Following last week’s dismissal of manslaughter charges against actor Alec Baldwin in the shooting death of the cinematographer on the set of the movie Rust, the movie’s armorer, who is currently in prison, is asking for a new trial.
On Tuesday, Hannah Gutierrez-Reed filed an expedited motion for a new trial or dismissal of the charges in the killing of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins. In March, Gutierrez-Reed was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter in Hutchins’ death and sentenced to 18 months in prison.
Based on the evidence in her trial, many observers expected the same result in the trial for Baldwin. But on July 12, Judge Mary Marlowe Sommer dismissed the charges against him, citing the failure of the prosecution to disclose some ammunition as evidence, which it was required to do.
At the time, Judge Sommer said: “The state’s willful withholding of this information was intentional and deliberate. If this conduct does not rise to the level of bad faith, it certainly comes so near to bad faith as to show signs of scorching prejudice.”
The papers filed by Gutierrez-Reed’s attorney cited that nondisclosure of evidence as a reason for their attempt to get the charges dismissed.
“Following the Baldwin trial and the dismissal with prejudice, Ms. Gutierrez-Reed intends to file an expedited motion for new trial or for dismissal for discovery violations and under the court’s inherent power,” the document said.
In the filing, Gutierrez-Reed’s attorneys claimed that “Baldwin’s trial exposes extreme misconduct,” and also stated that “Special Prosecutor Kari Morrissey lies to this court under oath.”
“The intentional withholding of crucial evidence … has compromised the integrity of the entire judicial process,” the motion also stated. “Justice demands that Hannah Gutierrez Reed’s conviction be overturned immediately.”
During the earlier trial, prosecutors placed the blame for the shooting squarely on Gutierrez-Reed.
“Hannah Gutierrez knew that Baldwin was loose. She knew it,” prosecutors told the jury. “She didn’t do anything about it, even though it was her job. It was her job. It is her job to say to an A-list actor, if in fact, that’s what you want to call him, ‘Hey, you can’t behave that way with those firearms.’ That is her job. That is what they pay her for. That is the job that she applied for. That is the job that she accepted.”
Gutierrez-Reed’s attorneys, however, argued that she should not be held responsible for Hutchins’ death for a number of reasons.
“Whoever put the live round on set and then Mr. Baldwin, in the end, going off script and doing what he did,” the attorneys said during the trial. “Those are outside events outside of Ms. Gutierrez-Reed’s control that she didn’t know was going to happen.”
Despite that defense’s argument, it took jurors only three hours to find her guilty of the involuntary manslaughter charges. Judge Sommer later gave her the maximum sentence of 18 months.
Along with seeking a new trial or dismissal of the charges, Gutierrez-Reed’s attorneys are also asking that she be freed from jail while further deliberations in the case proceed.
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