Steph Deschamps / October 28, 2021
Criminal charges against actor Alec Baldwin, who accidentally killed a director of photography on the set of a western film last week, are not out of the question at this point, the prosecutor in charge of the investigation into the fatal shooting said Wednesday.
He's the one who operated the gun, Santa Fe prosecutor Mary Carmack-Altwies noted at a news conference. All options are on the table at this point and no one is being ruled out regarding possible prosecution, she said.
Searches at the Bonanza Creek, New Mexico, ranch where Halyna Hutchins died Oct. 21 resulted in the seizure of 500 rounds of ammunition, Santa Fe County Sheriff Adan Mendoza said.
Pending forensic findings, investigators believe it was a mixture of dummy rounds, blanks and live ammunition
We are going to determine how (these live ammunition) got on the set, why they were there, because they shouldn't have been there, Mendoza said.
The film industry's strict firearms guidelines prohibit the presence of live ammunition on a film set, precisely to avoid this type of accident.