A New Mexico judge on Monday ordered “Rust” gun handler Hannah Gutierrez to serve 18 months in prison (the maximum sentence) for her role in the accidental shooting death of the film's director of photography. west two and a half years ago in New Mexico.
In March, a jury in Santa Fe, New Mexico, found Gutierrez, 26, guilty of involuntary manslaughter in the death of Halyna Hutchins during a rehearsal for a scene with actor Alec Baldwin, who pointed his prop gun at her. when it was shot. Prosecutors have alleged that Gutierrez brought live ammunition to the film set and loaded it into Baldwin's gun.
At an emotional sentencing hearing Monday, in the same Santa Fe courtroom where Gutierrez's trial took place, friends of Hutchins described the joy, generosity, determination and talent of the rising star in the film industry, and his pain for his death. The testimony, including that of his family in Ukraine, underscored the deep loss felt by friends, family and fellow filmmakers.
Gutierrez, dressed in a prison jumpsuit, cried at times during Monday's hearing. He asked the judge to sentence her to probation instead of prison for the felony. Gutierrez said her “heart aches” for Hutchins' family and friends, but questioned how she has been portrayed by special prosecutors and the press.
“I am saddened by the way the media sensationalized our traumatic tragedy and portrayed me as a complete monster, which in reality has been the complete opposite of what was in my heart,” Gutiérrez told the judge. “When I took on 'Rust,' he was young and naive, but I took my job as seriously as I knew how.”
But New Mexico First Judicial District Court Judge Mary Marlowe Sommer was not swayed, saying Gutierrez has shown little remorse, even on Monday or during his recent jailhouse phone calls, which are routinely recorded and shared. with special prosecutors.
“You were the gunsmith, the one who stood between a safe weapon and a weapon that could kill someone,” Marlowe Sommer told Gutiérrez. “You just turned a safe weapon into a lethal weapon. If it were not for you, Mrs. Hutchins would be alive, a husband would have her partner, and a child would have its mother.”
Marlowe Sommer then told the sheriff to “please take her” to jail, ending the 90-minute hearing.
The October 2021 shoot shed a harsh light on the safety of movie sets, especially on low-budget productions. The case attracted worldwide attention, in large part, due to Baldwin's stature in Hollywood and as a political lightning rod. Baldwin has also been charged with involuntary manslaughter and his trial is scheduled for July in Santa Fe. He has pleaded not guilty.
Gutierrez and her team have long claimed that she unfairly bore most of the blame for the accident when others shared responsibility for safety lapses on set. Hours before the fatal shooting, members of the “Rust” camera crew had walked off the job to protest safety concerns and the lack of housing near the film's set.
Gutiérrez had little experience; “Rust” was only his second job as chief gunsmith. He was also assigned the job of prop assistant.
On Monday, his stepfather, well-known Hollywood gunsmith Thell Reed, blamed the prop master and gun supplier. He argued that his stepdaughter did not bring live ammunition to the film set south of Santa Fe, as prosecutors have alleged.
Several speakers pointed out the unsafe conditions on the set of “Rust.”
“Film producers are responsible for ensuring that hired cast and crew members have sufficient experience to perform their jobs,” Hutchins' agent, Craig Mizrahi, said during Monday's hearing, which was televised on Court TV.
“When the producers hired someone with virtually no experience to be not only the gunsmith but also the assistant prop master, two very challenging positions in their own right, they made a crucial decision to put the safety of their cast and crew on the back burner. . ”Mizrahi said.
Famed victims' rights attorney Gloria Allred was present to read statements from Hutchins' family in Ukraine; she represents them in a civil case against Baldwin and other producers. Speaker after speaker, including the film's director, Joel Souza, who was wounded by the same bullet that killed Hutchins, discussed how the shooting had deeply affected them and said they remain filled with sadness to this day.
Cinematographer Halyna Hutchins with her husband Matthew Hutchins and their son.
(From the Hutchins family via Panish Shea Boyle Ravipudi LLP)
“The world lost not only a person who was a talented artist, but a truly kind and compassionate person, something that often seems in short supply these days,” Souza testified via video link, acknowledging that he continues to deal with the trauma of that moment. day.
Souza had been standing directly behind Hutchins during the rehearsal and the lead bullet from Baldwin's gun, which passed through Hutchins' chest, lodged in his shoulder. Doctors at a Santa Fe hospital removed him that same day.
“Halyna's parents lost their daughter, her sister lost a brother and a confidant. Mate [Hutchins] “He lost his wife,” Souza told the judge. “Halyna's son not only lost his mother but everything she had to offer him for the rest of her life. Every kind word, every gesture of love, every support.”
Prosecutors showed a slideshow of photographs from Hutchins' youth in Ukraine, the work he loved behind the camera and his activities, including hiking and enjoying life with his family and friends.
“Halyna was a force. … She was one of my favorite people in the world,” Jen White, a friend, testified via video link. “I feel like she has been lost in the whirlwind of accusations and blame after this completely avoidable tragedy.”
Gutierrez has long acknowledged that she loaded Baldwin's gun with what she thought were inert “dummy” bullets. Baldwin has described how she was practicing an upcoming scene by aiming her prop gun, a fully functioning Colt .45 revolver, at Hutchins, unaware that a real bullet was one of the six bullets packed inside the chamber.
Defense attorneys had asked Marlowe Sommer for leniency, saying Gutierrez was eligible for a probation program because the shooting was an accident and Gutierrez had no criminal record. But the judge said probation or sentencing her to a lesser punishment of a year in Santa Fe County Jail “would give her a pass she doesn't deserve.”
In recent days, prosecutors had built a case that Gutierrez had shown little remorse for Hutchins' death, even after she was sent to county jail following her conviction last month.
“EM. Gutierrez continues to deny responsibility and blame others” for Hutchins' death, special prosecutor Kari T. Morrissey wrote in a court filing late last week. On Monday, Morrissey said she was unsure of the appropriate punishment. for Gutierrez until last week, when she began sifting through Gutierrez's jailhouse phone calls: conversations with her mother, her boyfriend and a paralegal.
“During this process I had the sincerest hope that there would come a time when Ms. Gutiérrez would assume responsibility. [and] “I expressed some level of remorse that was genuine,” Morrissey said. “And that moment has never come.”
The judge also pointed to jailhouse conversations to support her decision that Gutierrez should serve time in a state women's prison, saying Gutierrez continued to blame others in those recordings.
“Did you have enough time to safely load the gun? Plenty. Did you load the gun? Yes,” said Marlowe Sommer. “Did you check what you were carrying? Not because? Well, in her own words, more recently, in her calls to jail, she 'didn't need to be shaking the dolls all the time.'”
Marlowe Sommer said Gutierrez, in the jailhouse calls, seemed to express more concern about how the criminal case “was ruining her modeling career” than about the devastating losses of others.
In one conversation, the judge said, Gutiérrez was quoted as saying: “People have accidents and people die. It's an unfortunate part of life, but it doesn't mean [she] “He should be in jail.”
New Mexico First Judicial District Court Judge Mary Marlowe Sommer, center, speaks with prosecutors Jason Lewis, left, and defense attorney Jason Bowles during the trial of Hannah Gutierrez in February in Santa Fe, N.M. Mexico.
(Eddie Moore / Albuquerque Diary)
Gutierrez's attorney, Jason Bowles, strongly disagreed with claims that Gutierrez lacked remorse.
“EM. Gutierrez Reed has felt true sadness and remorse for the tragic events,” Bowles wrote Sunday before the sentencing hearing. “She has experienced this largely privately and has sought counseling to deal with her emotions and mental crises. “.
The judge noted Monday that it was Bowles, not Gutierrez, who said she was full of remorse.
It was the second conviction New Mexico prosecutors obtained in Hutchins' death.
Last year, “Rust” deputy director David Halls pleaded no contest to a charge of negligent use of a deadly weapon for his role in the tragedy. Halls turned the gun over to Baldwin that day and declared it safe. He received a suspended sentence of six months of unsupervised probation. She testified against Gutierrez at her trial and has been on the witness list in Baldwin's case.
Gunsmith Thell Reed and his daughter Hannah Gutiérrez, who was the gunsmith in “Rust,” pose together on a film set.
(From Thell Reed)
Bowles has provided his services for free since taking on the case in 2021.
Last week, Thell Reed attempted to create a GoFundMe account to raise money to cover his stepdaughter's legal bills during an appeal, but the site removed the family's post due to its policy prohibiting fundraising for legal defense of criminal charges. for violent crimes.
