SANTA FE, N.M. — A jury began deliberating Wednesday in the criminal case against “The Last” Armorer Hannah Gutierrez-Reed.
The incident unfolded on October 21, 2021, how a live bullet entered the film set and entered a prop gun held by actor Alec Baldwin, ultimately killing the film's cinematographer, Halina Hutchins. The story focuses on the circumstances surrounding director Joel's injury. Souza.
Gutierrez Reed, an armorer who was on the set at the time, has been charged with manslaughter and tampering with evidence, which could carry a maximum sentence of three years in prison if convicted. She did not take the stand to defend herself.
After about two weeks of testimony, the prosecution and defense made their closing arguments Wednesday in a New Mexico courtroom.
During the prosecution's closing argument, Kari T. Morrissey outlined what he believed were the various safety deficiencies that caused the tragedy at the filming location.
“This incident is about a continuing and unending series of safety failures that resulted in the death of a human being and the near death of another person,” Morrissey said.
She went on to elaborate on the differences in appearance between dummy bullets and real bullets.
“Which of these is unique?” Morrissey asked.
Morrissey said Gutierrez-Reid brought to the set a leftover dummy from another film provided by his father.
“I'm not saying that Hannah Gutierrez-Reid was going to bring live rounds to the set,” Morrissey said.
“She was negligent, careless and thoughtless,” Morrissey said.
Morrissey also said that after the shooting, the 27-year-old armorer was “more concerned about his career” than the victims.
But Gutierrez-Reed's attorney, Jason Bowles, said prosecutors have not been able to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that his client was responsible for the live ammunition heading into the shooting scene.
” [ammunition] “The box doesn’t matter because we don’t know what was in it three or four days ago,” he said.
He also said some of the testimony in the trial was “unreliable.”
“We want the truth and all the facts discovered by OSHA. And we want all the facts that weren't discovered in this court. … If we don't have all the evidence, we can't reasonably “I cannot rule out doubts,” Bowles said.
During the trial, a number of witnesses who were at the scene of the shooting took the stand, including Souza, who described the moment of the shooting and the chaos that followed.
“Nothing made any sense,” Souza said last week, adding that he remembered looking up at Gutierrez-Reed after the incident and hearing her repeatedly say, “I'm sorry, I'm sorry, Joel.”
Souza described the feeling of being shot as feeling like someone “put a baseball bat to your shoulder.”
But Souza said he did not realize he had been injured by live ammunition, and when medical personnel told him at the hospital, “I couldn't calculate it.”
Dave Halls, the film's safety coordinator who pleaded no contest last year to negligent use of a deadly weapon as part of a plea deal, also took the stand. His testimony was the first time he spoke publicly about what happened that day. An emotional Halls testified that she should have inspected the gun more thoroughly and admitted that she had “inappropriately inspected the firearm.”
Halls also said he did not recall seeing Gutierrez-Reed rotate the entire cylinder to confirm that all the bullets were dummy rounds. Wiping his tears, he said, “I let him pass the safety check.''
In his opening statement, Special Counsel Jason Lewis called Gutierrez-Reid's behavior on the set of “The Last” “sloppy” and “unprofessional.”
“We believe that the defendant's negligence and failures led to Ms. Hutchins' death,” he said.
It is now up to a jury to decide whether prosecutors have proven beyond a reasonable doubt that Gutierrez-Reed was responsible for Hutchins' death.
Baldwin has been charged with manslaughter and his trial is scheduled to begin in July.
Dana Griffin and Sumiko Moots reported from Santa Fe, and Chloe Meras reported from New York City.
