(Headline USA) The FBI disputed actor Alec Baldwin’s claim that he didn’t pull the trigger of the gun used to fatally shoot a crew member on the set of Rust.
The agency, which has been working with local authorities to investigate the fatal shooting that occurred last October, said forensic evidence proved pulling the trigger was the only way to get the gun to fire.
FBI officials recently finished their report and sent it to the Santa Fe County Sheriff’s Office, according to NPR. It concluded the gun’s trigger must have been pulled.
Baldwin, however, has denied ever pulling the trigger.
“I would never point a gun at anyone and pull the trigger at them. Never,” he said last year. “Someone is responsible for what happened, and I can’t say who that is. But I know it’s not me.”
Baldwin claimed he “pulled the hammer as far back as [he] could without cocking,” then “let go of the hammer,” and “bang, the gun goes off.”
After the FBI’s findings were made public, Baldwin’s team claimed the report has been “misconstrued” and reiterated the claim that Baldwin never pulled the trigger.
“The gun fired in testing only one time — without having to pull the trigger — when the hammer was pulled back and the gun broke in two different places,” Luke Nikas, Baldwin’s lawyer, said in a statement. “The FBI was unable to fire the gun in any prior test, even when pulling the trigger, because it was in such poor condition.”
Santa Fe District Attorney Mary Carmack-Altwie has said prosecutors were not ruling out any sorts of punishment, including for Baldwin.
“Once the First Judicial District Attorney’s Office (‘FJDA’) receives the completed investigation from the Santa Fe County Sheriff’s Office (‘SFSO’), the FJDA will begin the screening process and any necessary follow-up investigation,” she said in a statement.
