• FuglyDuck@lemmy.world
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      4 months ago

      Remember, she filed a safety complaint against the production precisely because of all this. Alina was a union whistleblower who turned up dead.

      • bartlebee@infosec.pub
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        4 months ago

        I rarely comment, but your statement is factually incorrect on a few points. I assume when you stated “Alina”, you are referring to Halyna Hutchins. There were safety complaints filed by other production members, but not by her. The way you framed this statement also implies she may have been killed as retribution because she filed a safety complaint, which again, she did not.

        If there is a credible source that the victim in this tragedy filed a safety complaint before her death, I will happily amend or delete my comment. I’m not trying to start a flame war or anything and this is certainly no attack on you personally, it just bothers me when I see misinformation.

        • FuglyDuck@lemmy.world
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          4 months ago

          I rarely comment, but your statement is factually incorrect on a few points. I assume when you stated “Alina”, you are referring to Halyna Hutchins

          I apologize for a friggin typo. That’s not a factually incorrect statement, however.

          There were safety complaints filed by other production members, but not by her. The way you framed this statement also implies she may have been killed as retribution because she filed a safety complaint, which again, she did not.

          From Wikipedia:

          There were safety complaints filed by other production members, but not by her. The way you framed this statement also implies she may have been killed as retribution because she filed a safety complaint, which again, she did not.

          This makes her a whistleblower and provides (possible) motivation. Do you have any idea how much it costs for a single day of shooting? Proper safety protocols would have slowed down production, increasing costs.

          I’ve been unable to find information on who actually filed those complaints, and assume the union wouldn’t tell management who did- and I would be shocked if they did (that’d make them rats.)

          Something to think about when Baldwin puts on his most sincere act ever and insists it was an accident and not his fault.

          Also as a side note, there’s apparently a small technical mistake that HGR was in fact not the armorer (her contract for that apparently expired a few days earlier.)(she was still acting as armorer even if she wasn’t technically designated as such,)

    • ganksy@lemmy.world
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      4 months ago

      Seems like a little more than just Alec Baldwin heading an extraordinarily sloppy production. HG-R still did not do her job but if they both went to prison you’d feel like justice was done knowing evidence like this was withheld?

      • FuglyDuck@lemmy.world
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        4 months ago

        I don’t particularly think any kind of ballistics on the bullets is really going to change the out come of the trial. They could have easily omitted them and still had a rock-solid case.

        Like, Baldwin is not disputing that he was holding the gun that killed her. Just that it was his fault.

        HGR, that other producer. Baldwin. They can all share full guilt for what happened.

          • Arbiter@lemmy.world
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            4 months ago

            The issue isn’t that Baldwin held the gun, it’s that he was the producer of the entire production.

            • halcyoncmdr@lemmy.world
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              4 months ago

              True. But that’s not how he was being charged. He was being charged because he was the actor firing the weapon. There is a difference.

              If he was not a producer would we be talking about him being charged at all in this case?

              If the issue is him being a producer, why aren’t all the other producers being charged for the same crime? What was different about Baldwin? If the issue isn’t that he fired the weapon.

            • FaceDeer@fedia.io
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              4 months ago

              And ultimately none of that mattered, because the issue that got the case dismissed was gross misconduct by the prosecutor.

              • Arbiter@lemmy.world
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                4 months ago

                Which is almost justice.

                Real justice would be the prosecutor facing charges for misconduct.

          • FuglyDuck@lemmy.world
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            4 months ago

            First, no. That’s wrong.

            Hollywood movie industry doesn’t write law. New Mexico law says Baldwin was being negligent, and that negligence resulted in some one’s death. This is a crime.

            If a lawyer tells you it’s okay to go 80 in a 55, and a cop writes you a speeding ticket, you don’t get to pull “advice of counsel” as a defense to get out of it, because the lawyers advice is obviously unreasonable and incorrect.

            Alternatively, if you call a mechanic and describe some brake symptoms and he says it’s safe to get it into the shop without a tow, and you get into an accident because the brakes failed… the mechanic is not liable for that, ultimate liability rests with the driver. The mechanic didn’t know the full circumstances.

            Similarly, even an idiot could be reasonably expected to recognize that it’s unsafe to point a functional firearm at people and pull the trigger (or otherwise waive it around like a toy.) therefore, an expert’s advice to the contrary is quite unreasonable and on its own face should have been ignored; and HGR was unaware of his actions with the weapon as she was not immediately present.

            Therefore, Baldwin failed a duty of care to behave in a safe manner (aka he was negligent,) and some one died (homicide- probably invol. Manslaughter or whatever the specific term is.) It also goes out the window when you recognize that HGR was in fact not an expert. She was a laughably inexperienced neppo-baby and we all know it. (She was also hired because she was inexperienced and allowed things that she should not have. This benefitted the production by reducing slow downs in filming.


            Now to the second point:

            Baldwin did not receive the weapon from HGR- he received from an assistant producer (who plead guilty, too.)

            So no. He didn’t receive it from your “expert”.

              • FuglyDuck@lemmy.world
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                4 months ago

                Nope.

                The law describes behaviors/actions/stuffs that are or are not crime. Murder is defined as the unjustified killing of a human. (Usually.) there are then variations of “murder”.

                Specifically to New Mexico, Involuntary manslaughter :

                Manslaughter is the unlawful killing of a human being without malice.
                ….
                B. Involuntary manslaughter consists of manslaughter committed in the commission of an unlawful act not amounting to felony, or in the commission of a lawful act which might produce death in an unlawful manner or without due caution and circumspection.

                So any behavior that fits that is, by definition invol. Manslaughter.

                I’ve added emphasis to the relevant bit here. Let’s break it down.

                • Baldwin was preparing to shoot a sequence of a western movie. This is a lawful act.
                • he was handling a firearm. This might produce death.
                • he was handling the weapon in an unsafe manner; that is, without due caution.
                • these things resulted in Alina dying.

                This also gets into presumption of innocence. It’s a procedural presumption. It’s a very important procedural stipulation meant to protect the civil liberties of the accused. (It’s violated on a regular basis but that’s a different matter.)

                Regardless, the crime happened. If you’re guilty of a thing, you are guilty regardless of if you are caught, or discovered, or accused or even indicted or they blame some one else. None of that changed that you did that thing and are guilty. The trial doesn’t magically guilty- you are found to be guilty.

                Like how fossils are found. They’re always there. Just because we don’t know that they’re there, doesn’t mean they don’t exist. The fact of their existence is immaterial to any one’s knowledge of that fact.

                Similarly, the fact of one’s guilt is immaterial to anyone’s knowledge of that fact. (For example, a drunk driver so heavily inebriated they don’t realize they ran some one over. Or hunters plinking in the woods unaware that kids were playing behind their targets.)

                The court procedural rules say he is presumed to be guilty until the fact of his guilt is found in a court of law.


                He committed actions which are defined as being involuntary manslaughter.

                He doesn’t get to say he was behaving with due care because there was an inexperienced, inept armorer, somewhere around there. That’s not how it works.

                From an occupational accident perspective, it doesn’t matter that there was a “safety coordinator”, it’s still unreasonable behavior that lead to Alina dying, as an employee (and employer, but that’s a different set of charged ) he has an obligation and duty of care to maintain a safe working environment- and to report unsafe environments.

                  • FuglyDuck@lemmy.world
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                    4 months ago

                    Doesn’t matter.

                    Again, the fact of one’s guilt is immaterial to another’s knowledge of that guilt. One had always been guilty and only found as such by the court.

                    One is not factually innocent, and then suddenly factually guilty. It is a mere presumption.