Accidental Shooting Puts Liberal Actor in Undesired Spotlight

It looks like Alec Baldwin has killed someone. He was performing. He fired a gun in the direction of a cinematographer and a director. The former is dead, and the latter is injured.

It’s an interesting story, because the two articles I read say movie prop masters are traditionally given the responsibility for making sure movie guns are not loaded. The writers made sure they included this information, which sounds exculpatory. Did someone working for Baldwin tell them to do it? It won’t help.

When people think they’re in legal trouble, they tend to spout every argument and excuse they can think of. This is very useful to the authorities, because most people don’t know the difference between exculpatory evidence and damning evidence. They will rattle off excuses they think are helpful when they’re really telling the police they’re guilty.

“I knocked him down and fractured his skull because he called me the N-word.” “I told the kids to stay away from the gun cabinet.” “The meter reader let the tigers out.”

If you kill someone negligently, you can be liable both criminally and civilly. I have no idea how the jurisdiction where Baldwin shot these people handles negligent homicides. That varies. I do know how civil negligence works, and the standards are ancient and pretty much universal.

In order to be guilty of negligence, you have to owe another person a duty of care, breach that duty negligently, and cause that person harm. Assuming Baldwin’s gun was functioning normally, he is guilty of negligence.

There are rules to gun handling, and they are well known. They don’t vary from place to place, either. One of the rules is that you always check a gun when you take possession of it. You see if it’s loaded. I don’t care if your dad, your priest, or Santa Claus himself hands it to you. You check. Another rule is that you never point a gun at anything you don’t want to shoot.

Baldwin should have examined the gun to see if it was loaded. If he didn’t, the cinematographer’s loved ones, if any, may be able to sue. They can sue Baldwin, the prop master, and maybe the company or companies that were making the movie.

What if he checked, but there was some defect in the gun or ammunition that caused a projectile to do harm? He’s still negligent. Why? Because he pointed a gun at people he didn’t want to shoot and pulled the trigger. He violated a well-known rule of gun safety.

You may argue that it’s impossible to make a movie without pointing guns at people and pulling their triggers, and that is true, but it’s only true if you’re aiming at an actor or stuntman. There is no valid reason for aiming a real gun or any other dangerous instrumentality at a cinematographer.

Everyone in Hollywood should know that freak accidents can cause guns to kill even when they’re not loaded with normal ammunition. The most famous on-camera shooting involved a gun that had something called a “dummy bullet” stuck in the barrel. A blank drove it out, and it killed Brandon Lee. Every studio’s attorneys and insurers know this, and actors and directors should know it. Studios should have comprehensive documents covering firearms safety measures, and one of the rules should be that you tell the actors never to point a firearm at anyone who isn’t playing a character who should be shot or threatened. Everyone who will be on the set of a movie where guns are used should have to read these documents. They probably exist.

Maybe the victims were shot because they needed to film Baldwin shooting toward the camera. They could have been moved. In 2021, we have sufficient technology to allow a director and cinematographer to film something without standing close to a camera.

What about the guilt of the victims? They’re probably negligent, too. If they sat next to a camera while Baldwin fired toward it, and they didn’t have to, they breached the duty of care they owed themselves. No idea how a court or jury would apportion the liability.

Are there waivers in place? I don’t know. Will they help? I don’t know. Courts don’t like waivers, believe it or not. That’s especially true when one party has more bargaining power than the other. Matt Lauer probably can’t stand on a waiver that says an intern won’t sue if he molests her.

I think that if the cinematographer has loved ones, some money will change hands, either after a trial or, if the studio’s insurance company’s lawyers aren’t idiots, before one can start. I doubt the director will sue anyone. He was in a management position, and the killing happened on his watch. He would look stupid trying to blame anyone else.

In the case of Brandon Lee, various lay sources say the authorities determined that the cause of the killing was negligence. I don’t know whether that’s true, but I do know that an investigator’s finding is not a verdict, so it wouldn’t mean anything in court. Lee’s mother sued and got some money, and the filmmakers were fined for workplace safety violations. There was no criminal prosecution.

I’m rusty because I don’t practice, so maybe I’m wrong about Baldwin’s case, but it looks somewhat complicated to me. I don’t think it’s a simple case.

I hope they don’t prosecute him. He must be miserable. I think our legal system is way too hard on people who make mistakes. I have performed more than one negligent act that could have killed someone else, and you probably have, too.

Oh, you haven’t? Ever text in the car? Better get off that high horse, Jesus Junior.

As readers of this blog know, there was a young man who was like a son to me, and he died two years ago after an accidental shooting. I felt some frustration because I knew the killing was unnecessary and caused by negligence, but I never, ever wanted to see the shooter arrested. I never felt any hostility toward him. People make mistakes, and a prosecution would have made him unemployable for years. Baldwin is a jerky individual, but I don’t think prosecution would serve any purpose. It certainly would not be corrective. I don’t think he’s likely to be careless with guns in the future. He will probably be the most careful actor in Hollywood.

There is some justice in what happened. Baldwin is on the far left, and he mocked Donald Trump after a high school shooting. He loves gun control, but, let’s face it, he does a great deal to promote the sale of firearms. Google “Alec Baldwin” images, and you will see him holding a wide variety of guns, and I don’t mean for trap shooting.

I like to say Barack Obama is the greatest gun salesman ever, because when he was elected, people went nuts, and they went on a gun-shopping binge that still hasn’t stopped. Truthfully, though, Hollywood has probably sold more guns than Barack Obama. Hollywood has done more than any other entity to make guns and knives seem cool and desirable.

Remember Dirty Harry? When Clint Eastwood played him, he used a Smith & Wesson Model 29 revolver in .44 Remington Magnum. A bogus story has circulated, saying it was a Model 57 in .41 Magnum, but according to director John Milius, that isn’t true. I think I’ve repeated the myth myself.

Before the movies came out, you could get yourself a gun like Harry’s. They were in short supply because they had gone out of production due to low popularity, but they could be found. Afterward, they vanished. Everyone wanted one, so they were snapped up. They’re still in demand. I bought a 27-2 in .357 Magnum partly because I liked Harry’s gun. The Model 29 went back into production because of Clint Eastwood. He probably drove the popularity of revolvers from Colt and Ruger, too.

Movies and TV shows sell guns like nothing else. The best thing that can happen to a gun manufacturer is to have a model featured in a movie. It will drive people to stores. Actors make it all happen. They even pose with guns on movie posters. Baldwin appeared on a poster for The Getaway, pointing what looks like a 1911 at the camera!

If actors are going to try to take away our civil rights, they should stop exercising them and making them so alluring in movies. Obvious?

Or they could just admit we need guns. Still, though, they could make a little effort to make shootouts look less enjoyable. They could show what really happens when the hero gets shot in the shoulder. He doesn’t wrap a rag around it and keep fighting. He gets an amputation, maybe. He loses use of the arm due to nerve damage. He loses an entire bicep muscle, like the guy who tried to murder Kyle Rittenhouse. Stuff like that happens.

I’m against Ouija boards and tarot cards. If I were an actor, I wouldn’t accept roles where I made them look appealing to the public. Why can’t actors have similar standards? Believe it or not, it’s possible to make a good movie without firearms or with firearms but without making people want to buy and use them.

My guess is that Baldwin will have a bad year due to stress and legal issues, but I’ll bet there is no prosecution. I feel sympathy for him. This has to be a terrible thing to go through.

I wonder what other conservatives are saying. Probably nothing nice.