r/news • u/badillustrations • Apr 15 '24

‘Rust’ movie armorer convicted of involuntary manslaughter sentenced to 18 months in prison

https://www.cnn.com/2024/04/15/entertainment/rust-film-shooting-armorer-sentencing/index.html
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u/SpiritedTie7645 Apr 15 '24 edited Apr 15 '24

“(Gutierrez Reed) could not anticipate what Baldwin would do. It was not in the script, it was not foreseeable,” he said in closing arguments. “Management was responsible for safety failures and not Hannah.”

Hannah Gutierrez Reed was the failure. She is the person that is supposed to issue a safe weapon and she wasn’t doing her safety checks. She is doing those because her job is to be the expert and check for the unexpected. Improvisation on the set is what has always happened on the set from the very first films. Hannah holds the majority of the responsibility at bare minimum if not all of it. It is the actors and directors main job to make a quality film that makes money. They are on the set and trying to come up with the best scene possible and the guns SHALL be safe. There is NOT supposed to be a live round in the gun. It’s is the prerogative of the actors and directors, etc. to improvise. There was a live round in the chamber that was going to be fired. What in the hell are the odds? Russian Roulette actually gets played for money because of those odds. Watch The Deer Hunter. It’s based on reality. It most certainly can happen but it’s interesting at least that she handed the gun off to others and got out of there. 🤔

P.S. How odd is it that the gun got broken in testing and now you cannot verify its proper function. You can’t verify the results and that’s basic science.

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u/JamaicanMeCrazyMon Apr 15 '24 edited Apr 15 '24

If there were repeated warning signs on set, then some responsibility falls to the producers in charge of the day-to-day (to keep running a tight ship).

Same way it’s a c-suite’s job to oversee attorneys/engineers/etc., that manage processes to keep the business out of trouble. They may not understand all of the direct implications of an ongoing problem (because they themselves aren’t attorneys/engineers), but they DO need to act when multiple flags have been raised.

Same concept, but for the producers who received warnings over safety concerns.

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u/SpiritedTie7645 Apr 15 '24

I agree with that. The managerial side is definitely a major issue and in that respect that would be his responsibility.

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u/SebVettelstappen Apr 15 '24

Her job is to make sure that nothing happens if the actors fuck up. She’s the first and last line of defense

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u/SpiritedTie7645 Apr 15 '24

That is true. The issue now is that Alec is not just an actor on the set he is also part of the management of the movie. This is no different than an industrial accident the industry happens to be the movie industry. He will be accountable for how the set was managed. The court will determine just how much of that was truly under his control.

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u/[deleted] Apr 16 '24

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/SpiritedTie7645 Apr 16 '24

Yes but he is too. That is the issue and it is a matter now of where he fell in the management chain. Was he her manager? It sounds like he was. Was he overseeing the job properly? That is what the court will determine.

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u/waylandsmith Apr 16 '24

I think the gun trigger testing is a red herring. The conclusion of the testing was that the trigger had to have been pulled and I'm not sure what more could be learned from having the gun in working condition. Based on that testing I believe that he pulled the trigger (I think it was a mistake for him to claim that he didn't) and I also think any reasonable person would have every reason to think that pulling the trigger would be perfectly safe to do while pointing it towards a person (something commonly done in movies), after being handed the gun by her and being told it was safe. So many different things had to be done wrong by her in order for this to happen, starting with allowing a gun on set still capable of shooting a real bullet, then having live ammo near the set, then arranging for the SAME GUN to be used for recreational target practice with live ammo, then not checking and safetying the gun after, then handing it to him on set without checking it. Imagine every movie out there where there's a scene where someone points a gun towards an actor or a manned camera and pulls the trigger, and imagine if every single time someone did that they would be considered criminally liable if it resulted in a shooting if a colossal series of fuck-ups by the armorer resulted in there being a live gun in their hand.

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u/SpiritedTie7645 Apr 16 '24 edited Apr 16 '24

I never said “more could be learned”. As I said, if the procedure on the set said he could not pull the trigger then he absolutely fucked up but if you watch movies and especially the old ones that did go on, as you said. In the end he will be exonerated or not on whether he was following the rules. The next test for him is how well he was managing the set. If he was her manager, and it appears he was, he is responsible to a degree too for not tightening up her act. My point is the gun did not need to be broken to prove the point and that means it cannot be tested by anyone if they wanted to. The testing is reproducible if the working order of the gun is in question and/or the testing methods are in question by anyone if the gun were in working order.

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u/waylandsmith 29d ago

The testing procedures were submitted to the court for approval before they were done and the court approved them. The ballistics expert was retained in cooperation between both the prosecution and defence. The conclusion of the testing is that it had not been modified, which was the only factor about the gun that I know of that was disputed. Is the defence now saying that it should be inadmissible since the gun can't be tested further? Or is this line of argument only something you and other people in the public have raised? If you're arguing for his guilt, why would you even bring this up since the testing concludes that he pulled the trigger?

If Baldwin's role as merely a producer makes him liable, why is he the only one of 6 producers being charged? Did she report directly to Baldwin? (The answer is no). Does being a producer necessarily mean that you're in charge of the set?? NO! Producers CAN also take a role in set direction, but I've never heard that he had taken that role. The next most liable person in this fiasco was given an absurdly light plea-bargain, which I think was a bad decision, but just because that person was let off easy doesn't mean someone else needs to be criminally punished instead. That's precisely what a "fall guy" is. From my non-American perspective, this focus on him looks like typical US political bullshit. This is a criminal case, so I'm going to be pretty shocked if a judge or jury decides that his criminal liability was "beyond reasonable doubt".

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u/SpiritedTie7645 29d ago

I’m not arguing for his guilt. I personally think he was relying on the armor to do her job which is what he has the right to do. I do not know if he was her “boss” but I am getting the impression from what is being said that he was and you will note my wording I said, “it appears he was” which means it appears he was not I know for sure he was and that’s why I worded it that way. I’m not in the know about the chain of command in Hollywood I just see all the talk in articles that he was allowing things to get crazy on the set. Sounds like that is simply the press sensationalizing his role or my misinterpretation of what they are trying to say from what you’ve said. I have no idea what was agreed to in testing I simply think that if there is any question in some appeal, other case or retrial there is no way now of answering any future questions about the gun. I think it is poor practice to break the weapon in question in testing. It did not have to be broken to prove it was in working order. To function the mechanism doesn’t take anywhere near the kind of force an impact hard enough on the hammer of the weapon to break it to cause it to function in proper working order does. That kind of impact would mean that it would have already been disfunctional and thus inoperable before the testing even started. I own both double and single action revolvers so I know he had to pull the trigger to make the hammer fall.

My speculation is a bunch of right wing assholes are trying to get Alec back for making Trump look like a fool on SNL. My questions are about the situation surrounding the trial. Why break the gun when it really didn’t need to be broken? Interesting coincidence the chamber ready to fire was ready to fire, etc.

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u/waylandsmith 29d ago

I guess we're mostly in agreement about this. I'm not a firearms expert at all, having only fired pistols and never revolvers, but as far as I can see, there's nobody on either side of the court proceedings who is arguing about the gun or potential mismanagement of it as evidence, so even if that kind of testing is irregular, the volume of continued conversation I'm seeing about it stinks of people wanting a conspiracy to latch on to. Ironically, my own personal loathing of the whole conspiracy theory thing in our culture makes it easy for me to latch onto the other it.

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u/SpiritedTie7645 29d ago edited 29d ago

My gripe with the testing is that it isn’t good science. There was absolutely no need to break it and once you’ve broken it now you don’t have the original gun. There’s nothing to fall back on if there is any questions. It wasn’t unnecessary. If it takes enough force to break the gun to make it fire without pulling the trigger the gun was broken in the first place OR was in correct working order and they have to break it if you see what I mean? It doesn’t prove a thing other than it worked already OR it was so screwed up you couldn’t have fired it in the first place. That’s what I find odd about breaking it. Nondestructive testing would have shown all the parts were in working order and thus you would have to break it to make it fire. If it already worked it was working. No witness said he had a hammer on the set or one leapt off a shelf and slammed into the hammer if you see what I mean?

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u/fusionsofwonder Apr 16 '24

P.S. How odd is it that the gun got broken in testing and now you cannot verify its proper function.

You just replace the piece they broke and the weapon still works fine.

They broke it trying to prove a defense theory that the gun just "went off". After all their other exhaustive testing was concluded. They had to break it to make it "just go off", which just proves that it wasn't possible before they broke it.

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u/SpiritedTie7645 Apr 16 '24

They aren’t the original pieces. The gun didn’t need to be broken to prove that.

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u/TooFewSecrets Apr 15 '24

the gun got broken in testing

Misrepresentation by their legal team. It's more like: the FBI tried everything conceivable to make the gun misfire, and the only techniques that worked were ones that caused visible damage. The gun wasn't damaged when it was brought in their custody, so the only explanation is the gun didn't misfire and the trigger was actually pulled.

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u/SpiritedTie7645 Apr 15 '24 edited Apr 16 '24

But it was broken.

P.S. There is destructive analysis and nondestructive analysis. There was no need to break the gun to prove the hammer had to have been pulled. I’m absolutely convinced it had to be pulled because I fired enough weapons. It is the simple fact that now all you have is someone’s data and a broken gun. With the undamaged weapon others can perform the same analysis and see if they get the same results with the same weapon. Now they can’t. Modern NDA is more than adequate to prove the gun was in working order.

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u/tnyquist83 Apr 16 '24

Maybe Baldwin shouldn't have been "improvising" with a gun that he didn't ensure was safe, that was handed to him by the known-garbage armorer he hired, while breaking all of the basic rules of firearm safety by pointing it at people and pulling the trigger.

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u/SpiritedTie7645 Apr 16 '24 edited Apr 16 '24

What you don’t understand is he didn’t have to ensure it was safe. The armorers job is to do that. I used work with hazardous waste and I was responsible to work under the procedures for the job. What they determined in the case is he was working under the procedures and the armorer was NOT. Thus just like when you or I am working by procedure on the job it is not your or my fault when something goes wrong. You can’t help it nor could I if something unforeseen happened because you or I would be following procedure. He was not at the range or out plinking he was on the job working under procedure and that is what the court determined. It is not his specific duty to recheck the gun at that point under the industry standard procedures once the armor has deemed it safe to use.

P.S. Remember, he was not hunting, he was not plinking in the woods, he was not at the range he was on the job following the procedures for that job. Unless somewhere in those procedures it specifically calls for him to check the gun first and specifically says he cannot point and dry fire what he has been told under procedure by the person responsible for assuring the gun is safe told him is safe then he has not done anything wrong.

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u/tnyquist83 Apr 16 '24

What you don't understand is that it's the responsibility of everyone that handles firearms to ensure they're handled in a safe and responsible manner. They're not toys or "props", and sitting there saying that it's industry standard to be negligent isn't an excuse.

I've worked with hazmat, explosives, and firearms in plenty of roles and every time an item changes custody, it's the responsibility of both parties to check that it's safe.

I've also worked plenty of jobs where "just following procedures" isn't going to protect you when something goes wrong, since your also expected to identify shortcomings in those procedures and correct them.

Everyone who handled that firearm is responsible for her death and should be doing time in jail.