Alec Baldwin has submitted documents to have the special prosecutor in his involuntary manslaughter case removed because she is a Republican lawmaker.
Baldwin was holding a gun containing live ammunition at the time Halyna Hutchins was fatally shot on the set of Rust back in October 2021.
The 42-year-old cinematographer and mother was killed after being struck by a bullet from the gun, which also injured the film’s director Joel Souza.
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Prosecutor Andrea Reeb started proceedings last month with the sensational statement that Hutchins ‘would be alive today’ was it not for the actions of Baldwin and other people on the set of the film.
However, the 64-year-old actor has submitted a motion to the court requesting Reeb be removed from her position as special prosecutor because it is ‘unconstitutional’.
The motion which was filed in the First Judicial Court of New Mexico - the state where the accidental shooting took place - argues that the appointment of Reeb violates the state’s constitution because she is an elected member of the New Mexico House of Representatives.
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Reeb was appointed by district attorney Mary Carmack-Altwies to help her with the prosecution of the case.
The motion, submitted by Luke Nikas, a lawyer for Baldwin, reads: “Representative Reeb is not constitutionally permitted to serve simultaneously as a legislator and a special prosecutor.
“Doing so vests two core powers of different branches - legislating and prosecuting - in the same person and is thus barred by the plain language of Article III of the New Mexico Constitution.”
Baldwin was charged last month alongside the movie’s armorer Hannah Gutierrez-Reed.
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They are accused of failing in following the protocols of safety on film sets in the lead up to Hutchins’ death.
Both defendants have said that they will fight the charges.
Reeb previously worked as a district attorney in New Mexico before she resigned in March 2022, and she was appointed to the Rust investigation last August before she was then elected to the state’s legislature in November.
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At the time of her appointment she had already secured the nomination as the Republican candidate.
Last year, Carmack-Altweis wrote to the state’s officials stating that her office needed an ‘additional, more qualified attorney to assist in the prosecution of this matter,’ as the lawyers already on her staff have other cases to deal with and because of her responsibilities in handling the administration for the district attorney’s office, which covers three counties within the state.
Releasing a statement, Heather Brewer - a spokesperson for the prosecutors of the case - said Baldwin’s lawyers could ‘use whatever tactics they want to distract from the fact that Halyna Hutchins died because of gross negligence and a reckless disregard for safety on the Rust film set.’
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The statement added: “However, the district attorney and the special prosecutor will remain focused on the evidence and on trying this case so that justice is served.”
In the motion, Nikas said that Reeb’s dual roles could lead to unethical conduct such as future prosecutors attempting to ‘curry favor’ with legislators - who have control over their budgets - by offering them prosecution roles in cases.
He added that such a situation has never arisen before in New Mexico ‘perhaps because no one has attempted such a facially unconstitutional action in this state’.
Baldwin is set for the first hearing in the case this month, and if found guilty he could face up to five years in prison.
Topics: US News, Alec Baldwin, Celebrity, Crime
Tom Wood