Where it stands with the tragedy of Rust

For the love of sweet baby Jesus, before you offer any further commentary on this, prior, or subsequent threads, go read these two Motion picture Industry Wide Safety Bulletins:

1) Safety With Firearms 

2) Special Use Of Live Ammunition

They are quite literally the BIBLE on set operations on their respective topics. period. paragraph. Motherf**king WORD.

If you don't read them (FFS, they're about 4 short pages apiece, and it takes about 2 minutes, even if you need Hooked On Phonics to get through them), and aren't competent to comment based on them, you are, as has become manifestly obvious, not tall enough for this ride.

They make it abundantly obvious, by mentioning the specific duties of the armorer twenty-seven times, while mentioning any activity or responsibility by the actor only twice, in just the first bulletin, where the actual job responsibility, as well as legal, ethical, and moral culpability for safe use of weapons on any production lies.

Bummer for a thousand internet harpies, it is 0% with Baldwin, in any capacity, and nearly 100% with the armorer, in this case grossly criminally negligent and legally culpable for involuntary manslaughter.

That's 18 months in the NM State Prison, and a $5K fine. Call, raise, or fold, Sport.

What happened, per best information available:

A scene was being rehearsed.

Allegedly with a Civil War era/style muzzle-loading cap-and-ball black powder Colt revolver like this one.

The DP, 1st AC, and director were all grouped around the camera, where they could best see the shot they were planning.
Baldwin pointed, cocked, and fired a supposed "COLD" weapon at the camera, which turned out to be not only wrongly loaded, but loaded with a live round, which flew over the 1st AC's head, punched into the DP and through her, and then struck the director behind her. 

"One shot, one kill." 

Utterly tragic.

QED.

The number of fuck-ups that requires of Baldwin is zero.
The number of fuck-ups either actually performed, and/or actually neglected, by the armorer, by the numbers:

1) Failure to maintain possession of the weapon and put it in the actor's hand before the rehearsal.
2) Failure to remove a live round from the weapon before even bringing it to the set for rehearsal.
3) Failure to check that it was empty before rehearsal.
4) Failure to have someone else double-check to ensure it was completely empty before rehearsal.
5) Failure to ensure the actor witnessed the check and double check before handing it to them.
6) Failure to account for all live rounds previously loaded, and keep them, and/or any powder and ball materials for live shots completely separate from rehearsal weapons.
7)Failure to keep weapons capable of firing live rounds entirely segregated from weapons for use on sets where firing live rounds was neither practical, advisable, permissible, legal, nor discussed beforehand.

And probably

8) Failure to have a full and proper Safety Meeting before the rehearsal, to discuss the plan of events, identify danger areas, discuss emergency procedures, and go over chain of command on the rehearsal and the shot therefrom.

That last would be on the 1st Assistant Director, who runs all operations on set until the director says "Action", and after he says "Cut", and who, along with the Key Grip, is directly and legally responsible for the safe operation of the crew on the set at all times.

Being that this was a non-union low-budget ($6M, which is chump change for a movie these days) production, I'll wager dollars to donuts the production also did not have

9) a trained and equipped on-set medic (EMT, EMT-P, RN, or anything like) standing by in direct proximity to render aid in the event of the exact emergency that occurred, nor any other, which for any union production, and even most non-union ones where firearms are in use, is a requirement.
That fuck-up is laid at the feet of the Unit Production Manager, whose exact job it would be to hire or contract for such services, and who evidently failed to do any such thing, probably for budgetary reasons.

It was reported "the crew" rendered aid after the accident.
Not "the Medic/paramedic/nurse".
(We haven't even gotten started on that sub-topic, kids. Stay tuned.)

That's nine open and flagrant violations of standard set operations protocol, either stone-cold certain, or overwhelmingly likely.
Gonna be a lot of red asses by the time this gets to trial.

Now go back, and re-read what I wrote Friday morning when this news had just broken.

Everything I wrote in that post is batting 1.000, and that low-hanging curveball not only sailed over the center field bleachers, it still hasn't landed.

Don't be a hater.

Believe me, the fact that out of all the serial fuck-ups necessary to kill someone with a weapon on a movie set, exactly none of them tracks back to @$$hole Baldwin (mirabile dictu!) pisses me off too. But facts are stubborn things.

And maybe allow that after pissing away a couple of decades making feature films and TV shows, I know WTF I'm talking about regarding The Biz.