‘Rust’ Gunmaker Tells Court That Alec Baldwin Had To Pull Trigger To Fatally Shoot Cinematographer

deadline.com:

“No.” That’s what the man who made the Colt .45 replica that Alec Baldwin was holding that killed Rust cinematographer Halyna Hutchins in 2021 says today of the possibility the gun could fire without someone pulling the trigger. “It will only fire when you cock the hammer, the trigger will engage the firing position,” Alessandro Pietta from Pietta Firearms in Italy told Baldwin’s involuntary manslaughter trial Thursday in New Mexico. “If you want to release the hammer, you need to pull the trigger,” the understated Pietta added “The trigger is just a sear that lock the armor in that position.

And if you want to do that you need to pull the trigger.” Up against 18 months in a state prison if found guilty, the not guilty pleading Baldwin has always insisted that while he cocked the hammer, he did not pull the trigger and the gun somehow went off on its own.

Although the firearm is now somewhat beat up after various sets of testing over the years, the FBI and independent forensic investigators say there is no way the gun could have fired without the trigger being pulled – exactly what Pietta said today in his short but potentially pivotal testimony in Judge Mary Marlowe Sommer’s courtroom.

Hutchins was fatally shot, and Rust director Joel Souza was injured on October 21, 2021 after the Colt .45 Baldwin was pointing at the director of photography fired off a live round during a rehearsal at the Bonanza Creek Ranch near Santa Fe.