The woman who gave Alec Baldwin a live prop gun is firing shots at the actor, offering her damning position on his involvement in the 2021 accidental shooting death on the set of Rust.
Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, the film’s armorer, was convicted in March of involuntary manslaughter and she’s now refusing to support Baldwin, who’s scheduled to appear in court this July.
Keep reading to learn what the gun supervisor was caught saying in a recorded phone call from prison!
Two days before she was killed, Halyna Hutchins shared her last Instagram post.
“One of the perks of shooting a western is you get to ride horses on your day off,” she captioned the clip that shows her riding a horse on the set of Rust, filmed just outside of Santa Fe.
On October 21, during a dress rehearsal for the film, the 42-year-old cinematographer found herself at the wrong end of a prop gun, held by Alec Baldwin.
The gun, which the film’s lead actor and co-producer had gotten from the weapons supervisor Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, fired live shots, killing Hutchins and wounding the director, Joel Souza.
The armorer was convicted in March 2024 of involuntary manslaughter and charged by prosecutors for failing to follow basic safety protocols.
Gutierrez-Reed, 27, was sentenced to 18 months in prison for her involvement.
“You were the armorer, the one that stood between a safe weapon and a weapon that could kill someone,” judge Mary Marlowe Sommer told Gutierrez-Reed. “You alone turned a safe weapon into a lethal weapon.”
‘Never had a problem’
“I would never point a gun at anyone and pull the trigger at them, never,” Baldwin told ABC News of the tragic incident. Insisting he “no idea” how a live bullet got onto the set of his film, the 66-year-old actor continued, “Someone put a live bullet in a gun, a bullet that wasn’t even supposed to be on the property.”
Earlier, the star of 30 Rock defended himself in front of an audience at the Boulder Film Festival: “When someone whose job it is to ensure the safety of the weapon hands someone else whose job was to be the secondary layer of protection for safety and they hand it over to and you declare that that weapon is safe, that’s how I’ve lived my whole life.” He continued, “I’ve relied on the safety experts there to declare the gun is safe and hand me the gun. Never had a problem.”
Now that he has the problem, it’s not going away.
‘Failure to accept responsibility’
The star of It’s Complicated, who pleaded not guilty to a charge of involuntary manslaughter, is scheduled for trial in July at a Santa Fe courthouse.
Building their case for the actor who maintains his innocence, prosecutors filed a motion, forcing Gutierrez-Reed into testifying on Baldwin’s behalf.
But, according to documents that summarize her prison phone calls to family members and others, her testimony will only further complicate the future of the award-winning actor.
The documents, compiled and filed by special prosecutors Kari T. Morrissey and Jason J. Lewis on April 12, outline objections to the woman’s request for conditional discharge (probation instead of prison time). They are intended to demonstrate her “total failure to accept responsibility.”
In one of the call summaries, Gutierrez-Reed tells her mother that “if she is subpoenaed to Baldwin’s trial she will not show up.”
The document explains, “Hannah complains that she shouldn’t be subpoenaed if Baldwin didn’t show up for her.”
She also allegedly called Morrissey a “bi***” and described members of the jury as “idiots” and “a**holes.”
In perhaps the worst call, Gutierrez-Reed reveals that she wants to see Baldwin “in jail.”
What people are saying
Devastated by the death of the wife and mother, the public are openly expressing their opinions on the tragic incident, many suggesting stricter safety protocols on set.
One user writes: “This appears to have been a terrible accident due to safety rules not being followed on set. Mr. Baldwin is not at fault, but the rules need to change unless people are ok with accidental deaths by movie firearms. Russian roulette?”
A second netizen Tweets: “Hannah Gutierrez-Reed received the max of 18 months for her role in the Rust shooting & death of Halyna Hutchins. Her jail calls disparaging the jurors and judge factored into this sentence. I cannot stress enough why people should stop talking about their cases on the jail phone.”
Another user, defending Baldwin, writes, “Like obviously it’s the story but it is really not fair to have Alec Baldwin be the face of this tragedy. He wasn’t in charge of loading that gun. Safety on set needs to be taken so much more seriously.”
A fourth user, referencing Baldwin’s upcoming trial, says “You’ll be getting more justice in July.”
‘The good, the bad,’ and the twisted
About two months after Gutierrez-Reed was found guilty, Baldwin and his wife Hilaria announced their new reality series The Baldwins, which airs in 2025.
“We’re inviting you into our home to experience the ups and downs; the good, the bad, the wild and the crazy,” Baldwin says in an Instagram clip. “Home is the place we love to be most.”
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