Two items on the news. One from 2 days ago:
Santa Fe D.A. Mary Carmack-Altwies told Vanity Fair, “You can pull the hammer back without actually pulling the trigger and without actually locking it. So you pull it back partway, it doesn’t lock, and then if you let it go, the firing pin can hit the primer of the bullet.”
Alec Baldwin May Not Have Pulled Trigger in ‘Rust’ Death, D.A. Says (tmz.com)
And today:
Faith Rhodes, a real estate broker involved in the deal, told the local Bennington Banner newspaper that the historic farmhouse had been built shortly after the Revolutionary War and includes a guest cottage and other outbuildings, including horse stalls.
“There are 50-something acres, and it’s just gorgeous … just gorgeous,” she told the paper. “That part of Arlington is very old and historic. It dates back to the Green Mountain Boys. It’s a really beautiful part of the village.”
Alec Baldwin buys farmhouse in tony Vermont ski town | Fox Business
Nobody does a big buy of real estate or any kind if they are expecting to get in serious legal trouble (Unless it is witnesses or pay the lawyers.) At the end, he does not go to jail, at the most, he gets to act in a bullshit court appearance where his skills as an actor will have him playing weepy and remorse whereas he will be given a slap on the wrist and found guilty of littering or some other crap, a small fine and probably 100 of community service, suspended. The insurance will settle on any lawsuit against him, and everything will be forgotten, and he will be revendicated by production for Fall season next year.
On that first article: well, yes, that is true (for some revolvers anyway). But so what? Does this DA think that people are fooled by the magic words “he did not pull the trigger”? The actual question is whether he handled the gun in a reckless fashion, in violation of Coopers Four Laws. The answer is obvious, and whether or not the trigger was touched in all that is entirely besides the point.
Yeah — he fanned the hammer instead.
What a piece of shit (no insult intended towards actual fecal matter).
The gun was in his hands. It was pointed a 2 innocent people. It went bang. Two people were shot, one fatally.
Am I missing something here?
Whether or not he pulled the trigger, was moving the hammer, whether ill-tempered fairies emerged from the sagebrush and hit the primer, he is the responsible party.
Potter got 2 years for shooting (in error) a criminal who was resisting arrest.
It is unconscionable that Baldwin should escape responsibility.
/end rant
And if you read what the DA actually says, he didn’t get duplicate of the gun Alec used. It was “a personally owned revolver”.
So all he had to do was find a revolver that can go bang when you drop the hammer when the trigger isn’t pulled.
But even more than that, I don’t trust the DA to actually understand firearms well enough to know what is going on. Depending on the version that Alec was using, it could have a transfer bar, it could have the “fake” hammer mounted firing pin, or it could have a real hammer mounted firing pin.
My understanding is that the gun that Alex used has a “fake” hammer mounted firing pin. Which means it isn’t solid. If you drop the hammer the firing pin doesn’t hit the primer.
In addition, I know that it takes a certain amount of force to cause a primer to pop. In a single action army there are a couple of sears. The safety sear is deep and will catch the hammer if it falls off the primary sear if the trigger isn’t held back. Pulling the hammer back as far as it will go and not catch the safety notch will not generate enough force to set off the primer. Pulling the hammer back far enough to get that force will get the hammer stopped on the safety sear.
So the DA is a dork.
On top of that, Alec killed a person and injured another. It doesn’t matter how he did it.
Two systems of justice in this country. One for the rich, famous, and politically connected, the other for schulbs like us.
.
Seriously, would the DA say anything like that if you or I had the gun in our hands? Doubt it. But, a famous Hollywood type says it, and “Good enough for me. Accident.”
.
When that Maxwell woman got convicted of trafficking minors for sex, apparently she was trafficking them to… no one. Not sure where the crime is there, if the children were not actually trafficked, but….
They were trafficked all right, but to Those Who Shall Not Be Named.
I Am Not Surprised.
We will be seeing and hearing from him.
He has proven his Salivating Mad Dog Hate for anything R-wing and willingness to provide Criminaly Insane Sound Bites.
Another Protected Psychotic thats Full of Shit.
O, if only someone had told you, and told you, and told you, that any attempted criminal case against Baldwin didn’t have a legal leg to stand on, and that pissing into the wind like that wasn’t worth the effort.
The bigger question remains why that D.A. isn’t charging the obviously culpable PropTwit, who brought the gun, loaded the live round into the gun, and provided the gun to Baldwin, which all have a wee bit to do with actual criminal negligence.
What’s the peanut gallery’s explanation of her total failure to find anyone, particularly a penniless and incompetent 20-something, who broke every rule of weapon handling in the book, criminally and legally culpable for gross criminal negligance, aggravated battery and manslaughter?
They could have made that arrest with the evidence in hand 3 months ago, obtained a conviction blindfolded, and had the culprit already doing time for the death.
Great, the Peanut Gallery has arrived, to spew more fertilizer.
I expect no less, but thanks for the warning.
Give a holler when you see an indictment on Baldwin.
Should be about half past Hell Freezes Over.
BTW, the news that a SAA can fire by letting go of the hammer before it reaches half-cock is brand new info for folks…in 1873.
And to everyone salivating for Baldwin’s hide on a plank.
I guess y’all must still be using a dial-up telegraph modem for internet service.
Let it go.
Is there a reason why you choose to be a dick in my blog’s comment section?
That’s his online persona everywhere. Hopefully not in real life, but I fear there’s probably bleed-through.
Since you asked, and as the bloghost, you deserve an answer.
You and I disagree regarding Baldwin’s culpability in this incident.
(We are probably at one regarding his lack of merit in general as a human being.)
Fair enough.
But I don’t disparage you personally for your position, nor do you do so to me for mine, and we can thus remain gentlemen, and disagree without being disagreeable. (Well, at least until you called me a dick for returning fire.)
Others commenting here can’t seem to grasp that concept.
Is there a reason why you choose to tolerate your commenters being dicks to me in your blog’s comments section?
They seem incapable of stopping, and you seem unwilling to call them on their dickishness.
The examples here are endless, but you can look at EN2 SS’s remarks above, and Velocihamster’s below, just on this thread, for but the two latest.
I’m fine with rules that apply equally to all parties. Really I am.
One-way rules, not so much.
It’s absolutely your blog, so you get to choose how you’re going to apply them.
I dare to suggest that expecting people to stick with the merits of their argument, and not the personage of those typing them, would be something they should have learned to do by late middle school, but that incoming fire will be happily returned, whether online or in person, and metaphorical or actual. The entire world and all of recorded history is funny like that, no?
I refer anyone to the code expressed by J.B. Books’ in The Shootist, in case the concept needs illumination.
“Alec Baldwin May Not Have Pulled Trigger in ‘Rust’ Death, D.A. Says”
I’ll say it: Bullshit.
I have a 1873 clone – a correct one. And I’ll only say this: If the gun was not damaged (and I’ll acknowledge that’s crucial, and only examination of the actual firearm can answer that question), there is NO WAY that a hammer drawn back can be released and discharge the cartridge without touching the trigger. The “safety” stop – the first of four click stops and which should never be so treated as a safety, BTW), is so short that the hammer doesn’t have enough momentum to fire any but the touchiest of primers. Was he fanning it? If so, he pulled the trigger; indeed, he did more than that, he held it back.
And has been noted above – given that he was pointing a firearm (not a “prop” gun) at persons to line up a camera shot – and I get the need to do that on a movie set – it was Baldwin’s, as the holder of the firearm, who is responsible for safety at that moment. HE had the responsibility to personally inspect the firearm. His failure to do that is at least negligence. Don’t care who is the armorer. If I’m holding the gun, I’m ultimately responsible. Period.
That said, Aesop is right: anyone with half a brain knew from the beginning that no matter Baldwin’s actual responsibility, he was gonna walk. He’s Alec Baldwin. Our two tiered system of “justice” is not going to hold him responsibility, no matter the facts.
Whose job was it to never bring an actual firearm to the set?
Whose job was it to never bring live rounds to the set?
Whose job was it to inspect the weapon, and the loads, every single time it was handed off or received?
Whose job was it to never insert live rounds in a prop gun being used for rehearsal involving pointing and simulating firing right at the camera (which necessarily includes the operators of same)?
Whose job was it to insert the loads?
Who actually loaded the offending round into the weapon?
Who handed a live weapon with live rounds to an actor, in contravention of literally every single safety rule in place, let alone common sense, knowing what was about to take place on set, by express design, and scripted out in detail weeks in advance?
Why hasn’t that person or persons already been indicted for gross criminal negligence leading to manslaughter?
How can anyone suspect that the claimed special two-tiered dispensation applies to a broke, maliciously incompetent twenty-something, as though she were a rich and famous actor, without any further commentary or question?
None of those answers are Alec Baldwin.
And in no universe was doing any of those things Alec Baldwin’s job.
Everything he did do was his job.
There’s the rub.
That’s what makes charging him virtually impossible.
Annoying, but nevertheless true.
Feelings are irrelevant, but facts are stubborn things.
I get why some here choose to ignore those facts, but they exist nonetheless.
At issue is why the D.A. has done so for four months, even though they were settled questions withing 96 hours of the incident.
Cue crickets, chirping.
This isn’t a two-tiered justice system. That dog simply won’t hunt.
It’s more like a 2 IQ justice system.
You’ve found somebody more incompetent than the armorer: it’s the D.A.
Just as in NYFC, where Ghislaine Maxwell procured children for sex with no one, Halyna Hutchins was evidently negligently killed by no one.
I’d suggest that putting the torches and pitchforks down long enough to discuss that would probably be a helpful thing.
I get that it probably won’t feel as good, but it’s definitely a step towards good, and it’s where more interest ought to be focused.