Alec Baldwin's criminal charges for fatal 'Rust' shooting to be dropped: lawyers "We are pleased with the decision to dismiss the case against Alec Baldwin and encourage a proper investigation into the facts and circumstances of this tragic incident," attorneys Luke Nikas and Alex Spiro said in a statement. https://www.foxnews.com/entertainme...l-charges-fatal-rust-shooting-dropped-lawyers
Um, no, the state dropped the charges because they knew they had no case, and did not want to cause the state to lose taxpayer dollars perusing a case they knew that would lose. They have their evidence, and they realized that there's no way Alec intentionally fired a live round at the victim. He's an actor with what is known as a prop gun. It is not HIS responsibility to assure the firearm is not loaded with live ammo during the filming. Hey, what about this scene? Anything wrong with that? Did Pesci have a problem with it? No. They told him to shoot at the camera, so he shot at the camera.
Not much more than a slap on the wrist for anyone involved. The idiots were target shooting with live rounds, Alex even had two live rounds in his gun belt. Reckless and irresponsible people treated with kid gloves because they're special.
The case has had poor management from the beginning. First they overcharged and then had to back off of that. Then they could not get it together to prosecute on even the lower charges.' And to cover for their embarassment, instead of just dropping the charges and moving on they are pretending that the case is still live and active and that they were just not ready to proceed and may still prosecute. What a mess. Even though Baldwin is an obnoxious dipshit no one likes to see prosecutors jerk the citizenry around. We had a war with King George over that kind of prosecutorial abuse. Also looks like there was some fake reporting that said that charges had been dropped against the other person too- which apparently is not true. I would pretty much blame the prosecutors office for that too given their history of confusion in their actions and communications. Alec Baldwin Not Absolved In Fatal ‘Rust’ Shooting Despite Planned Dropping Of Charges, Prosecutors Say – Update “Over the last few days and in preparation for the May 3, 2023, preliminary hearing, new facts were revealed that demand further investigation and forensic analysis in the case against Alexander “Alec” Rae Baldwin, III. Consequently, we cannot proceed under the current time constraints and on the facts and evidence turned over by law enforcement in its existing form. We therefore will be dismissing the involuntary manslaughter charges against Mr. Baldwin to conduct further investigation. This decision does not absolve Mr. Baldwin of criminal culpability and charges may be refiled. Our follow-up investigation will remain active and on-going.” Despite reports earlier in the day that former Rust armorer Hannah Gutierrez-Reed would also see her charges dropped, her status has not changed. “Charges against Hannah Gutierrez-Reed remain unchanged,” the prosecutors said tonight. https://deadline.com/2023/04/alec-baldwin-charges-dropped-rust-shooting-halyna-hutchins-1235329568/
I was going to point this out yesterday evening . This "dropping" of the involuntary manslaughter charges is simply a re-grouping by the DAs office to take time to investigate & file a new set of charges. Alex Baldwin is no way in the clear yet.
At most it might be negligence worthy of a civil suit but might be hard to prove the standard for criminal behavior even if the set people were a little sloppy...
Even though I thought they were past that stage, the prosecutors apparently have a probable cause hearing or some motion to dismiss or something that puts them before the judge in May. Looks like the prosecutors took the charges down for Baldwin rather than get an adverse ruling by the judge. And then maybe try to get it together.