US police says criminal charges against actor Alec Baldwin may not be rule out over last week’s fatal shooting on a film set in New Mexico. Baldwin accidentally killed a cinematographer Halyna Hutchins and wounded a director on the set of the Western film Rust. Santa Fe prosecutor Mary Carmack-Altwies during a press conference said, “he was the one who operated the weapon.” “All options are on the table at this stage” “no one is excluded” regarding possible lawsuits. Searches conducted at the Bonanza Creek Ranch in New mexico, where Halyna Hutchins was killed on October 21, resulted in the recovery of 600 pieces of evidence including three firearms and 500 rounds of ammunition, Santa Fe County Sheriff Adan Mendoza said. Pending the conclusions of forensic science, investigators believe that it is a mixture of dummy cartridges, blank cartridges and live ammunition.
“We’re going to determine how (this live ammunition) got on set, why it was there because if shouldn’t have been there,” Mendoza added.
Sheriff Mendoza also said the projectile removed from Joel Souza’s shoulder had been handed over as evidence.
Speaking about the killing Mendoza said, “I think the facts are clear, a weapon was handed to Mr. Baldwin. The weapon was functional and fired a live round killing Ms. Hutchins and injuring Mr. Souza.”
The very strict recommendations of the film industry with regard to firearms prohibit the presence of live ammunition on set, precisely to prevent this type of accident.
The sheriff informed reporters there had been up to 100 people on the set of the film when the shooting happened on Thursday.
He also confirmed that two other people had handled the weapon, an antique Colt .45 revolver, before it was handed to Mr. Baldwin - the film's armourer Hannah Gutierrez-Reed and assistant director Dave Halls.
