms had been checked by the movie’s armorer, Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, then the first assistant director, Dave Halls, before Mr. Halls would hand the weapons to actors. Before the shooting, the affidavit said, Mr. Halls had grabbed the revolver from a cart outside the building that had been prepared by Ms. Gutierrez-Reed — on which three guns sat — and declared it to be a “cold gun,” which on a film set usually refers to an unloaded firearm.

Although the inventory did not stipulate what kind of ammunition was recovered, live bullets are generally forbidden on film sets.

Mr. Halls, an industry veteran who worked on films including “Fargo” and “The Matrix Reloaded,” has been the subject of complaints about safety on previous productions. On Monday, a production company, Rocket Soul Studios, said in a statement that Mr. Halls had been fired from the set of a movie, “Freedom’s Path” in 2019 after a gun unexpectedly discharged, causing a minor injury to a crew member. The statement was reported earlier by CNN.

“Halls was removed from set immediately after the prop gun discharged,” the statement said. Mr. Halls did not immediately respond to a request for comment on that situation.

Mr. Souza said the filming of the scene inside the church that day had been interrupted by a lunch break for the production. Neither Mr. Souza nor Mr. Russell knew whether the revolver had been inspected after the crew returned from the lunch break, according to the affidavit.

The sheriff’s office and the Santa Fe district attorney’s office are planning to hold a news conference on Wednesday to discuss the investigation.

 

Alec Baldwin accidentally shot and killed cinematographer Halyna Hutchins (top right, and together bottom left inset) and wounded writer-director Joel Souza (bottom right) on the set of the upcoming Western movie Rust in Santa Fe, New Mexico, on Thursday while firing a prop gun on set. Baldwin, 63, fatally shot Hutchins when the gun went off, with police saying it fired 'some kind of projectile' - though it is unclear exactly what kind or how it came to be loaded into the weapon. Hutchins, who hails from the Ukraine, was transported by helicopter to the University of New Mexico Hospital in Santa Fe, where she died. Souza, 48, was also injured in the incident and taken by ambulance to Christus St Vincent Regional Medical Center where he remains in unknown condition. Baldwin was taken for questioning by Santa Fe police before being released without charge, though investigations are ongoing. He was pictured looking distraught outside the detectives’ office, bent over double by a curb (center) and then tearfully talking to somebody on the phone (left). Filming of the Western has been halted for an 'undetermined period of time', the production company said, adding that everyone is 'absolutely devastated' by the news.