Rust armorer Hannah Gutierrez-Reed sobs after handing cops the pistol that killed Halyna Hutchins: ‘I’m so sorry… I’m so scared’

Rust weapons master Hannah Gutierrez-Reed is seen handing over the gun that Alec Baldwin used to accidentally kill cameraman Halyna Hutchins. She told officers and then told the crew how “scared” she was, new videos played during her trial reveal.

Both Reed and Baldwin are charged with involuntary manslaughter for Hutchins’ death.

She is accused of ignoring gun safety procedures by handing Baldwin the gun, which was loaded with a live round.

“That’s the gun,” Reed said, as another crew member kept an arm around her.

Moments later, she was crying as she spoke to Assistant Director Dave Halls.

“I’m so scared,” she said.

Prosecutors painted a picture of a “disorganized” and “chaotic” Reed who mixed live rounds with dummy bits on set and used cocaine the night before the shooting.

Her attorneys told the jury in response that she became the scapegoat for Baldwin’s carelessness and that he should never have pointed the gun at the victim.

Prosecutors tried to portray Gutierrez as negligent and disorganized. They showed the above image to the jury on Thursday

Baldwin was rehearsing a scene for Rust – his western film – when he accidentally shot Hutchins.

He claims he thought the gun was loaded with blanks and was assured it was safe, but says he didn’t even pull the trigger.

Five other live rounds were later found on the set by investigators.

Gutierrez-Reed sat in court, wearing a gray blazer and white top, looking impassive as District Judge Mary Marlowe Sommer read the indictment to the jury. Opening statements were postponed Thursday due to a juror’s delay.

“We believe that it was the defendant’s negligence and failure that led to both the acts that contributed to Ms. Hutchins’ death and the live rounds being brought onto the set,” prosecutor Jason Lewis said in the state’s opening speech.

Gutierrez-Reed’s attorneys have previously claimed that live rounds arrived on set from an Albuquerque-based dummy round supplier.

One of the prosecution’s evidence photos can be seen above. Authorities found six rounds of ammunition on the film set at locations that included a box, a gun belt and a bandolier worn by Baldwin

Alec Baldwin said he killed Hutchins accidentally and denied pulling the trigger. The jury was shown unedited footage of the filmmaking process in which Baldwin practiced drawing a gun while sitting in a church pew

On Thursday, they laid the blame on Baldwin, saying the actor “violated basic gun safety rules” when he rushed to finish filming and did not receive training that Gutierrez had requested.

Defense attorney Jason Bowles said, “He didn’t have to pull that gun for this scene. Instead, for whatever reason, Mr. Baldwin took it out and it ends up being aimed squarely at Miss Hutchins and Mr. Souza.”

According to Bowles, Baldwin “controlled the set” as he was the lead actor and one of the producers. By pointing a gun at someone else, Baldwin violated “some of the most basic gun safety rules you can ever learn,” Bowles said.

State’s Attorney Lewis said it was a “fairly chaotic” day when the shooting occurred, as the night before a group of camera operators who had “some concerns about safety issues on set” sent an email to the production team saying the message: they would stop it.’

Baldwin, the lead actor and co-producer of the western film Rust, was pointing a gun at cinematographer Halyna Hutchins (pictured) during a rehearsal outside Santa Fe in October 2021 when the gun went off, killing her.

The next day, the producers “decided to continue filming anyway and use less camera equipment,” trying to “improvise and make do with what they had.”

“During lunch, Miss Gutierrez took the gun from Mr. Baldwin and returned it to the safe, the gun safe that was loaded onto a rack cart,” the prosecutor told the jury.

“Once lunch was over, production decided they wanted to continue working inside the church. They weren’t filming anything at the time. They were doing blocking, which in film terms is what you do before you go to rehearsal, a very rough rehearsal where the lighting director and the cameraman are trying to get things so they can go to a rehearsal.

Gutierrez-Reed had a live round with mock rounds on set, prosecutors told the jury Thursday in her manslaughter trial.

Lewis said several witnesses, and “one in particular,” will say that “Baldwin could have used a stick to block, a rubber gun, anything that would allow him to simulate a gun.”

During the morning, Gutierrez had fired only five bullets into the gun Baldwin was using, but for the afternoon shooting she put a sixth bullet in it, Lewis said. She took it to church and presented it to first assistant principal Dave Halls.

They both performed a “sloppy and incomplete safety check of the gun, the dummy bullets were not removed and were rattling,” which would have told them what type of bullets were in the gun.

Lewis added: “Instead she opened the gun and partially rotated the cylinder to show Mr Halls some of the bullets. They have not been removed from the weapon and not all have been checked.

“After the incident occurred and when Miss Gutierrez was interviewed, she stated that when she retrieved the gun from the safe, she did not recheck the ammunition. When she put the sixth bullet in, she didn’t check the rounds at that time either.

“Witnesses will testify when the defendant pulled the gun out of the safe, what she should have done was opened the gun and checked each round. When she then took it to the church she should have done a second full ammunition check on Mr Halls. This double redundancy will help prevent the type of incident that happened to Miss Huchins from happening.”