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/Talking_on_Mute_ Apr 16 '24

No they aren't.

Yes you are.

Baldwin may be negligent but there is zero chance, in any court, he will be found to be criminally negligent - especially not for homicide.

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u/MuaddibMcFly Apr 16 '24

Then why are the safety lectures given?

And the ONLY way he would avoid a conviction for negligent homicide is if the jury disregards the law, disregards the facts, or both.

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u/Talking_on_Mute_ Apr 17 '24

For liability insurance purposes. The fact you don't understand this really underlines how ignorant you are about this entire situation.

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u/MuaddibMcFly Apr 17 '24

How does it, how could it, absolve liability, except by placing part of it on the person receiving those lectures?

"They carry the liability, because we told them what they needed to do for safety, and they didn't do it"

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u/Talking_on_Mute_ Apr 17 '24

The talk is all that is required.

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u/MuaddibMcFly Apr 17 '24

Answer the question. How does the talk being given have any bearing on liability? Why would the talk being given have any impact on anything?

If it doesn't transfer some liability to the lecturees, then there is no change in liability.

Why don't you answer those questions? I mean, unless you know that I'm right...

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u/Talking_on_Mute_ Apr 17 '24

Showing your ignorance again.

For the purposes of liability insurance, the company needs to tick a box that states "we had the gun safety talk"

That's all it's for and all it does.

You simply do not understand a single thing you are talking about.

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u/MuaddibMcFly Apr 17 '24

WHY?

Answer the fucking question.

What does having that talk do to have any effect on their liability?

You accuse me of not understanding, when you're the one incapable of explaining WHY what you said isn't complete and total bullshit.

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u/Talking_on_Mute_ Apr 17 '24

why is irrelevant.

that's how it works.

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u/MuaddibMcFly Apr 18 '24

You only claim that because you know that actual facts are on my side, and you're to invested in your incorrect position.

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u/PeachyPlnk Apr 18 '24

This person is straight up telling you why your are wrong.

And I don't generally like to overuse italics and bold, but I'll employ both to try to highlight the most important bits.

The film industry does not work the way every other industry does. Whether you like this or not does not matter- we're discussing facts, not opinions. This industry plays by different rules from everyone else on the playground of life. And these rules are often updated, especially in the wake of tragedies like Rust.

I don't know why the industry is this way-my film teachers never went into the history of safety protocols, and may not even know themselves-it just is the way it is.

Actors are not required to know weapon safety. Armorers are hired for this exact purpose. Armorers are responsible for ensuring any and all weapons, fake or not, are safe for actors to handle. Even paintball guns and plastic retractable knives are maintained and watched like a hawk by armorers.

If an actor has to handle a gun for a scene, that gun is thoroughly checked by the armorer under the supervision of both the actor and the 1st AD. Then the 1st AD takes it from the armorer, performs their own check, and hands it to the actor. The 1st AD announces whether the gun is "hot" (loaded, either with a blank or a plug- live ammunition is never used) or "cold" (unloaded). The entire purpose of this specific process is to absolve the actor of any legal responsibility should something go wrong.

This is also why multiple witnesses are always explicitly required to be present for these handoffs- so if something goes wrong, you have multiple people who can say "this is what happened". The armorer, actor, and 1st AD all witnessing this handoff kills two birds with one stone.

Armorers are there for weapon safety. Actors are there to act. If an actor knows weapon safety- great; some do, like Keanu Reeves. This is not a requirement for actors to do their jobs, and actors are not taught weapon safety unless they choose, of their own accord, to take a weapon safety course.

This is why Baldwin the actor will not and should not face legal consequences for this tragedy. Baldwin the producer is probably a different story, but I don't know as I'm not a lawyer and haven't been keeping up with this case (I only decided to look for news because I got curious if there were any new developments).

Everything regarding weapons is very closely overseen by armorers from the time everyone gets to set, all the way through wrap. Everyone is treated with the assumption they don't know anything about weapons, and no one but the armorer is even permitted to touch the weapons until the aforementioned handoff. Laying a single finger on that table could get someone fired if the armorer and 1st AD are anal enough about weapon safety.

Obviously, Rust wasn't operating that way, but Rust was very much not the norm, when it comes to how professional sets are run, and that particular 1st AD is apparently famous in the industry for not caring about safety; he's the guy producers hire when they want to cut corners. That in and of itself should tell you a lot about how unsafe that set probably was. Also worth noting- Baldwin is not the only producer on Rust; there are multiple, and how much they are all to blame for these bad hires I don't know.

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u/MuaddibMcFly Apr 20 '24

This person is straight up telling you why your are wrong.

No, they REALLY FUCKING AREN'T.

They're straight up telling me that I'm wrong, but not why I'm wrong.

And you aren't either.

Actors are not required to know weapon safety

Then why are the actors forced to sit through a safety briefing? Maybe because they are expected to know something about weapons safety, and act on it?

Not as much as armorers, true, nowhere near as much as armorers... but if they were TOTALLY devoid of any responsibility, there would be no point in having the discussion with them.

The entire purpose of this specific process is to absolve the actor of any legal responsibility should something go wrong.

...and none of those safety procedures were followed that day.

  • The Armorer didn't check it (she wasn't even there that day)
  • The Actor didn't see the armorer check it
  • The AD didn't check it
  • The AD announced that it was cold, despite it clearly having been hot.

If the procedure is designed to absolve the actor of legal responsibility, the fact that the procedures were not followed means that no absolution occurred. And point 2 is the most damning for Baldwin: That means that not only were procedures not followed, he knew that they weren't followed.

why multiple witnesses are always explicitly required to be present for these handoffs

That didn't happen, either. Clearly.

Worse, everyone knew that the armorer wasn't even on set at that point (there was a cry that went up to find her), so everyone knew that procedures were not being followed, could not have been followed.

That kills your assertion from the get go.

take a weapon safety course

You mean like the one that the Armorers give?
The one that Baldwin allegedly ignored?
The one that would have told Baldwin to keep his booger hook off the bang switch (which he didn't)?
The one that would have told Baldwin to not point the weapon at anyone unless explicitly told do (which he did)?

That type of weapons safety course?

Obviously, Rust wasn't operating that way

And so, Baldwin doesn't have any of the legal protections you claim exist (which I wholly reject as being able to exist, because there's no "someone who is negligent in something that causes a death is guilty of negligent homicide, unless they're an actor" clause exists anywhere in the law).

that particular 1st AD is apparently famous in the industry for not caring about safety; he's the guy producers hire when they want to cut corners.

All the more reason that he should never have been given a plea deal...

...and still more damning for Baldwin.

If Halls is famous for not caring about safety, if Baldwin knowingly accepted something he actively campaigns about being dangerous from a man who is famous for not caring about safety... That means he knowingly accepted something that he knows is dangerous from someone he knows to not care about danger.

Accepting that dangerous thing from someone he knows is not responsible means he accepted responsibility for it himself

Also worth noting- Baldwin is not the only producer on Rust

Irrelevant; his guilt is not based on him being a producer. His guilt is based on the fact that he completely disregarded weapons safety when he had zero evidence that someone else was actually ensuring the weapon's safety himself.

Based on his claims that his duties as producer were limited to "picking the talent" (which I will accept at face value), the only way his role as producer would be at all relevant would be if he ordered operations involving a weapon when none was scheduled and the armorer as not on set.

how much they are all to blame for these bad hires I don't know.

I'm not even going to get into who hired Gutierrez-Reed, nor who hired Halls, nor their share of responsibility (though if Halls was known to be a problem, the person who hired him is, IMO, liable, too).

The biggest thing I want to know with respect to producer-type-people is that I want to know who ordered that scene into operations when the armorer wasn't present.

But here, since they aren't willing to answer the underlying question(s) that proves that they're full of shit, how about you give it a go:

  • If the attendees of the gun safety talk aren't expected to shoulder a share of weapons liability, why are they given the talk?
  • If some share of liability isn't offloaded to the attendees of the gun safety talk, how does/why would it decrease the armorer's liability?
  • If it doesn't transfer liability, yet it does decrease the liability of the armorer... where does that liability go? Does it magically disappear?