'Rust' Armorer Hannah Gutierrez-Reed Has A Specific Request For The Jury

The trial for "Rust" armorer Hannah Gutierrez-Reed is set to begin in February 2024 after being postponed from December 2023.

The rookie armorer is facing two counts of involuntary manslaughter in connection with the October 2021 death of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins on the set of the Western film.

Although Gutierrez-Reed was not in the church during the rehearsal scene, a gun held by Alec Baldwin went off, killing Halyna Hutchins and hospitalizing director Joel Souza.

Amid their investigation, "Rust" prosecutors claimed a witness told them that the rookie armorer "transferred" cocaine to them on the day Hutchins was killed, thus impeding the police investigation. As such, she is now also facing an additional charge of tampering with evidence.

The involvement of high-profile actor Alec Baldwin has invited a lot of media scrutiny around the "Rust" incident, which has resulted in a substantial amount of press regarding Hannah Gutierrez-Reed as well. On January 8, 2024, according to exclusive court documents obtained by The Blast, her attorney Jason Bowles filed a motion to try to prevent the jury pool from being influenced by media coverage that they may have been exposed to before the start of next month's trial.

According to the legal filing placed by Jason Bowles of Bowles Law Firm and Todd J. Bullion of Bullion Law Office, the two lawyers asked the court to add a question in jury selection with the intention of eliminating potential jurors that might have already been exposed to the media coverage surrounding the "Rust" incident and the charges she is facing.

"As this Court is aware, this case has generated intense publicity over the past year and a half," the filing states, going on to say that "there have been numerous statements made in the press regarding Ms. Gutierrez-Reed. The likelihood is that some or most jurors will have heard or read something in the press" about the "Rust" shooting.

The legal team is asking the court to "allow a general question regarding anyone hearing or reading about this case or Ms. Gutierrez Reed in the press and a show of hands" so as "to not taint the panel."

The court documents go on to request a way that "individual jurors can be questioned about this, perhaps at the end of the other questions on what they have heard and whether they can be fair and impartial." They suggest that this could be done "at the very end of the questioning" so as "to not slow down" the court proceedings.

"What counsel is trying to avoid is the panel being prejudiced by jurors saying what they have heard in front of other panel members," her legal team wrote in the filing. "This is important to ensure a fair and impartial jury for Ms. Gutierrez Reed."

It is important to note that the "Counsel for the state does not oppose this motion," as stated at the bottom of the filing.

In court documents obtained by The Blast in July 2023, the "Rust" armorer's legal team slammed prosecutors, who they said "unleashed a repeated deluge of very prejudicial statements" against Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, which they allege were "designed to influence potential jurors as to her guilt."

They go on to state that rumors about the armorer being "hungover" on set were "recklessly thrown out as unsupported rumors and innuendo." Her legal team condemned these "completely unsupported statements" and noted that the state had yet to identify a witness "to substantiate its reckless claims."

In the court documents, Bowles wrote, “The State asks this Court to strike the supplemental filing by Ms. Gutierrez Reed, as untimely, but it could not have been filed before the state’s most recent statements. The State wants free rein to recklessly taint the jury pool, but not allow Ms. Gutierrez Reed to respond in a timely fashion to those statements with motion practice.”

Her legal team goes on to say that “the idea that a fair trial is possible in this case is a complete farce at this point,” adding that the drinking, using, and now drug tampering allegations have now all made their way through the national media multiple times and it’s impossible to run a Google search on her name and not get pages and pages of stories on those unsupported allegations.”