#Rust Assistant Director Failed To Check The Chamber Of The On-Set Weapon

Baldwin is both an actor and producer on the film and is fully cooperating with investigators following a statement. The investigation is still ongoing, but the Santa Fe County DA is “not ruling out” any criminal charges. “If the facts and the evidence and law support charges, then I will initiate prosecution at that time,” Carmack-Altwies said in today’s news conference. “I am a prosecutor that was elected in part because I do not make rash decisions and I do not rush to judgment.”

Both Gutierrez-Reed and Halls have faced scrutiny in the wake of the incident for failing to enact the proper checks before the on-set weapon was used. Now, three of the film’s producers are facing similar fallout for shady tax dealings in the past. “Rust,” Variety notes, has so many cooks in its kitchen that it’s “not yet entirely clear who was actually in charge of hiring the crew and making sure conditions were safe.”

The set conditions have been a hot subject since the deadly accident. Halls was called out by former crewmembers for repeatedly cutting corners on production safety, and several crew members walked off the “Rust” set mere hours before the gun was discharged, to protest working conditions including reckless firearm handling. 

They were replaced with a non-union crew. 

According to The Wrap, Gutierrez-Reed had multiple complaints filed against her on a previous film, another Western — this time starring Nicolas Cage. According to key grip, Stu Brumbaugh, who was on the set of “The Old Way,” Cage himself snapped at the armorer after Gutierrez-Reed discharged a gun near the set unannounced, and this wasn’t the first time. Brumbaugh tells The Wrap, “I told the [assistant director], ‘She needs to be let go.’ After the second round I was pissed off. We were moving too fast. She’s a rookie.”

Reed states in the affidavit that she checked all three firearms on the gray cart for “hot rounds” on the day of the incident, and when the crew broke for lunch, the firearms were secured inside a safe on an on-set “prop truck.” While some ammunition is kept in the prop truck, some was left unsecured on the cart during lunch. Only a few individuals have access to the prop truck safe, and that investigation is still underway. 

We will continue to publish updates on the situation as they become available.