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The trial of Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, theRustarmorerand the last defendant in New Mexico’s criminal case over the accidental 2021 shooting death of cinematographerHalyna Hutchins, has been pushed from December 2023 to February 21, 2024.
The trial was moved by State district court Judge Mary Marlowe Sommer on Monday and set to run Feb. 21 through March 6 in Santa Fe, according to the Associated Press.
Gutierrez-Reed’s attorneys told the Wrap that the date change was due to “scheduling issues with the amount of witnesses that need to be interviewed.”
The cinematographer was killed in Oct. 2021 whenAlec Baldwininadvertently discharged a prop gun that had been loaded with a live round, believing the prop gun had been “cold.”
Charges were brought against Baldwin and Gutierrez-Reed in January, but lawyers for the pair successfully got the originalcharges downgradedbecause they were filed under a new firearm law that was passed months after the shooting took place. When both a special prosecutor and the Santa Fe County district attorney had to step down from the case, two new special prosecutors were appointed in March. In April, prosecutorsdecided to drop manslaughter chargesagainst Baldwin.
Gutierrez-Reed has been charged with involuntary manslaughter and evidence tampering and haspleaded not guilty. If convicted, she faces up to three years in prison.
In June, prosecutors alleged that Gutierrez-Reed “heavily” drank alcohol and smoked marijuana the night before a prop gun on the film set was discharged and resulted inthe deathof Hutchins.
At the time, Gutierrez-Reed’s attorney responded, “The case is so weak that they now have chosen to resort to character assassination claims about Hannah. The prosecution has abandoned the idea of doing justice and getting to the actual truth apparently.”
Last week, a new forensics report suggested that Baldwinwould have had to pull the trigger for the gun to fire, contrary towhat the actorhas claimed.
“Although Alec Baldwin repeatedly denies pulling the trigger, given the tests, findings and observations reported here, the trigger had to be pulled or depressed sufficiently to release the fully cocked or retracted hammer of the evidence revolver,” the report stated. “If the hammer had not been fully retracted to the rear, and were to slip from the handler’s thumb without the trigger depressed, the half cock or quarter cock notches in the hammer should have prevented the firing pin from reaching any cartridge in the firing chamber.”
