The family of the late cinematographer Halyna Hutchins has filed a lawsuit against actor Alec Baldwin and other members of the film Rust, alleging that reckless behavior and cost-cutting led to Hutchins’ wrongful death on set.
Hutchins, a 42-year-old film veteran, was shot and killed on 21 October last year while preparing for a scene at the Bonanza Creek Ranch outside Santa Fe, New Mexico, when a gun held by Baldwin accidentally went off, in an incident that shocked Hollywood and prompted a reckoning over production safety and the use of weapons on set. Baldwin has since said in an emotional interview with ABC News that he believed the gun to be safe and did not pull the trigger.
“Someone is responsible for what happened, and I can’t say who that is, but it’s not me,” Baldwin said.
The bullet from Baldwin’s gun struck Hutchins in the torso and lodged in the shoulder of the director, Joel Souza. Hutchins was airlifted to a hospital in Albuquerque, where she died. She is survived by her husband, Matthew Hutchins, and a nine-year-old son.
The suit also names seven producers as defendants – Ryan Smith, Allen Cheney, Nathan Klingher, Ryan Winterstern, Anjul Nigam, Matthew DelPiano and Emily Salveson – as well as crew members Sarah Zachry, Dave Halls, Hannah Gutierrez Reed, Gabrielle Pickle and Seth Kenney, among others.
“We’re used to people coming in from out of town to play cowboy who don’t know how to use guns,” said Randi McGinn, the estate’s attorney in Albuquerque. “You don’t hand somebody a gun until you give them safety training … No one should ever die with a real gun on a make-believe movie set.”
The Santa Fe sheriff’s office has been investigating the incident, and determined that Gutierrez Reed, the film’s inexperienced 24-year-old armorer and key prop assistant, loaded the Colt .45 with what she believed were dummy rounds, then gave the gun to Halls, the first assistant director. Halls declared “cold gun” before handing the weapon to Baldwin.
Gutierrez has since sued Kenney, who supplied ammunition to the set, alleging that he supplied a mislabeled box of live ammunition. Three other crew members have also filed suit: Mamie Mitchell, the script supervisor; Serge Svetnoy, the gaffer; and Cherlyn Schaefer, the key medic.
In response to the lawsuit, the film’s producers, including Baldwin, say the case should be thrown out because it involves a workplace accident, and thus should go through the state’s worker compensation system.
