After evaluating the gun, investigators with the FBI, along with independent forensic experts, have said it would be impossible for the revolver to go off without its trigger being pulled.
Earlier court filings from the prosecution further claim that Baldwin had not respected on-set safety protocol after missing the production’s initial firearms training.
In a subsequent one-on-one training with Gutierrez-Reed, the state wrote that, “Mr. Baldwin was inattentive during this training and spent time during the training on the phone with his family and making videos of himself shooting the gun for his family’s enjoyment.”
The prosecution also contends that Baldwin’s current account of the shooting contradict earlier interviews with law enforcement, where he claimed the gun just “went off” but never asserted that he did not pull the trigger.
Prosecutors allege that the star only began claiming he did not trigger the revolver after a 2021 interview with George Stephanopoulos, in which they accuse the actor of having “lied with impunity and blamed the incident on Ms. Hutchins.”
A grand jury handed down an indictment earlier this year, charging the actor by two separate involuntary manslaughter standards: a lesser charge of negligent use of a firearm, as well as a felony charge for acting without due caution or circumspection.
The jury will only have to return one verdict on one count to convict Baldwin, however.