It’s been two years since the involuntary manslaughter charges against Alec Baldwin were dismissed in New Mexico, but the 68-year-old actor continues to face lawsuits and other consequences for his role in the 2021 fatal shooting that killed cinematographer Halyna Hutchins on the set of the Western film “Rust.”
That includes a pending lawsuit from Hutchins’ family in Ukraine, whose lawyers made the sad announcement Monday that Hutchins’ mother, Olga Solovey, had died at age 67. In an email statement, the office of victims rights attorney Gloria Allred said that Solovey had died in February while she was living in war-torn Kyiv, Ukraine. Before her death, Solovey remained “heartbroken because of the sudden and unexpected death of Halyna by the bullet discharged from the gun held by Baldwin on the set of ‘Rust,’” the statement said.
The statement also offered a reminder of the conditions in which Solovey had been living in Kyiv, which continues to be a primary target of drone assaults and ballistic missile attacks in that country’s ongoing war against Russia.
“Without a doubt, had Halyna’s life not been cut short, Halyna would have found a way to bring Olga to the United States to escape the perils of the war in Ukraine,” the statement said. “Olga’s relationship with her daughter Halyna, in this case, would have saved Olga’s life.”
In order to press Solovey’s claims related to Hutchins’ death, the family’s legal team said it will file an “Application for the Appointment of Limited Representative in New Mexico” with Solovey’s surviving daughter, Svetlana Zemko. They also are making arrangements to have Hutchins’ sister and father deposed in August or September from a bomb shelter in Kyiv.
“Olga’s death will not deter us from seeking justice in Olga’s name,” attorneys vowed in their statement.
On Oct. 21, 2021, Baldwin, Hutchins and director Joel Souza were rehearsing a scene on the “Rust” film set near Santa Fe, New Mexico. Baldwin was pointing a Colt .45 revolver at Hutchins, 42, who was standing less than four feet away, when the gun discharged a live round, authorities have said. The bullet killed Hutchins and wounded Souza. Baldwin has maintained that he did not realize the gun’s chamber held a live bullet.
As the Los Angeles Times reported, film industry protocols forbid real ammunition on sets, and the “Rust” assistant director had announced that the weapon was “cold,” meaning that it contained no ammunition. For reasons that were never determined, the live round ended up on the set and in Baldwin’s prop gun.
In the aftermath of the shooting, Baldwin faced trial on a felony involuntary manslaughter charge in the summer of 2024 but the case was dismissed after a judge agreed with his lawyers that prosecutors hid evidence.
But the Emmy-winning “30 Rock” actor also has been fending off civil lawsuits from multiple crew members and members of Hutchins’ family, as Rolling Stone reported.
Hutchins’ husband previously settled his lawsuit with Baldwin and the film’s producers, but her mother, sister and father, Anatolii Androsovych, filed a civil negligence lawsuit against Baldwin in New Mexico, the Los Angeles Times reported. Hutchins’ relatives were joined in their lawsuit by Mamie Mitchell, the “Rust” script supervisor who was standing just four feet away from Baldwin when the shooting happened.
The lawsuit contends that Hutchins’ death was caused by reckless behavior by Baldwin, who was both the star of the film and one of its producers, and by the actions of thee film’s other producers, its production managers and several crew members.
“The fact that live ammunition was allowed on a movie set, that guns and ammunition were left unattended … and that defendant Baldwin inexplicably pointed and fired a gun at Halyna Hutchins, makes this a case where injury or death was much more than just a possibility — it was a likely result,” Solovey’s lawsuit said, according to the Los Angeles Times.
A native of Ukraine, Hutchins moved to the United States to pursue her film career, which was taking off at the time of the accident, the Los Angeles Times reported. She was a graduate of the American Film Institute Conservatory, and had been selected as one of American Cinematographer’s Rising Stars two years before her death.
Meanwhile, Baldwin faces trial in another lawsuit, which was filed by Serge Svetnoy, a gaffer on the “Rust” set, NBC News reported. That lawsuit was scheduled to go to trial in the fall. Svetnoy alleges that he narrowly missed being hit by the bullet discharged from Baldwin’s gun. He also has claimed that measures on the set to cut costs meant that Baldwin, armorer Hannah Gutierrez-Reed and other producers “were consciously aware of the wrongfulness and harmfulness of their conduct.”
Perhaps the ongoing litigation is one reason that Baldwin continues to try to earn a living in movies and TV, even though his once acclaimed, four-decade career has never recovered from the “Rust” controversy, as Hollywood observers have noted. While Baldwin continues to work, his upcoming projects listed on IMDB mostly appear to be low-budget independent films. He also demonstrated his fall from “the A-list” by agreeing to film a 2025 reality TV series with his wife, Hilaria Baldwin, and their seven young children about their hectic family life as he was preparing to go to trial in New Mexico.
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