I can empathize that this sucks to go through because I haven't read anything to suggest she had murderous intent, but even accidents have consequences. There have to be penalties for setting up dangerous conditions to make sure that happens as rarely as possible. It's why charges like "involuntary manslaughter" exist.
While this was technically an accident, I put it in the same league as driving drunk and killing someone. It was preventable by doing the bare minimum of what her job responsibilities were.
I agree and that's why I finished by saying even these situations, where there's no intent, have to be prosecuted and punished. While I empathize with making mistakes (having made my own albeit none nearly so serious) I still think there's a good reason she's headed to prison.
It's "an accident" in the same way getting shit faced and going for a cross country drive and wrecking is "an accident".
She violated pretty much every safety regulation, and I believe was even getting drunk and shooting the prop guns on set with live bullets. She was definitely shooting them on set, I just don't know if they proved she was doing it while drunk.
A drunk driver doesn't mean to kill anyone either. But most don't say it was just an accident and try to emphasize with the irresponsible sociopath who got someone killed because they thought they knew more than the law.
She wasn't qualified to do a very specific job she was hired specifically to do. The people who hired her are also at fault, but her very actions and incompetence at her duties lead to a shooting and death. You don't just shrug and say oops, accidents happen if a certified electrician or utility worker messes up so badly they burn your house down.
Because there were six producers on the set, and the DA discovered that the celebrity producer you're mad about didn't seem to actually have any duties.
This is very, very surprising to people that know how hard working your average celebrity producer is.
Last time I saw a discussion on this, someone said it's been literally over 100 years since the last time someone died on set from a live gun being fired. There are so many rules and regulations in place I can understand why a producer would assume things are just automatically going to be fine no matter what.
Granted, that's the kind of "taking things for granted" attitude that leads to counties repealing fluoride requirements for municipal water. People get so accustomed to things working well that they forget it takes work to keep it working.
a fall guy to the producers who brought a bunch of non union workers on set during a strike. obviously she fucked up, but this isn't just on her, she was at work.
This is a dumb take. Her only job was to make sure the weapons are safe, and she had live ammo on set. The producers may share some of the blame with her, but she's no fall guy.
She was also supposedly complaining about the judge and jury on her recorded phone calls. The judge sounded incandescent with rage while sentencing her to the maximum of 18 months. In another jurisdiction manslaughter could land you many years in prison.
interesting that it was actually a white dude in a position with considerable power who discharged the firearm, maybe Baldwin could have checked the gun too.
If i'm caught accidentally shooting someone with live ammunition can I blame the last person who held the weapon, or is it my responsibility to check it myself?
Alec Baldwin shot an killed a woman ffs, and the buck has stopped with some low level minion.
While what you said is factual, this also was the very specific reason she was brought to the set: the safe and professional handling of firearms and firearm analogous props. Her entire job was to ensure no one got shot. 18 months for manslaughter is a slap on the wrist.
They are a subsection of Props which covers everything an actor holds or interacts with during a scene (minus things like furniture) and some things worn during a scene like jewelry (some overlap with costume dept there so not exclusively everything is props)
Armorer specifically deals with the sourcing and safe handling of weapons and armor. Depending on where you are all Props people need to be licenced to handle weapons wherever licencing programs exist so all props people can do the most basic armorer tasks but generally speaking once you stop dealing with rubber toy look-alikes and airsoft weapons most shows will upgrade to an armorer who has specialized knowledge to handle loading, proper storage and instruction on proper handling and guidance.
He probably didn't... But he also didn't take the weapon from her on the set. He took it from the 1st AD who had absolutely no fucking business handling that weapon in the first place. To give a parable it would be like if you regularly go bungie jumping and the person who is supposed to check your equipment and buckle you in pre jump isn't around but the parking attendant still wearing his vest shows up gives you a pat down and a thumbs up and says "good to go boss!"
Like if it was your first day on and you somehow got past all the safety layers of people who should give you the full safety spiel... But really? This was not the first nor second rodeo. This was a neon red flashing sign of bad practice.