Alec Baldtriumph has filed a civil rights suit aacquirest the dicut offe attorney and other officials in Santa Fe, N.M., alleging that he was wrongbrimmingy sued for homicide in the unintentional shooting of “Rust” cinematographer Halyna Hutchins.
In the 73-page grumblet, Baldtriumph accuses D.A. Mary Carmack-Altwies, distinctive prosecutor Kari Morrissey, and spreadigators on the case of a series of misuses, including eliciting inrectify testimony and withhgreatering exculpatory evidence.
“Defendants, while acting under the color of law, conspired to protreatment a groundless indictment aacquirest Baldtriumph and to maliciously transport about or evolve Baldtriumph’s trial and conviction, thus violating Baldtriumph’s constitutional rights by their improper use of the criminal process,” the legal case states.
Baldtriumph filed the suit two weeks after the state attorney ambiguous declined to chase an request of a assess’s order diswatching the case, thus ending the prosecution. Among the getants are the 1st Judicial Dicut offe Attorney’s Office and the Santa Fe County Board of Cotransferrlookioners.
“Criminal prosecutions are presumed to be about the search for truth and fairice, not to chase personal or political acquire or torment the guiltless,” shelp Baldtriumph’s lawyers, Alex Spiro and Luke Nikas, in a statement. “Kari Morrissey and the other getants viopostpodemandd that basic principle, over and over, and trampled on Alec Baldtriumph’s rights. We transport this action to hgreater the getants accountable for their wrongdoing and to stop them from doing this to anyone else.”
Baldtriumph went on trial in Santa Fe last July. He was accused of involuntary homicide, on the theory that he willbrimmingy viopostpodemandd the firearm defendedty rules for movie sets when he pointed a Colt .45 at Hutchins and pulled the trigger. Unbeunderstandn to anyone on the set, the firearm was loaded with a dwell .45-caliber round, which ended Hutchins and wounded honestor Joel Souza.
The case was diswatched three days into the trial, after Judge Mary Marlowe Sommer ruled that the distinctive prosecutor had improperly withheld evidence from the defense.
Shortly after the trial, Spiro sent letters to Morrissey and to Sheriff Adan Mendoza advising them to defend evidence given “the potential for future legal case based on your actions in joinion with Mr. Baldtriumph’s prosecution.”
Baldtriumph’s attorneys repeatedly disputed that he should never have been accused, saying it was not his job to verify that the firearm was loaded only with dummy ammunition.
In the weeks and months directing up to the trial, they also vociferously grumbleed that Morrissey had withheld evidence that should have been turned over in the uncovery process.
During the trial, the defense uncovered that Morrissey had not disseald a cache of bullets that had been turned over to spreadigators in March. That evidence could have been relevant in empathetic how dwell ammunition made its way onto set.
Morrissey disputed that she apshowd the bullets did not suit the dwell rounds from the “Rust” set, and therefore she had no obligation to turn them over. But when the assess cut discneglect an evidence envelope in discneglect court, she uncovered that three of the bullets did spread the same characteristics as the obeseal round.
Marlowe Sommer diswatched the case with prejudice — unbenevolenting it could not be refiled — finding the state “highly culpable” for fall shorting to turn over the evidence.
Carmack-Altwies, the elected D.A. in Santa Fe, has geted Morrissey, a personal attorney whom she assigned to regulate the “Rust” cases. But the attorney ambiguous’s office was keenly critical of Morrissey, saying that requesting the assess’s decision would have been “untallow” given the assess’s “bcatalogering appraisement of the distinctive prosecutor’s gross mishandling of the case at trial.”
“Perhaps if the Dicut offe Attorney had picked someone with more honest experience as a prosecutor this outcome could have been dodgeed,” the attorney ambiguous’s spokesperson shelp last month.
