Alec Baldwin’s lawyers accuse prosecutors of withholding evidence favorable to their client during the grand jury hearing.
• Read also: Fatal shooting on the film “Rust”: the gunsmith found guilty of involuntary manslaughter
• Read also: “Like a baseball bat to the shoulder”: the injured director’s account of the film “Rust”
• Read also: Fatal shooting on the film “Rust”: Alec Baldwin will be tried in July
Therefore, they asked a judge to dismiss the manslaughter charges brought against him following the tragedy of Rust in 2021.
Cinematographer Halyna Hutchins died and director Joel Souza was injured in October 2021 when the gun that was supposed to contain Baldwin’s dummy bullets fired live ammunition on the set of Rust in New Mexico.
The 65-year-old actor has always maintained that he did not pull the trigger. Previous charges against him were dropped last year, however, he was indicted by a New Mexico grand jury in January 2024 after new ballistics tests revealed the trigger must have been pulled.
Alec Baldwin’s lawyers have now filed a motion to dismiss the charges, accusing prosecutors (general counsel) of leaking information to the press and “deliberately stacking the deck” against him. “Enough is enough,” they wrote. This is an abuse of the system, and an abuse of an innocent person whose rights have been violated to the extreme. The court should dismiss the indictment.”
The lawyers claimed prosecutors withheld “substantial exculpatory and favorable evidence” from the grand jury and failed to call witnesses who could have testified that it was not Alec Baldwin’s responsibility to check the weapon before shooting.
They supported, according to Peoplethat prosecutors had “one goal”: “to indict Baldwin, no matter the truth, no matter the rules or decisions of the court, and no matter what it took to get there.”
The sitcom star 30 Rock pleaded not guilty on January 31. His trial is scheduled in New Mexico for July 10. The motion to quash comes shortly after the gunsmith of Rust, Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter. She is still awaiting her sentence.