By Andrew Dalton, AP
Alec Baldwin said he feels incredible sadness and regret over the shooting that killed a cinematographer on a New Mexico film set, but not guilt.
“Someone is responsible for what happened, and I can’t say who that is, but it’s not me,” Baldwin said in an ABC interview with George Stephanopoulos that aired Thursday night, the first time the actor has spoken in depth on screen about the Oct. 21 shooting on the set of the Western “Rust.” “Honest to god, if I felt I was responsible, I might have killed myself.”
Baldwin said it is essential for investigators to find out who put the bullet in the gun he fired, that was supposed to be empty, that killed cinematographer Halyna Hutchins and injured director Joel Souza.
“There’s only one question to be resolved, and that’s where did the live round come from?” Baldwin said.
Baldwin said in a clip from the interview released a day earlier that “I didn’t pull the trigger. I would never point a gun at anyone and pull the trigger at them. Never.”
He said it was Hutchins herself who asked him to point the gun just off camera and toward her armpit before it went off.
Baldwin said at Hutchins’ direction he pulled the hammer back.
“I let go of the hammer and ‘bang’ the gun goes off,” he said.
.@GStephanopoulos: “Do you feel guilt?”
Alec Baldwin: “No. Someone is responsible for what happened and I can’t say who that is, but I know it’s not me.”
READ MORE: https://t.co/zYugqKhIVW #BaldwinABC pic.twitter.com/97F9wOYYTT
— ABC News (@ABC) December 3, 2021
When Stephanopoulos told Baldwin that many say you should never point a gun directly at someone on a set, he responded, “unless the person is the cinematographer who was directing me where to point the gun for her camera angle.”
Baldwin said it was 45 minutes to an hour before he began to understand that a live round had been in the gun, and didn’t know it for sure until he was being interviewed hours later. He thought Hutchins might have been hurt by a blank at close range or had a heart attack.
“The idea that somebody put a live bullet in the gun was not even in reality.”
He had one of several tearful moments when he described Hutchins, saying she was “somebody who was loved by everybody and admired by everybody who worked with her.”
Baldwin said he was doing the interview to counter public misconceptions about the shooting and to make it clear that “I would go to any lengths to undo what happened.”
But Baldwin said “I want to make sure that I don’t come across like I’m the victim because we have two victims here.”
Investigators have described “some complacency” in how weapons were handled on the “Rust” set. They have said it is too soon to determine whether charges will be filed, amid independent civil lawsuits concerning liability in the fatal shooting.
Baldwin said he met with the film’s armorer Hanna Gutierrez Reed for a gun training session before the shoot, and she appeared capable and responsible.
“I assumed because she was there and she was hired that she was up to the job,” he said.
Gutierrez Reed has been the subject of much of the scrutiny in the case. Her attorney has said she did not put the round in the gun, and believes she was the victim of sabotage. Authorities say they’ve found no evidence of that.
Baldwin, who was also a producer on the film, said there was no indication to him that crew members were unhappy with safety conditions on the set, though some resigned over the issue.
“I never heard one word about that, none,” Baldwin said.
Baldwin said complaints about cost-cutting on the film have been misguided.
“Everybody who makes movies has the responsibility not to be reckless and careless with the money that you’re given,” he said.
Asked by Stephanopoulos whether the cost-cutting compromised safety, Baldwin said “In my opinion no.”
“I personally did not observe any safety or security issues at all in the time I was there,” he said.
Baldwin said he does not believe he will be criminally charged in the shooting.
“I’ve spoken to the sheriff’s department multiple times,” he said. I don’t have anything to hide.”
He said the incident left him emotionally ravaged.
“I have dreams about this constantly,” he said, ” wake up constantly where guns are going off. These images have come into my mind and kept me awake at night and I haven’t slept for weeks and I’ve really been struggling physically.”
Asked by Stephanopoulos if his career is over, Baldwin said, “It could be.”
He said his next production still wants him, “but I said to myself, ‘do I want to work much more after this?’”
“There’s only one question to be resolved, and that’s where did the live round come from?” Baldwin said.
There’s two questions. According to Baldwin, he didn’t pull the trigger. So, the second question is, how did the gun fire all by itself??
What a low-life scum sucking turd. In Roman times, actors were considered little better than prostitutes. It was considered scandalous for decent people to even be seen with one. The Romans were wiser than us.
So, class, let’s recap…
Mr. Baldwin accepted possession of a gun.
Mr. Baldwin accepted possession of a gun from an unauthorized person who wasn’t supposed to be touching it in the first place.
Mr. Baldwin did not perform a weapons check of the gun to confirm its condition. VIOLATION OF RULE #1
Mr. Baldwin pointed the gun in the direction of other persons on the set. VIOLATION OF RULE #2
Mr. Baldwin stated he pulled back the hammer. The gun in question was a hammer-fired gun. Whether the hammer was fully cocked or only partially pulled, this action placed the gun into a condition in which a negligent discharge would then be possible. On a single-action revolver, releasing the hammer via a slip from the thumb would allow the hammer to fall forward to strike the firing detent. This is similar to placing your finger on the trigger. VIOLATION OF RULE #3
Mr. Baldwin now states that he was not responsible for the gun subsequently discharging, which resulted in the death of one person located in the line of fire of the gun, and the wounding of another.
****
Liberal logic. It is never your fault. It is always someone or something else’s.
HAZ. Absolutely nailed it. I was waiting for Baldwin to pull a reptilian wiggle or two to avoid responsibility, and here it is. What an absolute bastard.
Halyna Hutchins shot to death.
Alec Baldwin hardest hit.
That’s a great summary.
i/ r to #3, gov brings up transfer bars below.
Yes, but I myself have a revolver (older model), and have personally experienced “hammer slip” while attempting to fire all six rounds quickly. I’m not familiar with the particular gun Baldwin had that day, but I know slips happen.
The other possibility is that he put his finger on the trigger before he cocked the hammer. Since the hammer was already back, the hammer went forward when he released it. Technically, he wouldn’t have moved the trigger back, but he fired the gun. The other possibility is his lack of care with the gun led him to have his finger inside the trigger guard without intending to fire, and he wasn’t conscious of the pressure applied to the single action trigger (negligent discharge).
A “hammer slip” is virtually impossible on a “four click” SAA. The weapon will not drop the hammer until you pull the hammer ALL THE WAY BACK, four clicks.
Baldwin is an idiot.
There’s a caveat to that.
The design of a traditional Colt SAA includes a sharp, tempered, fragile, hardened trigger nose for a sear. That sear must properly engage and lock into three notches on the breast of the hammer: A ‘loading’ or ‘safety’ notch, a ‘half-cock’ notch, and a ‘full-cock’ notch.
Those ‘four clicks’ are, in order, first the trigger-nose sear entering the ‘safety’ or ‘loading’ notch. Two is the half-cock notch. Three is the bolt popping up against the cylinder preparing to engage a slot. Four is the full-cock notch engagement coupled with the bolt fully entering a cylinder slot.
With that understood, part of this elderly but elegant design is that a ‘cam’ effect is formed by the curved breast of the hammer, one that is intended to guide the trigger point or ‘sear’, which is under pressure from the trigger return spring, into the ‘safety,’ or ‘loading’ notch, should the hammer slip during cocking or uncocking.
The problem with this is that there is no guarantee that the trigger nose won’t simply bypass the ‘safety’ notch and allow the hammer to fall onto a primer. The shallow, sharp, hardened notches on the hammer breast may not capture the trigger ‘sear.’ A broken or chipped hammer notch may no longer be able to capture and hold the ‘sear.’ A chipped or broken trigger-nose ‘sear’ may not be able to retain its position in a hammer notch. A weak, damaged, or broken trigger return spring (notoriously weak and fragile on originals and exact replicas that do not have a coil-type spring) may not keep the trigger properly engaged on the hammer-breast ‘cam surface’ and will allow the hammer to bypass the vital ‘safety notch’/trigger interface completely if control of the hammer is lost during cocking or uncocking.
Therefore, it IS possible for this simple, primitive system to fail internally, and randomly, without warning.
Bear in mind also that, during full decocking, the trigger must be pulled and either held back, or released and pressed in stages as the sear engages the half-cock and safety notches in turn, requiring some careful coordination of trigger finger and thumb; If one allows the hammer to fall too quickly with the trigger held back to stop it from snagging the half-cock or safety notch, or it falls out of control and hits a primer, the gun fires, as it is designed to do.
‘Hammer slips,’ therefore ARE possible with a four-click original-design Colt 1873, and are actually common. The hammer WILL fall if the hammer is released at any time during its cycle while the trigger is pulled, or with a broken or damaged component of the trigger or hammer.
Operation of a vintage firearm is FAR more complicated a thing than most people understand, not because it’s difficult to fire them, but instead because it’s difficult to keep them from firing when it isn’t desired, and a mistake is made.
On the other hand, Baldwin IS an idiot, and NONE of the failings of the type of gun has any bearing on whether or not he is responsible for a death.
Gun safety isn’t isn’t something you can delegate to someone else. And he wasn’t just an actor, he was the Executive Producer. The AD and the armorer had multiple screwups, and they were all his subordinates. He’s the boss. He’s a grownup. He’s responsible.
He just doesn’t get it. No matter what he does for the rest of his life, the third paragraph of his obituary will always read: “In 2021, Baldwin shot two people, killing a mother of two, on the set of Rust. . .”
He’s a coward for not stepping up, to hell with the lawyers or his liability.
“In Roman times, actors were considered little better than prostitutes.” For the most part, some things never change.
That was FEMALE actors, and it continued through Victorian times. The analogy, however, is accurate. Today we might equate ‘actors’ with ‘politicians’ instead. The comparison is equally insulting, is it not? Both are polished liars merely playing the part of someone that they are not, for money.
Baldwin admitted to pulling the hammer rearward, possibly not to full cock. Releasing an early original design single action hammer could result in the hammer falling, striking primer and firing round. That’s why they were actually “five shooters”…..rather than “six shooters”….. as the hammer always rested on an empty chamber. He obviously doesn’t understand the firearm he was handling…..as well as the Four Rules of Safe Firearms handling:
1 – Always treat very firearm as loaded……assumption “live rounds.” DUH!!!
2 – Never point a firearm at anything you are not willing to destroy.
3 – Never put your finger on the trigger until the sights are aligned on your intended target.
4 – Be sure of the background beyond your intended target.
A fifth rule should be added…..You are responsible for each round sent downrange, whether intentional or unintentional, until it comes to rest safely.
Four strikes……or five……and Baldwin goes to jail.
What’s curious is as the hammer is partially cocked it indexes the cylinder, which should rotate the chamber out of line with the firing pin- making a primer strike impossible.
And if the chamber was “slightly” out of alignment and the firing pin still struck the primer- you’d most certainly know it when the bullet strikes the forcing cone and either shaves the bullet or shatters it.
It is simple. He failed at all firearms safety rules.
A bad actor with bad lines!
… and this years Academy Award for best actor in a Fictional Biography is… Alec Baldface. Accepting the award on his behalf due to his incarceration is Elle Woods, played by Ms. Reese Witherspoon, whom you may recall from the classic Legally Blond series….
He pointed the gun. It was in his hand when it went off…
He did not check to see if the gun was loaded with blanks.
Ultimate responsibility falls on the person holding the firearm. He displayed carelessness bordering on wrecklessness.
I must have said that a hundred times now to people in the film industry, and they say two contradictory things: that the use of a firearm on a movie set is safer than at any shooting range, and that the actor has no responsibility for making sure anything handed to him is safe — that’s the armorer’s job.
Interestingly, according to a Canadian in the film industry up there, the actor is required to observe as the armorer clears and shows what if anything is in the gun, after the armorer has verified with a “script manager” what is supposed to be in the gun for that scene. So even though the actor himself isn’t responsible for making sure the gun is safe he is responsible for observing that someone else demonstrated it was safe and verifying that he observed it done correctly — apparently Canadians are more careful than Hollywood!
Somehow I can’t get it through to anyone associated with Hollywood that whoever handles a potentially dangerous item is responsible for what happens with that item.
I am a semi-auto pistol kind of person and I have questions; What would happen if I pull the hammer of a revolver halfway back and let it go? If the result of this action universal among all revolvers or are there variations among different makes/designs of revolvers? Any variations depending how far back I move the hammer before I let go (and before it locks back)?
I’m guessing he had his finger on the trigger when he cocked the hammer and it “went off.” Single action revolvers can be fanned, so it could be the same mechanical principle behind this “accident.”
Colt single actions and true replicas will lock at half cock but short of that if the hammer drops it would likely fire the round. Modern revolvers have either a transfer bar or firing pin block safety that requires the trigger to be pulled back for the firing pin to strike the primer.
Exactly, that’s why the hammer always rested over an empty chamber on the early designs.
“Colt single actions and true replicas will lock at half cock but short of that if the hammer drops it would likely fire the round.”
Forget the source (found it quick), the explanation is plainly illustrated.
i wanna think this was a single action in which case your query isn’t applicable.
in the case of a double action, i could see a discharge from a snap released three quarter pull back…
gov, good point on the transfer bar.
i sorta wish my s’bhawk hadn’t been converted.
They’re worth more if they’re not but if it’s a weapon you actually use I’d want the transfer bar.
well, the original parts are seal a mealed in the returned yellow box.
the white box it was shipped back in is worth more than the gun?
This explains it better and avoids me typing something incorrectly:
https://thereload.com/analysis-yes-alec-baldwins-gun-could-have-fired-without-him-pulling-the-trigger/
Another thing to keep in mind is that cocking the hammer is what rotates the cylinder, and the only time a round is directly under the firing pin is when the hammer is in the fully-down position (uncocked/at rest) or when it is near/at the fully-cocked position- anywhere in between a chamber is not aligned with the firing pin (unless the timing of the cylinder is off).
A half-cock notch is a safety device designed to “catch” a hammer that is “dropped” before it has reached the fully-cocked position. A Transfer Bar system is a device designed to keep the hammer from contacting the firing pin at any time other than the when the fully-cocked hammer has been released by the the action of the trigger.
Cylinder timing is extremely important because the only safe way to discharge a cartridge is when a chamber is properly aligned with the forcing cone/barrel at the front and the firing pin at the back- if it is not it can cause catastrophic failure of the firearm.
In short- the possibility of a single action revolver “going off” without the hammer being fully cocked and the trigger being activated is extremely unlikely. The half-cock notch prevents “accidental” hammer drops, and transfer bar systems prevent “unintentional” firing pin strikes. It would take an exceptionally rare combination of failures to make a single action revolver “go off” outside of intentional actions of the operator.
Two small points, but otherwise you’re golden.
An original SAA, or an exact clone such as an early Pietta or Uberti, has no transfer bar.
‘Unlikely’ is not ‘impossible.’ Old firing mechanisms are failure-prone, primitive, extremely simple devices, and inherently ‘unsafe’ by modern standards.
It is VERY true, on the other hand, that without the input of a human hand, no gun is going to ‘go off’ by itself. One way or another, a human operator is necessary to set up the conditions that enable a gun to fire.
From the link supplied by No_Ones_Home:
“Perhaps Baldwin is making some kind of semantic argument about pulling a trigger rather than keeping it depressed while cocking the hammer, but that’s a distinction without a difference.”
Baldwin is saying he did not pull the trigger when the gun fired which doesn’t mean he didn’t have the trigger depressed. If so, then he is making a word play between depressed and pulled.
Good observation. Bear in mind that a man who lies for a living soon develops a fine grasp on semantics and how to nuance meaning with proper word selection.
He’d make an excellent politician, would he not?
absent direct evidence of someone deliberately placing a live round in the gun…[and there is none, so far]..direct responsibility for what happened rests solely with him…
“Bear in mind that a man who lies for a living soon develops a fine grasp on semantics and how to nuance meaning with proper word selection.”
What may well hang his ass are all the ‘interviews’ he made following the homicide. Some tasty nuggets to be played over and over in front of a jury… 🙂
An excellent question(s) that I have as well.
(I am now going to demonstrate that internet phenomena of “I am an expert” and therefore what follows is the revealed word and may be taken as gospel.)
My credentials are as follows: I am old and own a lot of guns and stuff.
As for the “hammer slippage” issue:
We are assuming the for the sake of discussion that some sort of Western looking single action “six shooter” was the “prop” gun. I have read that there was a box/crate/receptacle outside by the entrance of the set/building that they were in containing a rubber gun, a plastic gun, and the “real” blank firing gun.
Wherever the “live” “real” ammo came from and how it got in the “real” blank firing gun will be revealed hopefully. This question focuses on a couple of questions.
What exactly was the “real” blank firing gun? and what exactly was the round that went off?
They recovered the projectile from the shoulder of the injured director after it had traversed the cinema photographer woman. Presumable they can determine the origin/manufacture of the round.
Which brings us to the firearm. Was it a Ruger Vaquero with a transfer bar safety or a old Colt with none. ( The old West tradition of leaving your gun’s hammer down on an empty cylinder with maybe enough paper money to bury you curled up inside was born out of experience with Samuel Colt’s mechanical invention.)
If you let the hammer slip on the old style and the half-cock notch didn’t catch it then gun go “Boom”.
“Wherever the “live” “real” ammo came from and how it got in the “real” blank firing gun will be revealed hopefully.”
There are reports *several* live rounds were found in Baldwin’s gun belt…
Thanks for the responses. Let’s just hope Baldwin never gets to produce or direct a John Wick movie or else nobody behind the camera (or anywhere else) will survive the first scene. Not even the coffee guy.
Don’t worry Alec, there’s plenty of stupid to go around here. You’re stupid, the armorer is stupid, the cinematographer was stupid, but you’re the only one who’s supposed to be stupid. You’re just a dumb actor. Oh but the producer is stupid so I guess you’re doubly stupid.
“I personally did not observe any safety or security issues at all in the time I was there,”
i’ll bet she feels safe and secure.
no matter what vocation you end up in including permanent dole, your community needs to teach you safe firearm handling.
puffy faced alky’s yahooing around included. this clown’s priv lidge is responsible here, exacerbated by lax protocols.
” this clown’s priv lidge is responsible here, exacerbated by lax protocols.”
Add a healthy dose of arrogance to the mix. He knows *everything* about guns, just ask him.
I’ll be a bit pissed if he doesn’t get the full ride. Still, 18 months in the state penn will be a wonderful opportunity to expand his horizons.
(To say nothing about the expanded anus he will personally experience… 😉 )
“If your protocol is you checking the gun every time, well, good for you”
This dismissive “not my fault” attitude about how to handle a gun is unacceptable. The fundamentals of gun safety do not change for movie stars, or for anyone else. I do not doubt that others have responsibility for this tragic death, of course there is that too. But the gun was in Baldwin’s hand. The person with the gun in their hand has the responsibility for what happens with it. For good or for ill, a gun in your hand is your responsibility.
Checking the loaded condition of the gun in your hand is not a matter of personal preference. Not for me, or anyone and certainly not for this former movie star. You pick up a gun or are handed one, you assume it is loaded or you check to be certain it is not. No exceptions, not ever, it is not a matter of personal choice.
One other thing, some are calling the gun he fired an “antique”, as if it failed somehow due to age or design. Very unlikely, antiques are too expensive for industrial movie making. Modern reproductions are used in movies and often in recreational Cowboy Action Shooting events. Modern metallurgy, not 19th century metallurgy. The Sheriff office briefing called the gun a “Pietta”. That’s an Italian gunmaker. They make many modern reproductions of 19th century guns. Their standard manual is here, have a look at page 28-29:
http://www.pietta.us/pdf/Manuale_Retrocarica_ITA_ENG.pdf
I have to wonder if any camera caught the moment the gun was fired. If one did, was Baldwin’s trigger finger visible, that’s my big question. Or if any witness was there for his cocking and releasing the hammer.
Reason is simple. In any gun with an external hammer if you cock it manually and let go of the hammer, while holding the trigger back, the gun goes bang. Does not matter if it 150 years old or newly made today.
A gun is a machine, a mechanism. It has no attitude, no point of view, no volition of its own. It does what the person holding it does. No different from a windup alarm clock or chattering gag teeth. A human must wind the clock or it stops ticking. A human must wind the chattering gag teeth or they cease making that annoying racket.
And the human hand controls that gun.
Unless of course, you are a movie star in need of an excuse why it wasn’t your fault.
Allegedly.
Fast forward to minute 5:00 in the link below:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ldHPNnsp-cs
Alec Baldwin admitted to pulling the hammer back and releasing it:
“Baldwin said at Hutchins’ direction he pulled the hammer back.
“I let go of the hammer and ‘bang’ the gun goes off,” he said.”
No matter the fault, a very sad event, indeed.
“He thought Hutchins might have been hurt by a blank at close range or had a heart attack.”
Yeah, a heart attack. Sure thing, Alec *eyeroll*
@The Rookie
It’s entirely possible. I asked one of my hunting buddies (a gen-u-ine elk huntin’ General Practitioner MD) about this. He confirmed that the sudden, rapid introduction of a 0.454″ chunk of lead into a human chest can, and probably will, result in a heart stoppage…
Ha! Point taken 🙂
Additionally…
It is telling that Baldwin claims he thought he fired a “blank” which might have given his victim a heart attack- he would absolutely feel the difference between discharging a blank cartridge and a loaded .45 Colt cartridge. It doesn’t take an experienced shooter to discern the difference in recoil- in fact, it would be much more apparent to a novice shooter (or a self-proclaimed gun-hater who wants nothing to do with “real” guns).
I know that Alec Baldwin hates the NRA.
He could definitely have benefited from an MRA approved safety course
“There’s only one question to be resolved, and that’s where did the live round come from?”
LoL 🤣
Not according to the sheriff who is expressing doubt about your claim of not pulling the trigger.
You were just as responsible as anyone else who touched that gun in the process of handing it to you, even more so because the act that resulted in the gun firing was yours and yours alone by your hand. If someone handed me a gun and said “its ok, its not loaded” and I pulled the trigger and killed or wounded someone I would have already been charged with, at a minimum, manslaughter.
Although there have been a few cases over the many years were a gun did fire, supposedly, “by its self” it was always the result of a persons interaction with it in some way, handling it or loading/unloading it or even holstering or drawing it or carrying it, etc… .
You will not find a single case of any gun firing “by its self” where prior to firing “by its self” it was not handled in some way by a human being.
You can not have a gun in your hand and it fire and then act like “whoopsie! I was not involved. It was someone else, not me.”
The particular gun Baldwin fired is an ‘F.LLI Pietta Long Colt 45 Revolver’ – the Baldwin gun is not a replica or “clone”, it is the genuine article. It can only fire if the hammer is cocked and the trigger pulled. It does not fire because the hammer happens to be “on a live round”, this original real gun has a hammer block. The Saturday before Baldwin fired the gun a stunt double was practicing with the same gun and fired two live rounds with it and said he pulled the trigger but it was called a “misfire” because of the stupid application of the term being applied to an actual normal act of firing the gun by cocking it and pulling the trigger. Several members of the crew had been firing the gun off set with live ammo and they did not report any “misfires”.
It’s very likely this gun was was in proper working order. Even if something was wrong with the trigger the hammer would still need to be cocked to fire the gun. But whats telling is that this gun has to have the cylinder rotated to place a round under the hammer and the trigger can not be pulled until the cylinder finishes its rotation and the cylinder rotation only happens when the hammer is cocked. The cylinder can be hand rotated at 1/4 cock used for loading but it requires the trigger to be depressed, ho0wever, the trigger block is not out of the way until its at full cock.
This is a pic of what one looks like;
https://i1.wp.com/valorguardians.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/C56AC086-9ED4-4DDB-8ED6-73CDB86809A0.jpeg?resize=500%2C252&ssl=1
“Someone is responsible for what happened, and I can’t say who that is, but it’s not me,”
Wow! What a bunch of self-deluded horsecrap.
If he successfully skates prosecution / conviction based on this paper-thin rationale, I can foresee future murderers resorting to the “Baldwin Defense” in their public statements and trials….” ‘the deceased told me to point at them and shoot’ so I did, your Honor…what’s the problem here? I’m not responsible for their death.”
Alec “lady killer” Baldwin was the producer of this Rust flick. The bullet er buck stops with him. Period. I dunno what replica old west 6 shooter he killed with. Doesn’t matter. All those temper tantrums they’ve got of him doesn’t help his lyin’ azz…
Yada, yada, yada. Once the gun was in your hands bozo baldwin it is a part of you. The director telling you where to point it, cock it and all of that is irrelevant. Your failure to verify the weapon totally safe caused an irreversible accident. The stakes were very high once the gun is in your hands and by all accounts those stakes at that point in time were the furthest things from your mind.
I’m going to expose myself in this comment and it is only food for thought as I’m at present still questioning not opinioning.
25 years ago I was moose hunting near Wasilla Alaska. I saw a moose along the small ridge near the road I stopped got my rifle worked the bolt and sighted in on the animal, I determined it to be not shootable I put the safety on handed the rifle to one of the other folks in the party he (holding it by the forgrip) put it down on the hump in the second set of seats.
When the butt touched the hump the gun went off and put a 30 calibre hole exactly where I would put a CB antenna if I so inclined.
Also as the gun was “supposed” to appear loaded the bullet was there for appearance only, so on inspection by Mr. Baldwin it could be “OK here is the fake bullet and it appears to be operational” .
What goes on after that is under scrutiny.
BTW My incident was my fault to trust a safety that turned out was a flaw covered by Remington as it was a model 721 that had this issue on a recall and repair.
No injuries except fast hearts and painful ears for a bit.
We’ve had anti freedom trolls here that insist that any accident, yours included, would be enough to ban you from gun ownership for life.
Fascists are absolute like that.
Damn, JWM.
We were getting worried something might have happened to you.
Good to see yas… 🙂
There is no comparison to a flawed rifle and a single action revolver. There is only one way the gun can fire and that is to have the hammer pulled back and either pull the trigger or fan the hammer. In either case YOU are responsible for checking the firearm which includes the status of bullets in the gun. George Clooney was appalled by what happened and indicated that any time he has used a firearm in a movie, he checks to see if every round has a small hole in the back of the cartridge where they drain the powder and then fires each round pointed at the ground to insure there are no live rounds in the gun. I guess Alec the 2A critic doesn’t know what he is talking about after all. Involuntary manslaughter. Guilty as charged.
Safety or no safety, bad trigger or no bad trigger your mistake was handing a loaded rifle to another person especially for transport. Always clear the chamber and LOOK in there to see if anything is playing hide and seek. I also suggest taking every firearm you own to a qualified Gunsmith for a probably past due safety inspection.
A loaded rifle in a vehicle gets you an expensive citation, impounded vehicle, impounded weapon, loss of hunting rights for five years in Minnesota… your stupidity mileage may vary.
my only experience with something like this occurred when I placed on of those super-large target grips on an AR-15..when I pulled the charging handle back and released it…the gun fired…word to the wise…
OK, Alec and the celebrity worshipping media. If the story is that Baldwin is in no way responsible for what happened here, then you don’t have to make a stretch to stop blaming every gun owner and especially every NRA member for being directly responsible for every shooting that occurs in this country. See there. Not so hard if you try.
“OK, Georgie. I’m not the victim here, the one who was shot, so let’s talk about me for an hour.”
These Hollywood hypocrites certainly have a way of living in their alternate reality when they foul something up and then try to rationalize why they were innocent of a crime. Can you imagine anyone as critical of gun owners as Baldwin indicating he is not responsible when he failed to check the firearm for safety, apparently discharged the bullet because of that, killed one person and wounded another and still thinks that someone else other than himself is ultimately responsible. Now I do agree the other may be culpable for their negligence as well but he is the one ultimately responsible for last handling the firearm. Period.
“Do you feel guilt?”
Alec Baldwin: “No.”
Democrat narcissism has no boundaries. Just ask Dacian.
Baldwin is a perpetually angry jerk who is likely to face charges for killing someone who did not deserve to die. Nothing he says to the legacy media will change the facts, the cops will investigate, the prosecutor will charge him, and the jury will decide his fate. One way or the other in a year or two it will be settled and either way that jackass will be silenced, either because he is a convicted violent felon in prison, or as embarrassment to the Left and their gun control buddies in the press.
pointing the gun at the ground and dry-firing it six or better yet seven times sounds like a good safety measure that Baldwin failed to employ…
Lt Columbo says: “Just one more thing…”
https://img-9gag-fun.9cache.com/photo/amvE0bv_460s.jpg
As the producer of the film, a civil court will disagree with his conclusion.
“I was just up in that Texas School Book Depository building, pointing my rifle out the 6th-floor window just off to one side of this limousine, but I’d never point a loaded rifle at the President, no way! I never pulled the trigger!”
“I was just in that booth at Ford’s Theatre, practicing a scene in my new play, and was getting the angle right on my Deringer. I’d NEVER point a loaded Deringer at anyone, no way! It was just off to one side. I never pulled the trigger!”
“I was just walking down the street in Sarajevo, working on a street performance of a play about assassinations with this FN 1910 .380, when this big open touring car pulled up, and as I was aiming just to one side of this big guy wearing a feathered hat and a bunch of medals, the gun just went off! Twice! I never pulled the trigger!”
It could happen. . .
“I was just a self absorbed prick actor whom detests guns but uses them in movies, who was showing the head of cinematography how to make the scene look VERY realistic, when a revolver that I am a self-proclaimed expert with somehow caused me to kill one person and injure one other. “. …. DID happen
LAST IN>>>FIRST OUT…meaning Mr. Righteous was the last person to handle that
firearm and HE and HE ALONE is responsible for it and its action. If not than millions of
us have been taught the wrong firearm etiquette from day one….whats it to be
Mr. Mouth?????
He’s a producer on a film that hired an incompetent armorer who either loaded a live round or allowed someone else to, and she didn’t catch it when checking the gun for safety. She also seems to have failed to train the cast and crew properly and enforce safety on the set. He’s at least partially responsible for that.
As an actor didn’t personally check the status of the gun handed to him, and he didn’t demonstrate that status to the cast and crew. He is fully responsible for that.
Other producers, the armorer, the AD (who handed him the “cold” gun without checking properly) are also partially responsible.
Best analysis of this case so far . . . by Andrew Branca:
https://legalinsurrection.com/2021/10/legal-analysis-alec-baldwin-situation-beginning-to-look-a-lot-like-manslaughter/
If applied impartially, New Mexico law does not accept Baldwin’s excuses.
Of course, who knows what kind of games the Hollywood machine is playing behind the scenes to make sure that the law is not applied impartially . . . .
And a New Mexico jury pool is nothing like a southern California jury pool, he will see… 🙂
Negligent Manslaughter at the very least… I like unintentional homicide, has a nicer ring to it…
This guy is a supreme @$$hole. Super egotistical prick, he deserves to pay his debt to society.
pointing the gun at the ground and dry-firing it six or better yet seven times sounds like a good safety measure that Baldwin failed to employ…it only takes a few seconds to do this and should be second nature before a real firearm is used in a scene…ie; “cold gun”?…let’s see”
kind of reminds me of a story a friend of mine told me about…he was working on planes for Air America while based in Thailand..after spending a good portion of the day servicing a T-28 the pilot emerged and asked “All fixed”?…my friend said yes upon which the pilot tossed him a helmet and said “Let’s see” and directed him to sit in the plane for a test flight…..
When the year 2000 bug was suspected, China ordered all responsible for overseeing the transition to be in the air at midnight…
In the recent Baldwin interview he revealed that he pulled the hammer of the gun back as far it would go and then released it and when he released the hammer the gun fired. But he said he did not pull the trigger.
So much for the theory that the gun magically fired by its self and there being no trigger pull. Well duh, the hammer hitting the bullet is suppose to fire the bullet stupid. On this particular gun model when the hammer is cocked all the way back if the trigger is depressed all the way back already when it is cocked the hammer would go forward when released and hit the bullet without a trigger release and then an additional trigger pull. This means Baldwin did pull the trigger, but had it pulled before the gun fired the live round when he released the hammer.
Baldwin pulled the trigger, he either does not remember doing it or is playing word games (I’m betting on word games) – but Baldwin pulled the trigger and did exactly what was needed for the gun to fire. The gun did not go off by its self, there was no “misfire”, there was no “accidental discharge” because Baldwin did exactly what was needed for the gun to fire – it was “negligent” yes, maybe, but the gun was in Baldwin’s hand and he pulled the trigger (probably held back after a previously trigger pull, he said he was practicing) and cocked the hammer back and released the hammer and the gun fired just like it was suppose to do and was made to do. Baldwin is just as responsible as any one else for the events that led up to the live round being in the gun, actually more so because he failed to demand that proper safety procedures be followed before he touched the gun, but Baldwin is the only one responsible for the gun firing.