OA685: The Alec Baldwin Charges

Transcript

This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors — the audio is the record.

0:01:17 Thomas: And welcome to Opening Arguments. This is episode 685. I'm Thomas. That's Andrew Torres. How you doing, sir?

0:01:23 Andrew: Am fantastic, but I'm fantastic for one very special reason today.

0:01:28 Thomas: Because I'm here?

0:01:29 Andrew: I'm fantastic for two very special reasons today.

0:01:32 Thomas: No, that's not a special reason. I am always here.

0:01:35 Andrew: That's a usual reason. The other reason is we have the return of Ace Associate Morgan Stringer for Poplaw. Hey, Morgan!

0:01:37 Thomas: Yeah. Well, what's the other reason? How's it going, Morgan?

0:01:45 Andrew: Woo!

0:01:45 Morgan: I'm back. It's my triumphant return.

0:01:48 Thomas: Long time no see. And it definitely is not the happiest story. But I'm exited because a lot of people have asked about the Alec Baldwin story. And I have to tell the listeners, uh, look, if you want to know how dedicated Andrew is to the law, uh, this news broke, I texted Andrew, I was like, "Oh, uh, Alec Baldwin, you know, we should, we should have Morgan on, we should cover this," and he said, "What, what is that?" I was like, "Okay, haha, yeah, the charges were announced in the, in the gun thing." He's like, "I have no idea what you're talking about." Andrew had not heard of this story, he didn't know anything about it, he's just in there in his document cave, you know, and that's, I guess that's why we listen to the show, he's, he's not paying attention to this, but uh, good thing we have a certain ace associate to cover it, because Andrew was at a loss and

0:02:27 Andrew: I Yeah. I know, I, I literally was like, uh, yeah, it wasn't, there, like, some voicemail he left that was like really mean towards his daughter.

0:02:38 Thomas: I was like, dude, that was 1985, that was, that was so long ago, that daughter is, she's 70, that's how long ago dat was, it is, that's around Ali McBeal time actually, and which, which fits, I think, when did that happen, Morgan?

0:02:53 Andrew: Yeah. Well, Yeah.

0:02:54 Thomas: Do you know, somebody Google, Google that in real time.

0:02:55 Morgan: God, I think in the, in the 80s or 90s.

0:02:58 Thomas: No, I would say it was like 2007 is what I would guess. 2006.

0:03:03 Morgan: Oh, So, yeah, I didn't realize this would have been, I'm trying to think of if it would have been when he was on 30 Rock or not, because, I mean, this is very serious subject matter, but I was, I just couldn't help but think, "They charged me with manslaughter, Lemon!" But

0:03:17 Thomas: Yeah. 2007. Wow, I nailed it. Okay, so that was in 2007, Andrew.

0:03:20 Morgan: Wow, okay. I don't know why I thought that was

0:03:22 Thomas: So if Andrew's like, hmm, what's a recent story? His mind is 15 years in the past. Just so everybody knows. It's going on 16.

0:03:22 Morgan: 90s. It

0:03:29 Andrew: Yep. All

0:03:31 Morgan: It's because I still think like 20 years ago was like 19 Yeah, like that's that's why it never stopped being 2000 for me, all

0:03:34 Thomas: 1980. 1980. Well, no,

0:03:36 Andrew: Right. Okay. Nope, no more Andrew was old jokes while Morgan is on the show.

0:03:44 Thomas: See, the difference is we as a bad mental habit think 20 years ago is 1980. Andrew thinks now is 1980, so that's, you know, that's the difference. All right, but all this levity aside, definitely tragic story. Really unfortunate no matter which way you cut it, But a lot of people really curious. Nobody thought there were going to be actual charges. It seemed maybe to the lay people like an accident. Why don't you give everybody, if someone else is a document troll living in a cave like Andrew, give the basics for everybody. And yeah, give us the typical Morgan Stringer breakdown.

0:03:51 Andrew: Yeah. Well, there's

0:04:18 Morgan: Right, so yeah, Alec Baldwin and Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, they have been charged with mans, involuntary manslaughter, by the first judicial district DA in Santa Fe, New Mexico, so for those who know absolutely nothing about this, this stems from an incident that happened New Mexico, the, yes, in the U.S., this is not a yeah.

0:04:31 Thomas: Sorry, Mexico or New Mexico? Ah, gotcha. Yeah. Yeah, it's

0:04:37 Andrew: A new Mexico now.

0:04:39 Morgan: Andrew's so behind, oh my goodness.

0:04:41 Thomas: Like, God, what else?

0:04:42 Morgan: There's

0:04:42 Thomas: I'm going to catch up on everything.

0:04:44 Morgan: 50 states now too, um, but for those who do not know, um, this stems, yeah, from an incident that happened on October 21st, 2021, at a film set location in a New Mexico ghost town, so that's why New Mexico was involved here, so it was on location for a film called Rust, which is a western movie that's being filmed, and the synopsis is actually kind of eerie once I get into the details, so the plot of this movie basically is, in 1880s Kansas, an aging outlaw, Harland Rust, who is, is played by Alec Baldwin, comes out of hiding to rescue his 13 year old grandson, who is sentenced to hang for murder after an accidental shooting, yeah.

0:04:46 Andrew: Oh,

0:05:26 Thomas: Geez.

0:05:27 Morgan: It's, there's, there're some weird eerie coincidence, I mean, it happens all the time with everything, you can, you know, people go, "Coincidence," to which I'm like, "Yes," but, um, so there's, um, let's talk a little bit about the, um, just so you know who I'm talking about as I go through the story, so Alec Baldwin is the star of a film, he is also a producer, now he is not the only producer and he is not the head producer, so something to keep in mind as I go through

0:05:37 Andrew: Yeah.

0:05:54 Thomas: I don't think any movie in the world has one producer anymore. There's always like 700 producer credits.

0:05:57 Morgan: Exactly. Right. And a lot of the time, you know, producer, sometimes it's even a vanity credit. You know, yeah, so Rust is actually a passion project though of his, and he had long wanted to collaborate with the writer of this film, and the director, his name is Joel Souza, so he's kind of an up -and -coming just sort of, it had, it was low budget, um, it's an kind of indy film, even though it has, you know, Alec Baldwin and some other notable people in it, um, but Alec Baldwin for sure is the biggest star in it, there's also the assistant director, David Halls, and also the, a woman who was serving as armorer and assistant prop master, Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, and the cinematographer is the woman who ended up being killed, she was an, an up-and-coming cinematographer, Halyna Hutchins.

0:06:04 Thomas: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Incredibly sad. That's interesting because I think there was some maybe some initial misinformation about about like, oh, he's also the director of the film and all that. Okay, so he really is, he is a producer, but that doesn't necessarily entail, you know, like full control over everything or anything like that.

0:07:04 Morgan: So, Yes, so it'll depend on the facts as they come out, right? Because it is still, you know, it hasn't gone to trial yet, right, so we don't have, the only information that we really have that I was able to glean from is from, of course, news reports, but those news reports relied on essentially the Santa Fe Sheriff's Department, the DA's office, office, and the lawyers for the people involved. Right, there is some excellent reporting though, LA Times on their own did some incredible reporting. If you want more background on working conditions and everything like that, I highly encourage listeners to go check out the series on this incident that's been done by the LA Times. It's a really great resource. So on October 21st, the day of this incident, cast and crew, they're rehearsing a gunfight scene. It's western. Right. Right. And it takes place in a church. So Sarah Zachry, who's a props master, she retrieved the guns that were needed for the scene from a truck where weapons were stored in a locked safe.

0:07:07 Thomas: Okay. Okay.

0:08:01 Morgan: The ammo was also in that truck, but it was left unsecured on a cart during a break, according to the search warrant. So then the armorer Hannah Gutierrez-Reed is given these weapons and the ammunition. And Alec Baldwin is actually off on a lunch break at this time, but they are preparing for the scene that they're about to rehearse. She places three guns used as props on a cart. One is a plastic gun that cannot shoot any live rounds. It can only shoot blanks. One is a modified gun that cannot fire any type of ammunition. So think, you know, fake plastic gun. And the third was a solid frame .45 Colt revolver replica that was made by the Italian weapons manufacturer Pietta. So this gun is, it's a replica, meaning, um, so it's kind of like a gun that they used in, um, previous decades, right, but the patent has expired on the gun. Yes.

0:08:53 Andrew: So it's meant to look like a Colt 45.

0:08:56 Morgan: It's meant to, but it has, you know, the modern safety mechanisms and things like that. Now, sometimes collectors will take those modern safety organisms off to sort of make it more authentic. That's obviously not recommended by anyone. I don't know any details about, you know, if, if anything about this gun was unusual. I think it was a standard replica, though, and

0:08:56 Andrew: Yeah.

0:09:17 Andrew: And wanted to sidebar and sort of ask a question, because you said the, the plastic gun could only fire blanks, again, consistent with the teasing that I received at the beginning of the segment. I remember in the, in the mid 80s there was an actor named Jon-Erik Hexum, uh, he was in a show called Cover Up, and he put a gun with a blank to his head and killed himself, right? Like because

0:09:35 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it can definitely, blanks can still kill you. Very much so, yeah.

0:09:42 Andrew: Yeah, and is that still the case today? Well,

0:09:46 Morgan: Here's the thing, and I'll go ahead and talk about, I guess, the differences between these ammunitions. So live ammo, so this is what actually ended up happening, right, so this is going to, keep in mind, lamp live ammunition means there is the cartridge case, right, bullet that comes out of the top, gun powder is inside that cartridge, and the primer is on the bottom. And how a gun works is, you know, or you know, and I don't want gun people going after me, this is the basics, calm down, I don't care. When you cock a gun on a, a single-action revolver like this one used.

0:10:12 Thomas: Yeah.

0:10:18 Andrew: That'll definitely calm down the gun people who are listening, sorry. There

0:10:21 Morgan: Yeah, I'm a redneck from Mississippi. Try me. It's, I outrank you. Is lining up the chamber that's holding the cartridge up with the barrel, but the hammer is still being held back by what's called a sear. So it's called a single -action revolver because you pull the trigger. That's a single action that disengages the sear, which allows that hammer to be released. So then in the original Colt .45s from 1873, hammer would directly hit the primer in that cartridge, but in these modern guns, it'll hit a firing pin that will then strike that primer. The primer has a small amount of explosive in it, and that explosive will then ignite the gunpowder that's in the cartridge, creates a hot gas under a lot of pressure, which then forces that bullet out of that casing and down the barrel of the gun. That is how, you know, this mechanism works.

0:10:25 Andrew: There.

0:11:13 Morgan: Now with blanks, and as you said, you know, blanks can be dangerous if been incidents where people have been injured or even killed by blanks. So these are cartridges, but there's no bullet. So you'll still see the flash from the gunpowder that you'll see from the gun, and there's still the big bang, right, because there's gunpowter. But sometimes to keep that gunpow der from just, you know, spilling out everywhere out of that cartridge, sometimes there will be little bits of plastic or wax that plug that cartridge, or you'll actually see that it'll be crimped at the end. It kind of looks like a dimple. So, but blanks can still be dangerous because of that gas shooting out at high velocity. Some of that filler material might come out at a high speed. Also, burned gunpowder can shoot out. So yeah, you still don't want to, you know, mess around with blanks.

0:12:01 Morgan: Now there's a third type of ammunition that is involved in this case, and that's dummy rounds. So these are cartridges that have no gunpowder, no primer, no bullet. So these actually, they kind of look like they are designed to look like live rounds, but they're usually made from plastic, or they'll be a different color. So some of the examples that I've seen have, you know, the bullet is orange, for instance, right, just to indicate, hey, this is a dummy bullet, bullet, not a live bullet. Also, they're completely empty, so armorers have said if you want to test to see if a gun is loaded with dummies or if it is loaded mit live rounds, one of the tools, now this is just one of the tools you can do, is you can kind of jingle it about, and the dummies will actually rattle because they don't have anything in them.

0:12:52 Morgan: But live ammunition has that gunpowder and primer in it, weighing down, so that's not going to rattle, so one of the reasons, um, actually that's a good point on why, why dummies are used at all, um, yeah, it's, it's because if they want a close-up shot of, you know, the hero loading a gun for instance if they and

0:12:58 Andrew: There's

0:13:00 Thomas: Are those just for film purposes to like look like actual rounds? Is Yeah, yeah, it checks how many bullets he has left and that kind of thing.

0:13:18 Morgan: Also they're used to train people to get used to the mechanics of a gun, right, so they're used if people want to practice loading and unloading a gun for rifle drills, things like that. The military uses them for training.

0:13:30 Thomas: There's no chance of a discharge because there's literally nothing in there to discharge.

0:13:32 Andrew: Nothing in it. Yeah.

0:13:34 Morgan: Yeah.

0:13:35 Thomas: Okay, gotcha.

0:13:35 Morgan: Yeah, There's nothing to discharge. It can't fire out. There's no way. There is no gunpowder. There is nothing that ignites. Right. Yeah. So back to, I guess, this is, you know, foreshadowing obviously for what happened here. So the armorer, uh, she places these three guns, right? We have the, um, that third one, which is the one that's important, that's the 45 Colt revolver replica made by Pieta. So according to reports, she does a safety check and Halls—this is David Halls, the assistant director—says in an affidavit later on that he can see three rounds inside the gun, but he does not do a further inspection. And there are then conflicting reports about who handed the gun to Baldwin. It appears perhaps that the assistant director did. If that is true, then that is not what was supposed to happen. It is actually supposed to be the armorer.

0:14:14 Thomas: Yeah,

0:14:26 Andrew: Okay.

0:14:28 Thomas: I mean, it probably goes without saying, but like, this is a major, major thing. Gun safety, like even to the point where, you know, I've done theater productions and we had guns blanks in a show. And there is just so much caution around it. There's so many, there's this, that's why I know the story that Andrew was talking about, they, people tell the same horror stories, one of them is, uh, of Brandon Lee from The Crow. Um, yeah, this is not something that anyone takes lightly whatsoever. Like, this should, the fact that there's even uncertainty on who handed someone a gun, is that already seems wrong to me, right? I mean, shouldn't this be a A hundred percent?

0:15:01 Morgan: Should be 100% the armorer, right? Yeah, so what happens here is, so to the search warrant, and again there's conflicting reports about if this happened or didn't happen, the assistant director yells "cold gun," that means the gun is unloaded, there is nothing in it, which again is weird because if in the affidavit he's saying, "oh, well, I saw that it was chambered," then, you know, I think he shouldn't have yelled cold gun. So

0:15:03 Thomas: Yeah, exactly.

0:15:29 Thomas: Okay, question. That mean nothing in it? Or does that mean it also could be the dummy rounds one?

0:15:34 Morgan: I could not find a clear answer on that, right. Which again is why I think some of the standards need to be updated. Right. But, um, so the gun gets handed to Baldwin, whoever, I don't know why, um, that off to Baldwin, so he could, it's so he can rehearse with the gun, right? The director, the B camera operator, and the cinematographer Halyna Hutchins are behind the camera. Nobody is wearing safety goggles or ear protection, which to me indicates they, they were, they were not expecting it to be filled with blanks, right? Because There's Been some, you know, people saying, oh, it was supposed to be blanks and it was a live bullet, no, it was opposed to be dummy bullets, and that you highly indicated by the fact that none of these people are wearing safety googles or ear production. So

0:15:37 Thomas: Okay. Mm -hmm. Mm -huh.

0:16:16 Thomas: Right. I was going to say, also from my theater experience, blanks, loud as hell. They're not, there's no, they're not the, you know, like the toy, like pop, pop ones. They're the very loud.

0:16:23 Morgan: Yeah. Oh. Oh, yeah, they're just as loud as, yeah, a gun, which is why they use blanks for this. Now, nowadays, a lot of times what'll happen is they'll just use a fake gun the entire time, and they can use CGI and special effects to Produce that flash and that bang, but yeah, so the director, Joel Souza, he is standing directly behind Hutchins, so while those three, they're repositioning the camera because there's a shadow that's in the scene that they're trying to get rid of, and while they're doing that, Baldwin is explaining to the crew how he's going, going to draw the gun. He says, "so I guess I'm going to take this out, pull it, and go bang," and then he removes it from the holster and the gun fires a single time and a bullet comes out, right, not supposed to happen, and it goes towards the three behind that monitor. Baldwin yells, "you know what the clown horning was that," the bullet hits the cinematographer in the chest and then exits out and hits the director Joel Souza in the shoulder.

0:16:34 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah. Jeez.

0:17:22 Morgan: And everybody's kind of in shock, you You know, Alec Baldwin, from the description that I've seen, he just keeps saying, you know, what the F, what the F. And he just kind of like drops the gun in a pew and he just seems to be in shock. Crew is rushing in to stop her bleeding once they realize kind of what's happened. Joel Souza just says, oh, that burns, you know, indicating obviously that he, you know, once called Hutchins is is taken by helicopter to Albuquerque, but she is very sadly pronounced dead. And Souza is taken by ambulance to Santa Fe, but he's discharged the next day.

0:17:24 Andrew: Yeah, huh?

0:17:47 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah.

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0:19:39 Morgan: Is no video of what happened.

0:19:41 Thomas: Not just, you publicly available, but no video at all?

0:19:44 Morgan: That's what I've heard. Unless, you know, they're keeping something, you know, because it, you have an investigation, unless they're keeping that private.

0:19:45 Thomas: Huh. Interesting.

0:19:50 Morgan: I've seen nothing. But yeah, I've actually read that there is incident, so, um, in all the reports that I've seen, when I've tried to find anything on that. But, um, I did want to shout out Nick Connor, Evan Lee, and Ben Young for their help with the gun mechanics and weapons on set here. But, um, there is an investigation that's done, right? Obviously, there's a person dead, we need to figure out what happened. So the Sheriff's Office of Santa Fe County actually finds a mix of dummy rounds, blanks, and live rounds on set, which is shocking. Because live rounds, there is zero reason for live rounds to be on set.

0:19:52 Thomas: Okay. Oh, wow. Right. Right.

0:20:29 Morgan: Zero reason. Actually is quite, it's quite disturbing that a live round even ended up there. And I think that was a question everybody had, you know, when this happened was how, you you know, how was it loaded with a live bullet? But the police also found no evidence that anyone intentionally loaded the gun with live rounds. And there's no evidence of a setup, which that's important for, you know things I'll talk about later, but the FBI also tested the gun and, um, the FBI ballistics lab does not give me access to their reports, which I think is rude, but, um, but yeah, what we had, so what we have, um, from the report is basically what the Sheriff's Office, the DA, and the attorneys are saying about this report.

So the f- what I do know is the FBI tests the gun, and the report says the following: with the hammer in the quarter and half cock positions, the gun could not fire without pulling the trigger, and then they said, with the hammer fully cocked, the gun could not be made to fire without pull of the trigger while the working internal components were intact and functional. You might notice that language is very, you know, like, why would you say as long as it was intact and functionally, don't

0:21:01 Andrew: Yeah. Right.

0:21:22 Thomas: Hmm.

0:21:39 Morgan: They? No, because what happened in the ballistics lab, and I could not believe this detail, the gun breaks. Is an internal fracture that happens. And after that fracture, the the gun fires without the trigger being pulled, but with the gun cocked because Alec Baldwin claims he never pulled the trigger, but it's possible that he did and is just in shock and can't remember.

0:21:45 Thomas: Hmm, huh. Yeah.

0:21:45 Andrew: Oh, yeah.

0:22:04 Morgan: That's also possible. Could be he's not telling the truth. I mean, we don't, you know, but the DA is saying, so Alec Baldwin's lawyer says, well, this shows that, you know, the gun was in bad condition and the DA is saying well, this actually shows the gun was in good functioning order so it's it's going to be, I think, a battle of experts here. And I think what is and what has happened here, what was supposed to happen here also, is the armor or prop master, they're supposed to have a chain of custody of guns anytime those guns are outside of the safe. And the assistant director Halls that I mentioned, he would be the one who who is responsible for deciding when to bring guns on set and whether it will be a hot gun or a cold gun.

0:22:50 Morgan: The gun actually is not supposed to be loaded until the assistant director directs the armorer to load a specific gun. And it appears from, you know, the testimony that the gun was already loaded when it was brought in and that she just did some kind of check and looked at it. And basically what is supposed to happen is the armor is supposed to load the gun and tell and say it's a hot gun, um,

0:23:15 Andrew: Now, when you describe these procedures, are they written down somewhere? Is it, you know, is there like a best practices manual? Is it just sort of common practice? Tell me a little bit more about that. Yeah.

0:23:27 Morgan: Yeah. So it's common practice and, um, I I imagine there's probably manual, training manuals out there, but

0:23:34 Thomas: Well, not only that, there there's are a lot of unions involved in filmmaking, I imagine, as a safety part of part of, you know, being protected at your workplace. I would think that would be part of it. Right.

0:23:38 Andrew: Okay.

0:23:38 Morgan: Yes. That is, and, um, there are reports also that there were, um, safety violations. Again, I I encourage people to read the LA Times. Now, a lot of those safety concerns and people wanting to walk off the set were because of conditions that didn't necessarily involve the guns, but I could see where the prosecutor could definitely use that sort of atmosphere to say, hey, people were not in control here. Um.

0:23:44 Thomas: Right.

0:24:09 Thomas: Now, this pandemic plays into this. Right. Was this am I remembering right that that could be at least part of like the not an excuse, but an explanation for why things were a little lax. Wasn't this during the pandemic? And so filming might have been a little, you know, different than it would have otherwise been or no.

0:24:25 Morgan: See, this was October 2021, so I mean, yes, pandemic is a concern there, but I I think that, you know, a lot of filming had shut down, right? And so I think that could play into it, the fact that a lot of people are out of practice, right, that can't be, you now, ruled out. But what ended up happening is state of New Mexico, sort of their version of OSHA is the best way to think about this agency, they actually fined the set $137,000 afterwards, which is the maximum under state law. But again, a lot of those were were for issues that didn't have anything to do with guns, but there were incidents that did have to do, um, um, so I want to talk a little bit about the armor here. So the armorer is actually the daughter of Thell Reed, who is a longtime Hollywood industry armorer. He was the quick draw trainer on Django Unchained, he was Weapons specialist for Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, he was the armorer for 3:10 to Yuma, um.

0:24:35 Thomas: Yeah.

0:25:25 Thomas: So a nepo

0:25:26 Morgan: Well, This might play, this might play into it, you Know, and that's Been a discussion recently about nepo babies in, you know, the industry, especially the film industry. And I think people mostly think about people who are actors and actresses, right? But I also very much nepo babies behind the scenes too. So she is 24 or 25 years old at the the time of this incident. And again, this is October 2021. So unit production manager Gabrielle Pickle actually said in an internal Slack message, she was working on Rust before the shooting and said, quote, apparently props and armorer require handholding. So there's also crew members have said before the shooting that there were actually three accidental discharges of weapons on set. Yeah.

0:25:26 Thomas: Baby. Yeah, yeah.

0:26:13 Thomas: Oh, wow.

0:26:15 Morgan: That happened before this incident. Baldwin stunt double accidentally fired a blank after being told that a gun was cold, on Two different Occasions. Yes. Well,

0:26:22 Thomas: Oh wow. Is this confirmed? Oh wow, yeah, that's okay. OK, because I was going to say, I mean, resetting a little bit the facts, as you described there, it did seem a little weird to think that Alec Baldwin was would be guilty of manslaughter. If someone says cold gun like, yeah, you can make an argument that maybe he squeezed the trigger. But but I don't know, in my mind, it's like, oh, well, if I've been told cold gun, I just on those facts, what would you be thinking in terms of charges? Charges.

0:26:51 Andrew: I mean, I would be thinking of a declination to prosecute, right? I mean, the core, whenever you have a homicide, right, which you action that resulted in the death of a human being, you then need to gauge both the intent, right, of any potential defendant, and also need to assess their, so, for example, with manslaughter, right?, analog would be negligence at civil law, right.? Like, That is, is there a standard of care, an degree of conduct that you fell below? And in a situation where it like on those facts that you've abided by the appropriate standard of care, you know, it's sort of hard to see where any sort of criminal liability might attach. But I don't want to jump, I don't

0:26:54 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah, no,

0:27:40 Andrew: T want to put the cart before the horse on Morgan.

0:27:40 Thomas: That, yeah. The hypothetical was based on just those presented facts. Just making clear. I was asking Andrew just based on those presented facts. But then when you learn some of this stuff, I imagine that changes the picture.

0:27:42 Andrew: Yep. Yep. Yeah.

0:27:52 Morgan: Yes, and to keep in mind, um, and I'll get into the prosecutor a bit later, she has said that she's charging him based on his actions as an actor but also as a producer. But there was actually a third incident where a, a young woman from props shot herself in the foot with a blank.

0:28:08 Thomas: Oh, wow. What?

0:28:09 Morgan: And there was a third incident that led to an explosion, but that was, or there was fourth incident that lead to an Explosion, but that wasn't with, that was with pyrotechnics. That wasn't worth, but yeah, there's stuff there's again, I encourage everybody to read the LA times, particularly about how the camera crew were treated, but again, they wouldn't have had any effect on, you shooting, I don't think per se, but you know I think the atmosphere very much so. So this actually was Hannah Gutierrez -Reed's second job as lead armor on a set. Her first one was on a film called The Old Way that stars Nicolas Cage.

0:28:14 Thomas: No. And did he kill anyone in this? Like, how did that go?

0:28:46 Morgan: Well, well, here is what people have said. Crew members have come forward and said Gutiererez -Read would do things like carry guns under her armpits, accidentally aim guns at people, walk onto set with live rounds without announcing she had live rounds, which again, those aren't even supposed to be on set. And there are also reports that she fired a gun without warning near cast and crew twice in three days during filming. After the second time, Nicolas Cage actually walked off set and yelled, make an announcement. You just blew my clown horning eardrums out.

0:29:10 Thomas: Wow.

0:29:21 Andrew: Right.

0:29:22 Morgan: However, the prop master of that film has actually been shocked by these reports and said he was surprised by the Rust incident, and a producer of The Old Way said that this incident never happened and the details are being blown out of proportion. But I don't know how it can be both. You know? Yes.

0:29:38 Andrew: Right.

0:29:38 Thomas: Yeah? Yeah. But I think another Another component of the pandemic, you a lot of people in a situation where they haven't been able to work, you and the government cut them a check for however pathetic amount of dollars one time or whatever. And they were not in as good a position to say, to complain, to say I'm not working with this or to make noise. You know, I think that could be an ingredient here. You know, when you have the less power you have as a as a worker, you know, the less security you have, the more often anything, you it abusive or just bad conditions, the More often that can flourish, because you don't want to complain about it, you need the money.

0:30:16 Morgan: And actually, Gutierrez -Reed um, has sort of this defense that she has would be that she had the job of assistant prop master and armor. Usually those are two separate jobs. And they say that she actually did make noise about how this is an unsafe situation. But, and then also, there was a producer who was not Alec Baldwin who emailed Gutierrez -Reed about a week before the shooting happened that where she was saying, hey, you're focusing too much on your job as an armorer, you need to be focusing more on props. And she responded with, well, you know, if I do that, because, you know, it's dangerous, like these guns are dangerous, you know, and that, and mistakes happen if I'm not focused on those dangerous

0:30:26 Andrew: So

0:30:47 Thomas: Oh, boy. Yeah,

0:31:00 Morgan: Weapons. So

0:31:00 Thomas: The glass with the fake ice cubes is probably not going to kill anybody. But you know the guns might.

0:31:04 Andrew: So

0:31:01 Morgan: Yeah. That armor or he, he's an armor but also a, um, master, he's a long time prop master who actually was offered this job of the being prop master, but when he told them, hey, I'm going to need an armor and a prop master assistant, they said they were combining the job into one and he actually ended up turning it down. He said, no, it's necessary that I need two assistants. So this is actually, like, but again, I'm not sure if, and we don't know if Alec Baldwin was in control of those kinds of decisions or if that was a joint effort, or how much responsibility he had there, or what. But yeah, no, he, he, again, he was not the head producer, and we see that the head producer and this producer who emailed, um, the armorer, they have not been charged. So that's that's strange to me. And

0:31:52 Thomas: Hmm. Hmm. Yeah. Well, is it? I mean, like if it's not illegal to be both an armor and a props person, I feel like it's you know, I could see that that seems pretty attenuated to it's just de facto, not possible to do that job to do both those jobs safely. Yeah. It feels hard to me To to, say they would be criminally liable, but what what do you think?

0:32:18 Morgan: And that's that's exactly what this, um, the statute that they have, um, prosecuted them under, it calls for either, either you have committed a crime that is not a felony but that has resulted in the death of somebody, or you have you done a lawful act, but due caution and due circumspeection is the language. And so, what does that mean? That's criminal negligence. So that's criminal negligence. So again, like Thomas, you were saying, it's going to have to rise to not just negligence but criminal negligence, you know, what, what you have done. Is And there have been lawsuits filed, um, the cinematographer, her family has settled the lawsuit, and her husband actually is now the executive, an executive producer of the film now.

0:32:43 Andrew: Is that is action without due caution? So yeah, criminal negligence.

0:33:08 Thomas: They're still going forward with it.

0:33:08 Morgan: Um, they are, her um, I think that her husband wanted the film to go forward because, you know, he wanted to honor his wife's work, but Gutierrez -Reed also has had this very strange angle that she's kind of been working in the media, or that her lawyer has. So in the search warrant, the police say Gutierrez-Reed may have accidentally purchased live ammunition along with dummy bullets from PDQ Arm and Prop LLC. She has filed a lawsuit against that company and the owner, Seth Kenney. And in the lawsuit, she, you know, explains the chaotic set, lack of safety precautions, people being overworked and underpaid. But about the ammunition, she's kind of blasé about it. But then she says that it kind of mysteriously appeared. And she even implies that she was set up, because Kenney and the prop manager resented her, because in her role as armorer, she criticized the prop manger in the prior incidents on set involving the accidental discharges of guns.

0:33:10 Thomas: Wow. Yeah. Yeah. Hmm.

0:34:07 Thomas: Wait,

0:34:08 Morgan: Well, the she was the assistant prop, um, yeah, the assistant to the prop master, yes. Um, so her father, who, as I've said, is a big industry armor, he's really leaned into this and saying that, you know, which I feel bad for this man too, because he said, oh, my daughter absolutely would have done her job right, she would have have checked. So somebody had to have set her up. But even Alec Baldwin's been skeptical and said, like, you know, to set up who, me? Her? That that doesn't make any sense.

0:34:08 Thomas: I thought you said she was the armor and the prop manager. What Oh, OK.

0:34:37 Thomas: Yeah, that doesn't make sense.

0:34:39 Morgan: And that's why the police, the police did that. Um, well, we didn't find anybody had intentionally, you know, um, let this live ammunition. So, um, still think, though, that she can create enough, um, her attorney can create enough reasonable doubt here. And her attorney is a former U.S. attorney, but I mean, so was Alex Jones's Texas lawyer, so, you know, there we go. Well,

0:35:01 Thomas: Interesting. So we're into the prediction phase here. Oh wow.

0:35:04 Morgan: I am not convinced by this, um, by this prosecutor and her reasoning on things, because she, has she doesn't seem concerned with explaining how live rounds got on the set, doesn't seem to believe it matters. And the prosecutor thinks she has him, I think, because she waited on the FBI report that says, oh, this shows he pulled the trigger. But again, as y'all were saying, I don't think that's as relevant as she seems to think it does.

And even if not an actor, you know, you can lay the blame at these other producers, I feel like, enough, and you can spread that blame out. And I don't think this sort of contributory negligence theory is going to be good enough to do, to amount to the criminal negligence aspect that she's going to need to prove beyond a reasonable doubt. Out and she also, she has no narrative, at least that she's revealed, about the ammo, and she's even been dismissive of it in the press. But if I'm a juror, explain that to me. Like, you're going to have holes? Absolutely. But holes are where defense attorneys are going to create reasonable doubt, right, or they're going to come up with an alternative theory that they can really sell there to the jury. Yes.

0:35:55 Thomas: Interesting.

0:36:19 Thomas: Interesting, because my initial reaction, I'm curious, we can all, now we're in opinion time about what might happen. And my initial reaction was still wasn't quite sure it made sense for Alec Baldwin to be charged, but it definitely made sense in my mind for the armor to becharged because it feels like, regardless of whether or not, even if somebody planted ammunition, whatever, like your job is to be the one in charge of the guns and to hand the gun and to use your expertise to feel, you know, verify this is a live round, round this is not a live round. That feels to me like, you know, okay, you can say the one -armed man did it, as I often make the joke, but like, still, why are you not handling, isn't it part of your job to make sure you're signing your name to this, you're you're in charge of guns, you can't be letting another person handle them, you know, isn't that still ultimately your responsibility? And And maybe that, so there's still possibility for criminal negligence there.

0:36:34 Morgan: Yes.

0:37:17 Morgan: But I think that her attorney is going to really try to lay the blame him on the production and say, you know, basically overworked and underpaid, and that it was a pressures of, you know, this job, and you know, I, I think they can, but I do agree, Thomas, that you're, and you're exactly right on this, I think she has a better case against the armor, but she is saying that Alec Baldwin should have checked the gun and not pointed it at anyone, in his role as an actor, which is confusing to me because it's acting, right. And also, yeah.

0:37:29 Thomas: Hmm. What?

0:37:45 Thomas: Yeah. That seems pretty weak.

0:37:47 Morgan: And it's very weak, I think, and Baldwin has even filed a suit against, um, production company for this as well, and it's not clear yet exactly on how much control of a set that Alec Baldwin had, what decisions he was in charge of, again, maybe this prosecutor knows things that, you know, we don't, but, um, it seems to me, just based on the the vibe I was getting, it seems like, you know, since this is a big passion project, it seems more that he's on the creative side and making more creative decisions. But, um, what's also, um, telling is that on that same day that, so this happened just this week where she charged both the armor and Alec Baldwin with involuntary manslaughter, assistant director David Halls, he pleads guilty to negligent use of a deadly weapon.

0:38:15 Thomas: Hmm. Yeah. Oh, okay. I was just going to ask, like, I can't believe the assistant director gets off with nothing and all this. It almost felt like that's the person most responsible. Cause I was also going to add maybe one thing the attorney for the armor could do is make the argument like, Hey, this is a 24 year old, you working in a, you environment where if the assistant director says, give me that, she's not able to say no to that or something. I guess this answers kind of that question of what happened with the assistant director there.

0:38:36 Morgan: Yes. Yes.

0:38:41 Andrew: Yeah. Yeah.

0:39:06 Morgan: And I think that's very telling. And I think that he's done this plea as part of an agreement, you know, testimony. But again, that's something, if I'm a defense attorney, I bring up how it's awfully convenient that, you know, he's getting away pretty much scot -free because his sentence was, um, got suspended sentence and six months of probation. Now, what is going, what also the prosecutor's doing, which I find, um, is she's kind of letting the jury decide decide which part of the involuntary manslaughter statute applies, which, I mean, you can do in the alternative. But as far as like getting into the statutory language, I think this is going to be very difficult, right? And I've said, you know, jury instructions, it's one of the most, you know, it's there's a reason they don't have a jury instruction segment on Law and Order, right. It's not the most riveting thing.

0:39:52 Morgan: But I think that you can really, you know, you could win and lose cases on jury instructions. I think, um, so what she's doing is she's letting them choose basically between involuntary manslaughter that consists of manslaughter committed in the commission of an unlawful act not amounting to a felony, or whether it's in the commission of a lawful act which might produce death in an unlawsful manner or without due caution and circumspection, which, if I'm a juror, I don't know what is the difference. Like, if you're negligently handling a firearm, that is a crime, but then what's the difference between that and then criminal negligence, right? So if it's the criminal negligence that applies, if it, is if it that section, then there is an enhancement because it's with a deadly weapon, which is a five -year mandatory minimum sentence. But if it just the involuntary manslaughter, um, know, negligent handling of a firearm, then that kind of subset, that kind of combines in with the involuntary manslaughter charge and you get the 18 months in prison and five thousand dollar fine.

0:39:58 Andrew: But

0:40:19 Thomas: But

0:40:58 Andrew: Not the enhancement.

0:40:59 Morgan: But Not the enhancement, correct. I

0:41:00 Andrew: Yeah. Okay, that, that makes sense.

0:41:03 Thomas: This any different than when you try to charge second degree, third degree murder or whatever, and you kind of see what lands, or is this different than that?

0:41:12 Morgan: Think I Think she is trying to see what lands here. And I think also, um, this, this district attorney, this is Mary Car, Mary Carmack Altweese. She's in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and she ran for office based on holding those in power accountable, right? So I think this is very much a political move for her as well. But I do want to put to bed this, um, you know, I, I can't come on here without debunking something. This is not a plot by Donald Trump to get back at Alec Baldwin for making fun of him on Saturday Night Live, like

0:41:12 Thomas: Hmm.

0:41:39 Thomas: What? Wow. How, how would that work? Unravel me the yarn on that one, Morgan.

0:41:51 Morgan: I think it's because people are assuming this DA must be, you know, mad because Alec Baldwin's, you know, this big supposed, you know, Hollywood liberal. And so, you know, they're wanting revenge, right? But she's a Democrat, um

0:42:06 Thomas: Yeah. How would Trump be in control of it?

0:42:07 Morgan: Yeah. I, again, it's, yeah, I think some people have lost their minds. I haven't seen this as much as with some, but I have seen that kind of of thread of like, you know, what if, you know, isn't it a coincidence, to which I say yes, um But yeah.

0:42:22 Thomas: What? Is nothing's A coin, what's the coin, there aren't two things to be a coincidence, there's not even an incidence, I don't know what, the that's silly, I don't get it. I

0:42:25 Morgan: Yeah. It absolutely was, but I wanted to go ahead and debunk that, she is a Democrat, but I do think this is kind of a political move on her part, right? I mean, to go after somebody of this caliber and say I'm going to take them on, now If It Ends up, oh, I didn't realize, but I, but you know, if you come for the king, you best not mess. So I, I don't know if this might end up actually backfiring, or she might be hoping that Alec Baldwin pleads To a lesser Charge, yeah.

0:42:44 Thomas: See what you did there. Okay.

0:42:59 Thomas: You You're Rattling off puns and I feel like it's not Not really appropriate for the situation, but okay, you do you.

0:43:06 Morgan: No, I, I feel that, but, um, think that she might b, um, a bit, a bit above her weight here with the Alec Baldwin charge. Now, with the armorer charge, I think maybe she didn't want to be seen as, oh, I'm going to blame this 24 -year -old girl for everything that happened. But again, it's why charge anybody at all? Like maybe, you know, say, I mean, again, there's been civil suits that have been filed. I Think that was the appropriate way to go here. I, again, it's possible that she, you might be holding something that's the key to all this. I know that they subpoenaed Alex Baldwin's phone records. So maybe There's something there. I Again.

0:43:29 Thomas: Yeah. Hmm. Another voicemail.

0:43:44 Morgan: Yeah.

0:43:45 Thomas: Yeah, from daughter.

0:43:46 Andrew: Okay.

0:43:46 Morgan: Maybe it Might be another 20 year old voicemail, we, we don't, but um, yeah, it's just, it's really, really sad and I Think part of this is like, there is this young woman who had her whole life before her and she's gone now, and Somebody And I, I, I understand this feeling that, you know, this happened in my community and somebody has to pay for it. And I think, again, though, I think the proper way through that is civil litigation. I don't know if these, this involuntary manslaughter is going to hold up, especially where you have to prove beyond a reasonable doubt. Right. So it's, a high burden.

0:43:46 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah.

0:44:03 Andrew: Yeah. Yeah.

0:44:26 Thomas: Do you think, Andrew?

0:44:27 Andrew: I'm struggling with that, I thought that was fantastic, and, and obviously I'm, uh, reacting, uh, to, uh, the, the recitation of facts that we got from Morgan, um, in my mind I'm trying to analogize without the gun component, right? And, and so I'm thinking about like, what, what if this was a, you know, a Fast and the Furious movie, right? Someone got run over on the set. You would be asking.

0:44:53 Thomas: -hmm. I didn't think it was a live car.

0:44:56 Andrew: Well, yeah, I think he'd be right. I think she'd be asking like the same level of inquiry. Right, which is, OK, who's responsible for maintaining the safety of the car? Who's responsible voor maintaining the saftey of the folks around it? Right. And again, I guess I'm sort more sympathetic on your end, Thomas, that what I've heard – and I guess easy to dismiss, Baldwin, right? Liberal, so I should be on his side. But – oh, no, no. See, that's why I – yeah.

0:45:24 Morgan: Yeah. Oh. Oh yeah, huge Dick,

0:45:21 Thomas: No, Alec Baldwin is a complete asshole. Fantastic actor, complete asshole, yeah. It's not about sympathy for Alec Baldwin, yeah, okay.

0:45:27 Morgan: Oh.

0:45:27 Andrew: Yeah. No, no. That was a Joke that fell flat, like I thought. Even even among here, like, you know, I think we all know, right? Like, my even my recollection of him was the, you, uh, voicemail thing, um, but no, but the idea that, like, an actor you are required to do things that are counterintuitive and that seem potentially dangerous and you rely on the representations of those around you, of you, X, not things that, you require sort of your ordinary judgment to kick in. I guess I feel a little bit like, you, when we talked about the you that was crammed. And the question was, you know, do you have a responsibility as the rapper on the main, on the, the main stage, you know, to look out so

0:45:55 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah.

0:46:16 Thomas: We're going to open this up again. No, you, that's not your job. So it's silly. Oh, great. Here we go. Why don't we bring up D and D again? Just get all the emails out of the way in one, one go.

0:46:21 Andrew: Yeah, so there way yeah

0:46:26 Morgan: My goodness, no, all the gun people, the Dnd people, everyone's gonna email me, but yeah at opening arguments dot edu edu, but yeah, it's just, it's a really sad story again, I I wish I was coming on for something more fun. I mean, that, I mean, I feel bad for her and her, her family. And I'm hoping they can, you know, find some kind of justice and that there can be, you know, better rules and regulations around this kind of thing so that it doesn't happen again. And I am hoping that they can get answers and,

0:46:28 Thomas: Adnan. Yeah. Yeah, that's Morgan Stringer at doesn't have an email with us. Dot, don't send it. Yeah. Yeah, speaking

0:46:30 Andrew: Well, remember that's Morgan Stringer and yeah, it

0:47:08 Thomas: Of answers, I do feel like Andrew kind of weaseled his way out of giving an answer. What do you think, man? You didn't finish your answer. What's going on? Do you think? Because I think, you opinion of this is kind of a civil thingy. Makes Like, sense to me.

0:47:21 Andrew: Sense, in when you layer sort of the realities of prosecution on top of it, right, which is, uh, whenever you have, you, or nine folks involved in a chain and there's no interest in prosecuting, you, of the rest of that chain, right? So there are, there are two folks who've been indicted, and then, uh, know, a bunch of other folks who, who have kind of contributed to the overall environment, um, standard defense, defense strategy, right, is to point your fingers at the folks who were not charged, right? From a prosecutorial standpoint, and I heard Morgan say that a couple of times, right.

So from a prosecutorial viewpoint, I that is probably a pretty good prediction. Like civil justice standpoint, it's why I raised the question, you're correct that I didn't take a stance on it. Kind you of a question out there of, like, of a wrong was committed here. And the question is, you should know, there be a criminal consequence? And if so, you should it be and to whom should it be allocated? Or, you saying this can all be allocated kind of in the civil system, I think, like can see why, you You know, if you are friends or family of, you then you, that might not feel good enough to you, you know?

0:47:55 Thomas: What's

0:48:39 Andrew: So, yeah.

0:48:39 Morgan: And, I do feel bad and I do wish there was, again, you, if there is something that can be done, then, you kno, that, that you know maybe we don't know about. Because again, Again, prosecutor's not going to tell the media like, oh, here's exactly all the evidence I have. Right. So, you know, it's a possibility that they have something that we just don't know about. But I hope that they're able to get, you Know, some kind of comfort or peace. I'm not sure if her family has, you for these charges. I'm I'm Not sure. I think it's best that, You know, everybody just give them their privacy. Right. That's the victim here.

0:48:52 Andrew: Yeah.

0:48:54 Thomas: Going to happen?

0:49:15 Andrew: Well, that's not going to happen.

0:49:16 Morgan: I know, but I know. But, you know, it's it's still I think that's, you know, going

0:49:22 Thomas: Is this anything, uh, or is this just the watching too many Law and Orders? Is this anything like you charge them with this and then you try to get them to agree to some sort of plea or something? What?

0:49:33 Morgan: I might be a possibility here that they end up getting what Hall's got, right, with the suspended sentence and the probation. But again, it kind of, I mean, if you're the family, you kind of feel like that's, I, if you really think they're criminally responsible, doesn't it feel like a slap on the wrist? You, I, I can see where definitely if a family is, you know, behind this, of course, you know, you kind of want to, you want to support, um, victim and their family, but also there's a reason why we don't let them, you know, what happens in the criminal justice system, right? If this does end up going to trial, I think what we're going to have is it's going to be obviously a very expensive trial. I think that we're going to have a of experts here, right? It's going to be gun experts battling it out with each other. It's going to be people who are familiar with safety procedures on sets.

0:50:24 Morgan: It is going to be armors. It will be eyewitness accounts, which notoriously we all know are pretty terrible, right. It's going to be this FBI report that comes in, but then, you know, figuring out, okay, well, the gun broke, you know, wait, that's, I feel like that alone. I mean, the weapon you So that alone is going to affect you trying to prove your case. Because if, as a defense attorney, what I'm going to do is I'm going to use that to plant some reasonable doubt in people's minds. And, you know, these gaps in the story, where did the live ammunition come from? You How did it even get on set? Jurors, they like a narrative. If I'm a juror and the prosecution just doesn't seem like matters to explain what happened, you have to give me a story.

0:51:10 Morgan: That's how people understand how events take place, is through narrative. And if the defense can either offer a better narrative or point out, hey, the prosecution doesn't have a narrative and doesn't seem interested in these details, they haven't proved their case, right? And it's their burden. So I, like, this is going to be, again, an uphill battle if you do want to see criminal prosecutions take place.

And I feel like, you know, maybe negligent use of a firearm probably would be probably even better to charge the armor with. I think that would be a, you, I don't think, I mean, after this, I mean, I don't know, we've seen nepotism and how Hollywood works and how people, you know, seemingly come back, right? So I, but I seriously would doubt if she would work in the industry again, right? But again, I don't know, I I don't know if that's if that's going to happen. Because, again, it seems her father's fairly influential. But after all, this was such a big deal that happened that I don't see how she could. But again, we've seen people do horrible, horrible things. And I mean, this seems like it was an accident. The coroner ruled it as an accident, but based on all the police reports that the coroner had available, said it was best ruled an accident. But again, that's kind of what involuntary manslaughter is, right? It's an accident, but somebody needs to be held criminally accountable, and medical examiners are not lawyers.

0:52:00 Andrew: Yeah.

0:52:35 Thomas: Right. Well, uh, Morgan, it's next time it'll be a cheerier topic. But thank you, as always, for the expert breakdown.

0:52:42 Morgan: Think it matters. All right. Thank you for having me. And

0:52:44 Thomas: A reminder for everybody to come to the Q &A. That's this Saturday, the 4th. That's at 5 p.m. Pacific, 8 p.m. Eastern on our YouTube. And of course, go ask the questions on patreon.com/law. We're looking forward to seeing you then. And I guess. We'll also, we'll see you for the, the, what's now the Thursday show. Cause I'm going to get the days correct, which might be Liz Thursday. I don't know. We'll see. But that's all from us. Thanks so much for listening. We'll. See you then.

0:53:07 Andrew: Right, guys.

0:53:11 Clip: I move for a bad court thingy. You mean a mistrial? Yeah, that's why you're the judge and I'm the law talking guy.

0:53:45 Clip: www.openargs.com. Be sure to join the Facebook group at facebook.com slash groups slash Yodel Mountain and follow us on Twitter at OpenArgs. This podcast is a production of Opening Arguments Media LLC, all rights reserved. It is produced with the assistance of transcriptionist Heather Leverage, production assistant Ashley Smith, and additional contributions from Morgan Stringer and Debra Smith. Special thanks to Teresa Gomez, who runs our live shows and heads up the OA Wiki, follow at OA Wiki on Twitter. Additional thanks to the moderators of the Opening Arguments Facebook community, Emily Waters, Alicia Cook, Eric Brewer, Natalie Newell, Brian Ziegenhagen, and Teresa. And finally, thanks to Thomas Smith, who edits the show and created the fabulous theme music, which was used with permission.