True Crime Vault: The Deadly Take

Summary

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20/20 True Crime Vault: The Deadly Take

Date: December 9, 2025
Host: ABC News
Episode Focus: The tragic fatal shooting of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins on the set of the film "Rust" and an in-depth comparison of on-set safety failures, specifically revisiting the 2014 "Midnight Rider" accident that killed Sarah Jones. The episode explores how two young women lost their lives due to avoidable on-set negligence, the immediate aftermath, the criminal investigation, and the broader industry implications.

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Episode Overview

This episode of "20/20 True Crime Vault" provides a gripping, minute-by-minute account of the Rust shooting incident, details the context leading up to the tragedy, addresses unresolved questions, and draws powerful parallels with the Midnight Rider train tragedy. Filmmakers, crew, experts, and loved ones give emotional testimony about the personal losses, the shocking lapses in safety, and the urgent calls for systemic change in film industry protocols.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Setting the Scene: The "Rust" Production

• Bonanza Creek Ranch in Santa Fe, NM, is introduced as a classic western filming location. (02:22)
• "Rust" is a low-budget western, starring and produced by Alec Baldwin, with a 21-day shooting schedule and a $7.5 million budget, described as "the catering budget on a DC Comics movie." (07:57)
• Crew roles were combined to save costs, notably assigning the armorer (in charge of firearm safety) to also assist with props. The armorer, Hannah Gutierrez Reed, was only 24. (08:05–08:34)

2. Halyna Hutchins: A Rising Star

• Hutchins, born in Ukraine, was a passionate cinematographer and mother, lauded for energy, confidence, and collaborative spirit. (04:12–06:15)
• "There's always like a spotlight on her whenever she's around everybody else." – Filmmaker (05:50)

3. Mounting Tensions and Safety Concerns

• Crew began noticing issues with hotel accommodations, long commutes, rushed schedules, and—most crucially—firearm mishandling. (14:22–15:14)
• Multiple accidental gun discharges occurred prior to the fatal shooting, raising alarm. "When you hear about something like two accidental discharges of weapons, the gun's going off. That's serious business." (13:42)
• Some crew resigned over safety concerns; their resignation email cited "things often played very fast and loose." (16:05)

4. The Fatal Incident

• Timeline recounted in detail:
  • The day began with most of the camera crew walking off; replacement crew brought in under pressure. (18:35)
  • A safety meeting was held prior to filming, reiterating that gunfire was scheduled. (19:17)
  • Key Moment: After lunch, in preparation for a close-up shot, Alec Baldwin was told the gun was "cold" (safe). A gun loaded with what were supposed to be dummy rounds discharged, killing Hutchins and injuring director Joel Souza. (20:12–22:27)
  • "I let go of the hammer, and the gun goes off." – Alec Baldwin (22:10)
  • Chaos ensued, and emergency services responded within minutes. (23:54–25:32)

5. Aftermath: Investigation & Grief

• Immediate disbelief and dismay on set and in the wider film community. (25:07–27:11)
• The realization that a live round was fired—never supposed to be present on set. (27:44)
• Grief over Halyna's death and visible devastation among crew, Alec Baldwin, and Halyna's family. "What can you possibly say to him? ... I don't know how to convey to you how sorry I am." – Crew member, to Halyna's husband (29:40)

6. Broader Context: Accidents in Film History

• The episode draws direct parallels between this tragedy and previous deaths: John Eric Hexum (1984), Brandon Lee on "The Crow" (1993), and Sarah Jones on "Midnight Rider" (2014). (30:23–31:21)
• "No one should die making a movie." (43:52)
• The show recounts the details of the "Midnight Rider" train accident: improper location permits, lack of safety meetings, and the fatality of Sarah Jones due to blatant negligence. (47:00–65:17)

7. Legal & Industry Fallout

• Rust tragedy prompts criminal investigation, search warrants, and lawsuits—the focus is on determining how a live round ended up on set and ultimately in the gun. (33:01, 34:03)
• Discussion of “safety bulletins” and the lack of legal enforceability—most industry standards are not codified laws but are voluntary best practices. (45:54)
• Testimony from safety experts and armorers about strict protocols:
  • "If I picked up a dummy round and it didn’t rattle, I would stop and isolate it from the rest." – Hollywood armorer (34:40–34:59)
• In the "Midnight Rider" case, director Randall Miller was the first in history to go to jail for a film-set death. (72:19)
• Civil and possible criminal liability are discussed regarding Rust's armorer, assistant director, and Alec Baldwin. (75:23–75:59)

8. Industry Reckoning & Future Changes

• Growing movement to ban real firearms and live ammunition on set; some studios immediately implement such bans. (76:14–76:40)
• Use of CGI muzzle flashes as a practical alternative, with visual examples described. (77:53)
• Debate continues over whether real guns are necessary for realism or whether safety must take absolute precedence. (78:43-79:12)
• Call for codified legal protections, not just voluntary industry guidelines. "Nothing's more important than that. Never again let someone's daughter die." (79:12–79:36)
• Names of Halyna Hutchins and Sarah Jones are honored and remembered as a catalyst for industry change. (80:06–80:44)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

"There’s always like a spotlight on her whenever she’s around everybody else."
– Filmmaker on Halyna Hutchins (05:50)

"If I picked up a dummy round and it didn’t rattle, I would stop and isolate it from the rest of the dummy rounds. If there’s any question, any anomaly, it’s not going into the gun."
– Hollywood armorer (34:40)

"No one should die making a movie."
– Narrator (43:52, 73:33)

"Just because something is an accident doesn’t mean that a criminal act didn’t occur."
– Legal expert (75:43)

"How many more names need to go on a slate before the needed changes are made in this industry so it just will not happen again?"
– Industry advocate (80:33)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• Opening & Rust Set-Up: 00:32–05:13
• Halyna Hutchins: Life & Career: 04:12–07:02
• Safety Concerns & Accidental Discharges: 12:46–14:11
• Crew Walkout & Rising Tensions: 15:02–16:34; 18:35
• The Day of the Shooting: 19:02–23:54
• Immediate Aftermath & Police Response: 24:24–27:11
• Shockwaves & Industry Context: 31:21–34:03
• Rust Shooting Investigation & Legal Questions: 33:01–39:05
• Midnight Rider Story & Parallels to Rust: 47:00–72:19
• Industry Reckoning, Legislation, and Visual Effects: 76:14–78:43
• Tributes and Final Reflections: 80:06–81:17

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Emotional & Industry Reflections

• The episode is marked by a tone of sorrow, outrage, and urgency.
• Families, colleagues, and industry members express profound grief and demand change.
• The deaths of Sarah Jones and Halyna Hutchins are represented as avoidable and emblematic of larger, systemic failures in safety culture.
• There is optimism that these tragedies might finally drive lasting reforms: codifying laws, eliminating live guns and ammunition, and ensuring no more names are added to the slate.

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Conclusion

"True Crime Vault: The Deadly Take" is a sobering account of the Rust shooting tragedy and its chilling echoes from film history. By combining minute-by-minute re-creations, personal remembrances, and expert analysis, the episode delivers both a cautionary tale for an industry at a crossroads and a heartfelt tribute to lives lost. It underscores one clear, pressing message: No one should die making a movie—and it is finally time for real change.

Transcript

[Narrator]

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Welcome to the true crime Vault, home to 2020's most chilling stories.

[Interviewee]

The scene up at the church was to be done. I let go of the hammer. Bang. The gun goes off. Then there's a shot. There shouldn't have been a shot because they were dummy rounds. And then there was a scream.

[Narrator]

Oh my God, what is that? Helena has instantly fallen.

[Interviewee]

I noticed this bunch of roses right in the spot where Helena was when she was shot.

[Narrator]

None of us can process that there was a live bullet even on set.

[Interviewee]

Where did the live round come from?

[Narrator]

You've already heard Alec Baldwin speak. Now what do others on the set and those in the know have to say?

[Interviewee]

Two other people that handled and or inspected the loaded firearm, armorer Hannah Reed Gutierrez and assistant director David Hal. Sabotage is the most likely possibility.

[Narrator]

This was not sabotage. This was incompetence.

[Interviewee]

So when someone dies.

I've been told that it's highly unlikely I would be charged with anything criminally. I can't control what he says or what he believes. But I know that we have not ruled out anyone.

[Narrator]

And the sad thing is there have been other accidental deaths on movies, but they're still happening. Such a horrific tragedy of someone losing their life again.

[Interviewee]

It will be a cold start on the day, but we'll also have plenty of sunshine over high mounted 56 degrees and Santa Fe 53. I'm cheating you all.

[Narrator]

The.

[Interviewee]

Bonanza Creek ranch in Santa Fe, New Mexico is a longtime location for shooting films.

Several thousand acres, a number of buildings, lots of great views. All the things that people come to New Mexico to shoot for.

[Narrator]

It's used for a lot of westerns. If you go back and look at different movies, you can see like, oh yeah, that looks like Bonanza Creek branch.

One thing you notice just as you're getting off the highway is there are these yellow corrugated plastic crew signs everywhere, kind of dotting the desert landscape, letting you know, this production this way or this production this way.

[Interviewee]

Rust is A classic western.

[Narrator]

The story is about this grizzled outlaw named Harland Rust. And that was a character played by Alec Baldwin.

[Interviewee]

I read it and I said, I love it. I love it.

[Narrator]

From the jump, Baldwin knew that he wanted to be the star in it. And he's also a producer. This was a real passion project.

The ranch will become the meeting point for 75 crew members, 22 principal actors and hundreds of extras. And they're all converging on the set with this singular goal of making the movie Rust.

Well, the first days on just about any set are exciting. My first day on set, I'm like truly living a western dream, getting to.

[Interviewee]

Be in my full cowboy garb and.

[Narrator]

Riding a horse and watching stunts happen.

We're out here making a western.

[Interviewee]

That's classic cinema right there.

[Narrator]

And I know Helena shared that. Helena Hutchins is the cinematographer.

[Interviewee]

Helena Hutchins was born in Ukraine 42 years ago.

[Narrator]

Make sure we don't see people walking around.

[Interviewee]

Like, walking around. She originally was an investigative journalist before turning to cinematography.

[Narrator]

Felina's Instagram bio reads, restless dreamer, adrenaline junkie, cinematographer.

She's married and they have a nine year old son. You can see them on her husband's Instagram.

[Interviewee]

In 2015, she graduated from AFI American Film Institute and then a few years later, in 2019, was listed as a cinematographer on the rise.

[Narrator]

Yeah, it's a passion for sure. Yeah, once you get the bug, you can't get out of it.

[Interviewee]

I wrote and directed a movie called Archenemy and Helena was my cinematographer on that film.

Helena's confidence was a kind of like quiet self assurance. She would laugh a lot. She was a very sort of calculating, collected person who also had a deep reservoir of emotions.

[Narrator]

It's more about, let's continue with everything. She was working really hard to establish herself in the film industry and in particular really a male dominated branch of the film industry. Okay, so setting up this one here. It's going into the start. Couple steps first.

[Interviewee]

Yeah, there's this one image I have in my head. I think of a lot. She wanted to see what was behind a very high up window. So she sat on the shoulders of a tall camera department guy. It was a superhero movie and she looked just a little bit like a superhero herself. In my mind. There's always like a spotlight on her whenever she's around everybody else.

After Archenemy came up, I was getting a lot of calls from people saying, can you put me in touch with Helena? We want her.

[Narrator]

Rust was a big break and it Was an opportunity for her to just show how good she was.

[Interviewee]

Helena was very gifted and she had a vision and she knew what she wanted and she commands the room.

[Narrator]

She would sometimes reach out and grab my arm and pull me over in front of the monitor, like, look, look how good they look. She just seemed to think that every single person here, here to create this dream. And that excitement was infectious. Also on set, there's director Joel Souza and assistant director Dave Hulls and also first camera assistant Lane Looper, who meets Halina for the first time on this project.

[Interviewee]

And we became friends pretty quickly.

[Narrator]

Describe that working relationship between the head of the camera department and the cinematographer of a film.

[Interviewee]

It's basically myself, the camera operators and Helena, you know, all creating the frame. Her friend Serge was the gaffer of the movie, you know, handling the lighting and everything. And I'm there to handle the camera for her. So it's kind of like a. It's a very close knit team.

[Narrator]

I know Halinas maybe five, six years, something.

[Interviewee]

We understand each other, we trust each other. We have maybe same vision.

[Narrator]

Film sets are instant. Community was more tight knit than most films I've worked on. Very, very quickly we became each other's family away from home.

[Interviewee]

This is a $7.5 million movie. It is the catering budget on a DC Comics movie. Okay.

[Narrator]

And part of the low budget nature of this film, they were trying to do more with less producers even combining some crew roles for people. They were insisting upon having one person do two very important jobs. The armorer role, taking care of the guns and ammunition. And then they wanted that person to also be an assistant prop person.

[Interviewee]

And this was a western, so there were a lot of firearms in this movie. That's a lot of responsibility.

[Narrator]

The person who's hired as both the armorer and the prop assistant is a young woman who's just starting out in her career named Hannah Gutierrez Reed. Hannah was only 24, so being the lead armorer on a movie is a big role. Her dad named Thel Reed, who is a very well known gunslinger in Hollywood. He's especially known for something called the quick draw. He demonstrated his quick draw ability in a video about the making of Django Unchained.

[Interviewee]

As you can see, it doesn't take much time to get it on the fire. Hannah Gutierrez Reed has spent her life watching her father handle and oversee the use of firearms in any number of movies. She's been raised around gun safety and all that stuff. 14 little girls, she's so safe with the guns and the way she Handles them. It's just I don't have to worry about anything when I get her on the set.

[Narrator]

You trust her on your sets?

[Interviewee]

Any set? Yes, absolutely.

[Narrator]

Within days of getting the job on Rust, Hannah was posting on Facebook about how excited she was to have gotten this job. And she specifically noted, excited to be working with armory and to step into the world of props. Before the job started on September 29, just right after she had secured it, she wrot on Facebook. How is it that life's been so good lately? I can't help but to feel like I'm about to fall from grace.

The tensions with the camera crew really started to grow. Talina, she didn't look. She wasn't her usual, you know, calm, focused, cheerful self.

When you're working on a movie set, every single moment counts. Moviemaking, in some ways, it's a race against the clock. You only have a certain number of days and a certain amount of money. Rust is scheduled to be a 21 day shoot.

[Interviewee]

What does that demand you? Do you have to be efficient to be efficient?

[Narrator]

Helena was so intense and so full of energy and so passionate.

[Interviewee]

She would get it in her mind how she wanted it. Look, and we'd work to get her what she wanted. She had that intensity. Every day you went to work, she would say, good morning, how are you? How was your evening? Boom. It was small talk. Go. We weren't gonna hang out and chit chat or whatever. She knew that the clock was the enemy and we have to move forward.

[Narrator]

I felt like it was a good pace for the level of the budget that we had. It ran smooth than anything of that budget I've ever been involved with. It really did. But some crew members said the production felt rushed.

[Interviewee]

The tone on set was like, we need to go now, now, now. It just was a beat the clock kind of thing.

I arrived on the 11th. I had dinner with Halyna.

[Narrator]

Baldwin posted a video of himself on Instagram shortly after he arrived on set.

[Interviewee]

I want to say I look at myself in the mirror reflection of this and I'm really kind of appalled. It's appalling. We're here shooting the film we tomorrow and.

No, I'm not playing Santa Claus. On the 12th, I had a safety demonstration with Hannah Reed, the armorer. We spent an hour and a half shooting the pistol, her giving me all her safety instructions.

[Narrator]

We were told by several members of the crew that Hannah sometimes had the guns in her waistband or she would carry them underneath her armpits. Now this is a young woman who was around guns her whole life. For other members of the crew, this was sort of alarming. Hannah's lawyer tells abc it's not unusual for armorers to carry firearms like this to various places on set as they need to. He says there was never a safety issue with Hannah's carrying of the firearms.

[Interviewee]

Did you think she was up to the job? I assumed because she was there and she was hired, she was up for the job and nothing she did Raise any red flags with you? No.

[Narrator]

The second week of filming, some members of the crew said they were starting to have concerns with how weapons were being handled on the set. Saturday, October 16th was a big day on set. There were several major shootouts scheduled to be filmed that day. And in the midst of that, there were two accidental discharges.

The prop master, Sarah Zachary, was loading the gun. The gun was pointed down and it went off in her hands. It definitely caused a commotion on set. Several people I talked to described it as something that upset people. There was, you know, a sound and it was unexpected.

[Interviewee]

There is no projectile in the gun. It's just a bang and some smoke. Sarah did self report what had happened.

[Narrator]

There was another accidental discharge on this Saturday. And Alec Baldwin's stunt double had this misfire with a gun.

[Interviewee]

When you hear about something like two accidental discharges of weapons, the sun's going off. That's serious business.

[Narrator]

The Russ production team told ABC News, the safety of our cast and crew is the top priority of Russ Productions. Russ producers say they never received any official complaints regarding weapons or prop safety on set. Russ productions declined to comment specifically on the accidental discharges.

[Interviewee]

I never saw anything that was in my mind unsafe ever.

[Narrator]

I felt safe, Honestly, every time I was handling a gun, Every time I was on set, I felt safe. I had to have a gun in every scene. I always had it in my holster.

[Interviewee]

In every scene because we're cowboys. During the second week of filming that an issue with hotels comes up for the crew because they're pulling what they feel like are some very long days on the set. They went to the production to talk about this so that after 12 hour days, they didn't have to drive for like dozens and dozens of miles just to get back to somewhere where they could put their head down for just a few hours to then have to get back up again and go right back to work. My drive to set was 75 miles a day each way, every day. It was never a problem. The work schedule, the ins, the outs, when we would come in, in the morning, when we left, it was really never a problem. There was nothing about the schedule that was grueling.

[Narrator]

The Russ Productions team told ABC News that they're confident that they provided hotels when they were required. This issue of the hotel rooms became such a divisive issue.

On Sunday. This cruise call time was noon. They were there till 1:30 in the morning. It was dark out, but it was cold and they were gathering up all their equipment. And one of the camera operators that night, what I was told, spent a few hours sleeping in his car because he felt it was unsafe to drive home. And that's really, I think when the tensions with the camera crew really started to grow.

They show up for a 6am call time. It was a long, arduous day that day. One of the camera operators asked for a hotel room that night and the production said no. And that what several of the camera operators and assistants and camera crew people told me was that that's when they felt like, these people don't care about us.

Later that night, Lane Looper and some other members of the camera crew, they email production managers their resignation letters. And in Lane's letter he writes about his concerns regarding their housing. He also lays out some safety concerns, saying during the filming of gunfights on this job, things are often played very fast and loose. So far there have been two accidental weapons discharges. It was, you know, close to 9 o' clock when these emails started rolling into the production office that they were going to be without the camera crew.

[Interviewee]

For a group of crew members to come together and say we need to as a group, basically strike this set, it's not that common.

[Narrator]

This week, 25 members of Russ cast and crew released a letter that Alec Baldwin posted on his Instagram which they say was not sanctioned or influenced by the producers. And it stated the descriptions of Rust as a chaotic, dangerous and exploitive workplace are false. In response to Lane Looper's allegations, the production team from Russ told ABC News that Mr. Looper's allegations around budget and safety are patently false. And they say safety is always the number one priority in our films.

The next morning, their departure would be the beginning of a deeply troubling day on set.

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[Interviewee]

Phew.

[Narrator]

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The day got off to a. Most of the camera crew packed up their gear and they walked off the job. They were making good on the threats from the night before, quitting over their concerns, which included accommodations and safety on the set.

[Interviewee]

I was as surprised as everybody else when for the first hour and a half there was no camera crew on set at all. I know that that put a little bit of a strain on the whole production.

[Narrator]

The first person I saw was Helena and she didn't look. She wasn't her usual, you know, calm, focused, cheerful self. She was under pressure to not look stressed to keep everything rolling.

And shortly after that, there is a safety meeting that did address that. There was going to be, you know, gunfire happening that day.

[Interviewee]

So before launch, there was a scene where there were some guns being used. At the end of those scenes being done, all the guns were collected and placed back in the safe.

[Narrator]

They broke for lunch around 12:30.

[Interviewee]

When they come back from lunch, we get word that they're gonna do this little insert shot of just the gun that Helena wants pointing right at camera.

[Narrator]

The scene wasn't supposed to have any gunfire.

[Interviewee]

The scene is the two. Two guys are there, the other two actors who have got me, you know, cornered. And I then draw the gun, cross draw out of my holster, pull the gun up like that and start to cock the pistol. Cut.

[Narrator]

Now comes a key moment. Alec Baldwin hears cold gun. That's the signal that the weapon is safe to use.

What does it mean for a gun to be declared cold?

[Interviewee]

It means not nothing is going to happen when you pull the trigger besides the click. So it's either a completely empty chamber or it has the dummy rounds in it, which are also fake.

[Narrator]

Joey Dillon is a Hollywood armorer. He did not work on rust. You've brought some dummy rounds with you?

[Interviewee]

I did, yeah. It looks exactly the same as the real bullet. In lieu of the gunpowder in there, they put a single BB in There. And you can hear that. You can hear it rattle, shaking around, especially on the. You can.

[Narrator]

Yeah, the whole thing's rattling. Yeah.

[Interviewee]

By 1:20, the scene up at the church was to be done.

[Narrator]

Alec Baldwin was sitting in a pew. They wanted to have the camera look down the barrel of the gun. They were trying to set it up.

[Interviewee]

You could see the ends of the bullet. So that's why it was loaded with dum dums. You know, you need to be able to see that bullet. I'm at the front door of the church and I was probably four or five yards away from Alec and Helena. Helena was telling Alec she wanted to see his thumb working the hammer back to do the shot. She was probably only 18 inches, 2ft away, maybe from the muzzle of the gun. She takes a monitor, that is his monitor, the operator, and turns it toward her. And she says to me, hold the gun lower. Go to your right. Okay. Right there. All right, do that.

I was like.

[Narrator]

Then like this.

[Interviewee]

This was Helena camera was more or less here. I'm holding the gun where she told me to hold it, which ended up being aimed right and below her armpit.

[Narrator]

The cameras were not rolling, so there is no actual footage of this tragedy.

[Interviewee]

You just hold the hammer as far back as I could without cocking the actual. And you're holding onto the hammer. I'm holding that. I'm just showing. I go, how about that? Does that work? You see that? Do you see that? Instead she goes, yeah, that's good. I let go of the hammer and the gun goes off.

[Narrator]

Yeah, I saw the gun. And.

[Interviewee]

All of a sudden, boom. And it was so loud.

[Narrator]

I actually thought that maybe some equipment had exploded or fallen after the gun went off. People in the room have described it as just being total chaos.

[Interviewee]

And then there was a scream.

[Narrator]

And then they look and Halina has instantly fallen back and she's on the ground and she is bleeding from her chest.

[Interviewee]

Immediately.

Bleeding and bleeding profusely. That's when it got real. Oh, my Lord.

[Narrator]

She said, something happened with my.

Stomach.

[Interviewee]

I don't feel my legs.

[Narrator]

Her skin was so white.

[Interviewee]

And the lips.

Great.

[Narrator]

And director Joel Souza is also hurt. He is writhing on the floor in agony. It's total confusion.

[Interviewee]

When she went down, he went down and he was screaming really loudly. And I thought, what is he screaming? What happened? Did you go up to her? Did you back up? I went up to her and then we were immediately told to get out of the building. We were forced to get out of the building.

[Narrator]

Mamie Mitchell, the script supervisor Runs out and she starts calling 911. Santa Fe firing EMS on the location of emergency. Bonanza Creek Ranch has two people accidentally shot on a movie set by a prop gun. We need help immediately. It didn't take them long at all to begin sending units. But the people who were on set, the people who were at the base camp, had this false sense that it might not be that bad.

[Interviewee]

Nobody told you what happened? No, no.

[Narrator]

And we just were all sitting there waiting and trying to get any information on what happened. Are they okay?

[Interviewee]

I knew there was nothing short of something catastrophic happening that would cause what I had seen happen to Helena there. I said, I'm telling you right now, that was a bullet. No one was ready to believe that.

[Narrator]

After the shooting, everyone's trying to get their bearings.

Helena has finally been taken away in a helicopter. Joel Souza has been taken to a different hospital.

[Interviewee]

Within 15 minutes or 20 minutes after that, the police arrived and took the church set and put the crime tape around it, the yellow tape, and forced us all to the perimeters of the parking area.

Where we sat and waited.

Nobody told you what happened? No, no.

We got the call at 1:48pm that day.

Our deputies responded within two or three minutes to the scene, along with EMS. So it was pretty immediate. Alec was just beside himself. We were all dumbfounded. When they get there, there's over 100 people there. It's pretty hectic and pretty chaotic.

[Narrator]

The people who were in the church all had to be interviewed by police. I was in my trailer and one.

[Interviewee]

Of the other actors told me, hey, you should know. I just heard on Milwaukee a pretty urgent call 911.

[Narrator]

And we assumed the stunt went wrong.

I went back to base camp. We were there until.

The police came down and talked to all of us. News of the shooting spread quickly, breaking.

[Interviewee]

News on a movie set near Santa Fe.

[Narrator]

The sign behind me does say Rust. We do believe that's where the incident may have happened, but we are working to get that confirmed.

[Interviewee]

In the afternoon, we heard some rumblings out of New Mexico that there'd been some sort of accident on the set of the Alec Baldwin film Rust. At first, we weren't really clear what it was, but as the day went on, we learned more.

[Narrator]

Ultimately, we found out something had happened with a gun, and it was Joel.

[Interviewee]

And Helena who were involved, which was frightening.

[Narrator]

A while later, there was a helicopter above. There were news stations and paparazzi all at the gate. And then there were more helicopters as all of a sudden, it went all over the news. It became this Huge thing. And we were like, it was so surreal.

[Interviewee]

A source of mine said that it was actually Alec Baldwin who fired that gun. New details about this. Alec Baldwin fired a prop gun. Alec fired the shot. My mouth dropped to the floor. The story just became something much, much bigger than we thought it originally was.

[Narrator]

We're all sitting there waiting, trying to get any information on what happened. Are they okay?

[Interviewee]

The mood was still, still optimistic.

[Narrator]

We kept hearing, she's stable, she's stable.

[Interviewee]

The main focus of the investigators is to get initial statements. Gutierrez, Reed, Mr. Halls and Mr. Baldwin were brought to the sheriff's office. Everybody understood that this was a major incident and everybody was cooperating. I was there for like an hour and a half or so, so. And finally one of the police officers, she takes her phone and she slides it across to me. She says, that's what came out of Joel's shoulder. A.45 caliber slug was a real bullet. It was utter disbelief over the idea. It was unacceptable, the idea that it was a live round.

How did a live round get in this gun? The kind of insanity inducing agony of thinking that someone put a live bullet in the gun.

The key grip gets a phone call.

It said that she's gone.

Then it's just tears everywhere. Everybody was, it was unbelievable, but that it was just universal tears all around and just a sense of despair, you know.

They said to me, we regret to tell you that she didn't make it. She died. They told me right then and there. And that's when I went in the parking lot and called my wife to talk to my wife.

He looked disheveled, he looked distraught.

[Narrator]

Those pictures underscored this was a tragic accident. And this guy is reeling.

[Interviewee]

Her husband comes to town. Her husband Matthew.

And I met with him and their son. And he was as kind as you could be.

What can you possibly say to him? I didn't know what to say. He hugged me and he goes, he goes, I suppose you were not going to go through this together. He said. And I thought, well, not as much as you are, you know. And his little boy is there who's nine years old. And I told him, I said, I, I, I, I don't know what to say. I don't know how to convey to you how sorry I am.

About four days later, they finally let us get back in, just to even collect our gear. I noticed this bunch of roses right in the street spot where Elena was when she was shot. And it was almost.

Almost a spiritual kind of a moment.

[Narrator]

There was really palpable grief with pretty much anyone you spoke to in the film community. This is not the first highly publicized death involving firearms on a movie set. In 1984, John Eric Hexum was an actor. He. He was on the set of a TV show called Cover up, and he had a.44 Magnum which was loaded with blanks. He pointed the gun at his head and fired. A wad of paper burst out from the dummy bullet and actually fractured his skull. And he died a decade later. On the set of the Crow, which starred Brandon Lee, Bruce Lee's son. There's a scene where there was a guns going off and somehow the tip of a bullet had wound up in the chamber of the gun and he was shot fatally.

Tonight is about Helena. To comfort each other and to celebrate a remarkable life of a remarkable woman. If you weren't on this movie, you can't possibly understand what this feels like.

[Interviewee]

And what it was to experience that day and what it was to lose this person.

[Narrator]

You can't know what this feels like. And.

There'S nothing that can prepare you for.

Losing somebody.

In a horrible accident that you would never imagine being able to happen at a place that you assume you're safe. Going to work.

[Interviewee]

For the Santa Fe Sheriff's Office, I would say the number one priority is finding out where the live round came from.

[Narrator]

There's so many unanswered questions.

[Interviewee]

Everyone is wondering, how did live ammunition get in there?

[Narrator]

But something went horribly wrong here in Santa Fe. On the set of Alec Baldwin's new western film, Rust, the actor and producer.

[Interviewee]

Fired the firearm that killed the director of photography, injured the director.

[Narrator]

The idea that a gun could have been fired and someone could have been killed in 2021 on the set of a movie was completely shocking.

[Interviewee]

And ultimately, the big question is, who is to blame?

[Narrator]

There are so many questions that investigators are trying to answer. The who, what, why, and how. How on earth does this happen?

[Interviewee]

In the aftermath of the shooting, the set was shut down, search warrants were issued, and the investigation began.

[Narrator]

It turns out there have been a number of different questions raised about what exactly caused the deadly shooting to occur.

[Interviewee]

Tonight. Authorities now confirming it was a live bullet that that gun had that was handed to Alec Baldwin. When we processed the scene and the evidence was collected and all the rounds were gone through, we determined that there were other possible live rounds that were on set.

Here's the reality. Guns have been used in Hollywood movies for decades and decades and decades. The live ammunition is never supposed to be on the set of a movie or television show. End of Story.

[Narrator]

Obviously we want to know how that live round got on the set, but what's more important is how that live round got into the gun.

[Interviewee]

We identified two other people that handled and or inspected the loaded firearm prior to Baldwin firing the weapon. These two individuals are armorer Hannah Reed Gutierrez and assistant director David Halls.

[Narrator]

Marker Dutch Merrick is a longtime Hollywood armorer and prop master, and though he didn't work on rust, he told us his protocol for checking rounds.

[Interviewee]

When we're dealing with dummy rounds as they come out of the box, each one gets a rattle and it's very easy to tell which is a dummy. If I picked up a dummy round and it didn't rattle, I would stop and I would go, wait a second. I would isolate it from the rest of the dummy rounds. If there's any question, any anomaly, it's not going into the gun. It's not going onto the film set.

[Narrator]

According to a search warrant, assistant director Dave Hulls told investigators that Gutierrez Reed opened up the firearm that would be used by Baldwin. But hall said he could only remember some seeing three rounds and that he should have checked all the chambers of the gun but didn't and he couldn't recall if Gutierrez Reed spun the drum. Halls also told investigators he didn't know that there were any live rounds in the gun. An attorney representing Dave Halls has said it was not his client's responsibility to confirm whether that gun was loaded. According to a search warrant, Gutierrez Reed told investigators that she loaded five dummy rounds into Baldwin's gun before lunch and then a six after when the gun was retrieved from a safe.

[Interviewee]

She would have never in a million years thought a live round was going to be on that set. Nobody did.

[Narrator]

Her attorney has said his client has no idea where the live rounds came from.

[Interviewee]

There is scrutiny on Hannah Gutierrez Reid's role. She was responsible for the arms and for whatever projectiles or bullets went into the weapon.

[Narrator]

Was this the second feature film where she was the head armor?

[Interviewee]

She had previously worked on a Nicholas Cage movie. Hannah Gutierrez Reed's first job as armorer was on a movie called the Old Way.

[Narrator]

She did a podcast interview in September where she said basically she did not know she should accept it. I was really nervous about it at first and I almost didn't take the.

[Interviewee]

Job because I wasn't sure if I was ready.

[Narrator]

But doing it like it went really smoothly.

[Interviewee]

She is a very safety conscious individual. She's been trained extremely well by the best in the business from the get go. She seemed very competent with the handguns. She seemed very safe. I had no reason to doubt her. She showed me in the first couple days on set that she knew what she was doing.

[Narrator]

On that tragic day on the set of RUPs there are now live ramps rounds and one live round has somehow made it into this gun. And now the third question here when this turns deadly is why did the gun go off?

[Interviewee]

I'm handed a gun and someone declares they said this is a cold gun. Dave Halls the first ad. There are conflicting statements in reference to who handed the gun to Mr. Baldwin but at this point in the investigation I think it's clear to the investigator and that was Mr. Hulls in the statement from Mr. Hall's that he did not recall handing the weapon or he did not hand the weapon to Mr. Baldwin. Independent witnesses state that he that he did. So there's a discrepancy there.

[Narrator]

Dave Hall's lawyer will not confirm that he handed Alec Baldwin the gun.

[Interviewee]

It wasn't in the script for the trigger to be pulled. Well the trigger wasn't pulled. I didn't pull the trigger now. So you never pulled the trigger? No, no, no, no, no. I would never point a gun at anyone to pull it trigger at them. Never, never. That was the training that I had. You don't point a gun at spin and pull the trigger.

[Narrator]

Dave was there when the gun discharged. Dave has told me since day one it was an accident. He's told me that Mr. Baldwin never pulled the trigger.

[Interviewee]

This is a replica model. It's virtually identical but it's a non firing replica of the gun that they used on that set. If you don't pull the trigger, the design of this gun will not let the hammer go forward. It's designed to stop at the halfway point. If I pull the hammer back most of the way and let go. As Alec Baldwin said, it's designed to not drop on a round. If this gun had been in service for many, many, many years and had worn parts, maybe that's a factor. A worn out gun or a broken gun may be a factor in this.

[Narrator]

The FBI is currently examining that gun.

[Interviewee]

There will be time and analysis done on the firearm for its functionality.

[Narrator]

There were several things that went wrong when people accidentally shot. We need help immediately. It wasn't just one accident. It was a series of perhaps just accidents all put together. Caused this really catastrophic breakdown on the set of Rust.

[Interviewee]

It was kind of a perfect storm.

[Narrator]

Are you prepared to press criminal charges once this investigation is in your hands? Of course. If the investigation shows that criminal acts occurred for many in the film community. The Rust incident brought back memories of another tragedy that ended in a fatality and also raised concerns about safety on sets.

[Interviewee]

The first thing I thought when I heard about the tragedy on the set of Rust was the terrible tragedy on the set of Midnight Rider. I was in an ambulance. Someone got hit by a train.

[Narrator]

Sarah Jones was killed by by a train while shooting the film Midnight Rider in Georgia. After the shock and anger.

I couldn't stop crying when Sarah died.

[Interviewee]

We'd hoped her death might save someone's life, would have prevented Halita's death, but it didn't.

[Narrator]

No one should die making a movie.

[Interviewee]

Thanks to HomeServe for sponsoring this episode. Owning a home is amazing. Until it's not. Sometimes you're five minutes away from welcoming guests into your house for your annual holiday party when suddenly you're ankle deep in water from a burst pipe. All of the sudden, the celebrations have to wait until you can find a repair company in your budget. Repairs can sneak up on you, and they won't always be covered by regular homeowners. Insurance issues like plumbing failures, H Vac breakdowns and electrical issues might leave you on your own. That's where HomeServe comes in. For over 20 years, HomeServe has been helping homeowners get repairs fast with a range of convenient plans that offer a variety of coverage. Just choose a plan for your needs and budget, and when something on your plan goes wrong, just call their 247 hotline to start the repair process.

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[Narrator]

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[Interviewee]

All of a sudden, boom. And it was loud.

[Narrator]

Palina is bleeding from her chest.

[Interviewee]

That fatal accident on the set of Rust isn't the first time it's happened before. The first thing I thought was to the terrible tragedy of just a few years earlier on the set of Midnight Rider.

[Narrator]

They were going to film a drugged out dream sequence.

[Interviewee]

They did not have permission to be on the track.

[Narrator]

William Hurt climbed onto the bed and asked, you know, what do we do? There's a train. All I know, I heard and I saw the train. And you just immediately started running. Sarah Jones was trying to get the expensive camera equipment off the track. It was like the train was right there. The impact happened like an explosion. Sarah was the first person I saw. She was lying on the side of the tracks dead.

[Interviewee]

For them to overlook something that jeopardizes safety is absolutely, positively unacceptable. I see many similarities and parallels between Sarah and Helena. Their deaths were so unnecessary.

We're here tonight to mourn this loss and to share our collective grief.

When late October, several hundred film industry people gathered in a Burbank parking lot mourning the loss of cinematographer Halina Hutchins and trying to comprehend the senseless death of one of their own.

[Narrator]

Helena was amazing. From the first day I met her, she's.

I'm sorry. She was really great.

Helena was like a little ball of light.

But even as the film world mourns Helena's loss, there's still this one burning question that remains unanswered.

[Interviewee]

Someone put a live bullet in a. A bullet that wasn't even supposed to be on the property. I hope that the sheriff's department doesn't give up on that. They follow this to the ends of the earth. Our concern right now is how the live rounds got on the set. Who was responsible for making sure that there were no live rounds? I just can't understand how any live rounds got on that set.

[Narrator]

Did Hannah supply any ammunition to that set to try to trace the source of that live round? There was a search warrant and executed at this Albuquerque prop house that provided firearms and dummy rounds and blanks.

[Interviewee]

PDQ Arm and Prop supplied the guns, the blank ammunition and 50 dummy rounds to the show.

[Narrator]

Seth Kenney is the owner of PDQ Prop in Arms. And when we spoke, he asked that we not show his face. He says he wasn't the film's Only provider.

[Interviewee]

It's not a possibility that they came from PDQ or from myself personally. When we send dummy rounds out, they get individually rattle tested before they get sent out. I think it's going to be apparent that's the most likely thing that happened was sabotage. The reason is you get a new box on set that day, it's got 50 rounds in it. They're labeled dummy. Seven of them turn out to be alive. Somebody wanted to cause a safety incident on some. Nobody wanted anybody to be killed.

[Narrator]

If something were to come up, some sort of evidence, of course that would be investigated. But not one person has brought up sabotage. It didn't happen. This was not sabotage. This was incompetence. It turns out there are detailed guidelines for firearm use on set that are put out by a labor and management safety committee.

[Interviewee]

Safety bullet number one, that live ammunition is never to be brought onto a film set. There's 44 different bulletins right now. Everything from firearms to how to handle helicopter operations on set.

[Narrator]

There are recommended guidelines adopted after the tragic accident during filming for the Twilight zone movie in 1982 in California.

[Interviewee]

They were filming a war movie today.

[Narrator]

When suddenly a helicopter crashed right in.

[Interviewee]

The middle of the action.

[Narrator]

Actor Vic Morrow and two children were killed when a helicopter crashed on top of them.

[Interviewee]

There's no law governing how to run a film set. We follow the industry guidelines. Someone who doesn't follow the guidelines is someone who will find it very, very difficult to be hired again. In this industry.

[Narrator]

There are no laws that mandate. It's industry standards that we have to trust. Industry professionals are following.

And at the vigil for Halyna, there were reminders of another tragic on set death involving a young woman. One that also put a spotlight on safety in the film industry.

[Interviewee]

After standing here seven years ago for Sarah Jones and sharing the stage with another family, we're here again. The first thing I thought when I heard about the tragedy on the set of Rust and the killing of Helena Hutchinson was the terrible tragedy of just a few years earlier on the set of Midnight Rider and the death of camera crew member Sarah Jones.

Sarah Jones was an assistant camera operator doing a job that her parents told us meant the world to her.

She fell in love with the camera. Why do you think she was drawn to the camera department? It's a challenge of it, I think. I think. I think for the most part, it's man's world, and I think that was a little bit of a challenge.

[Narrator]

She started out on Army Wives, a television show.

[Interviewee]

She had an internship there.

[Narrator]

She would Offer to do anything she could.

[Interviewee]

Sarah then went on to become a camera assistant for the TV series the Vampire Diaries. This guy doesn't know that you're a vampire. Let's keep it that way.

[Narrator]

Well, maybe that's it, Sarah. And first, the first time I saw her, she was literally right in front of my face. She was doing this late. Hey, Mark. You couldn't help but notice Sarah Jones. She's always wanted to be around her.

And then she got her big break and that was on Fast and Furious seven Paul Walker. She was in the position she was striving so hard to be in to get her foot in the door on the feature film breaking news out of Hollywood this morning.

[Interviewee]

Yeah, Paul Walker, one of the stars of the enormously popular film Fast and Furious movies dead in a car crash. Of course they stopped that production for a time. So Sarah took her own fateful path. She took a gig based out of Savannah on a movie called Midnight Rider.

[Narrator]

Midnight Rider was a biopic about the life of Greg Allman, the big southern rock legendary now and his brother Dwayne.

And it was to star William Hurt.

[Interviewee]

Independent movie budget, about $5 million. Written, produced and directed by a man named Randall Miller. She had mentioned to me that it is a low budget film and she was a little bit surprised that some of the people did not seem to have the level expertise that she experienced expected.

[Narrator]

It was the first day of filming on a historic trestle. It's just an ideal, beautiful setting in rural Georgia. It's on the Altohama River, Spanish moss around it.

[Interviewee]

It's high up over the river. You can walk along the edge of the track that's several feet at the most wide.

Sarah and hairstylist Joyce Gilliard were among the crew.

[Narrator]

I was told that we were going to do a pre shoot trying to get a few shots of an area, you know, I did not expect to be shooting an entire scene on the radio.

I went straight over to where they were setting up.

I began photographing and also taking behind the scenes footage.

We were told that two trains had passed and that was the schedule for the day and that we wouldn't have to worry about more trains.

[Interviewee]

It was going to be a dream sequence in which Greg Allman from his hospital bed would imagine Duane Allman, the guitarist, his late brother, somehow across the.

[Narrator]

Bridge.

Unbeknownst to their crew. They thought it was permitted. It was not. There was no medic on set and there had been no safety meeting. I wasn't aware we were even going on tracks until I got there. The director is the one who led everyone on the railroad tracks because he wanted to get the certain shot with the bed on the trestle.

And so William park climbed onto the bed and asked, you know, what do we do if there's a train? He asked, how much time would we have to get off the tracks? They did say, you have 60 seconds to get off the track. I was more or less 60 seconds to get off the track. And I started praying. I'm mad at myself because I didn't say something.

We had only been on the tracks for five, maybe 10 minutes. And that's when they yelled that there was a train coming. I heard and I saw the train. And you just immediately started running.

[Interviewee]

Greg Allman's memoir began with a scene on a bridge, but it never mentioned railroad tracks. That was an edition by Randall Miller. In the screenplay that he wrote and in this case clip, you hear him read aloud. Scene 14, exterior train track. His hospital bed is in the middle of a train track. He sees a bridge ahead, a train trestle. Sarah Jones was an assistant camera operator. They were just a few minutes into shooting the scene on the trestle.

When they spotted a freight train barreling down the track at an estimated 57 miles per hour.

[Narrator]

They yelled that there was a train coming. And there was a sort of a pause. And I saw the train. I saw the light of that train. It was like the train was right there. So you had seconds to figure out what you were gonna do.

You had to run towards the train to get out of the way. And they struggled to get the bed frame. Oh.

[Interviewee]

Video captures the scream of the fast approaching train's horn as Randall Miller and other crew members frantically try to yank the hospital bed off the tracks.

[Narrator]

It was total chaos. Sarah Jones was trying to get the expensive camera equipment off the track. It seemed to be so far away. And then all of a sudden, just right there. When I realized that I could not get to the lane, that's when I ran to the side and held onto the iron girder. And I prayed I didn't get hit by the train.

The pressure from the wind from the train was so strong that holding onto the girder, I wasn't able to. It pulled me off.

The ground was shaking. Everything was shaking. The impact happened like an explosion. I was hit. I had a very brief blackout.

[Interviewee]

The train struck Joyce Gilliard's left arm after smashing into the hospital bed.

[Narrator]

I couldn't believe what was happening.

Thought about dying.

And my family getting that call.

[Interviewee]

The train's impact had snapped A bone in Joyce's arm.

[Narrator]

Sarah was the first person I saw.

She was lying on the side of the tracks dead. You didn't know it was her?

You didn't know it was her?

I received a phone call from one of her friends and she said, sarah's no longer here. I said, what do you mean? You mean as in dead? She said, yes, ma'.

[Interviewee]

Am.

[Narrator]

And how do you tell your husband that your daughter's dead?

[Interviewee]

It was rough. I mean, it took the wind out of me.

Sarah Jones was just 27 years old. Old Randall Miller called us that day. He was very upset.

[Narrator]

He. He was crying.

[Interviewee]

He was nearly hysterical.

So immediately after the accident, investigators are trying to find out who had failed to protect the Midnight Rider crew. Police questioned producer Jay Sedrish about shooting on active train tracks. Of course, our question was, did you have permission? We got that one. Well, it's complicated answer. Randall Miller got an initial email through the location manager, Charlie Baxter, which said that it was the company policy of CSX not to allow people to film on their tracks. On the morning of the shoot, a representative of the railroad once again refused to grant the film permission to shoot on its tracks. To me, those emails were extremely clear that they did not have permission to be on the. In fact, Mr. Baxter was scheduled to be at the scene and would not come because of that email. Randy knew that I wasn't going to go if we didn't have permission. How do you know that? Because he told me. He told you what? That he was going to go down and going to film by the trestle whether they had permission from CSX or not. My investigation shows that Randall Miller gave that decision to tell everybody to move on to the trestle.

Randy Miller had no perception of danger and was relying on his team that had never failed him, that he was in a safe place. He'd been told there were just two trains and those had gone.

But in fact, the Midnight Rider production had no way of knowing when a train might be coming. You don't shoot on a railroad track unless you absolutely are positive that you have permission to be there and you know that a train isn't going to come by.

[Narrator]

CSX would later tell investigators that it was their busiest track. They had probably 2730 trains that pass through on that track a day per day.

[Interviewee]

There is no freight train schedule I can rely on to make sure there'll be no train on my trip. It's a day to day thing and the variance can be great. There's not such a thing as a Freight train schedule that approximates what, say, a major airline might publish. So you're going to help me stay safe while I shoot a scene that involves a train. How are you going to do that? You need a railroad employee. You need the agreement of the railroad. And you also need to make sure that the film crew has been trained and knows how to operate safely in this very unique industrial environment. The laws of gravity and inertia are not repealed for film crews. And just like with the use of guns on a set, there are also very strict guidelines when filming near railroad tracks.

Attorney Jeff Harris filed a lawsuit on behalf of Sarah Jones parents. And I think they said, well, you know, we don't have access to actual permission, but ultimately we're just going to try to steal the shot. If so, it would apparently not be the first time Randall Miller had stolen a shot. He would say, we're trying to make a movie here. As if that outweighed the needs or the safety of other people. It was like, that's some kind of magic car.

[Narrator]

It was so fast.

And I could feel the wind going by. And then it finally stopped.

And it was very, very quiet for.

Just a moment.

At first, it was like people were in shock. I remember hearing some. Somebody say, oh, my gosh, she's dead.

Can you get my location where I am?

[Interviewee]

I think we need a. We need an ambulance. Well, someone got hit by a train.

The news that Sarah Jones had been killed on the set of the film Midnight Rider reached her friends on Vampire Diaries. Just a few hours after it happened.

[Narrator]

I got the call. We sat in the car, going to see, and it was just pure shock.

She just left. Too soon.

She would have been.

Yeah, it was just too soon.

[Interviewee]

I was angry, really angry. For them to overlook something that jeopardizes the safety of the people that are working with them is absolutely, positively. It's unacceptable.

[Narrator]

They wanted to get the shot. So whatever it took to get the shot is what they did. Information started to emerge about how Randall Miller and his wife, Jody Savin, were these guerrilla filmmakers who played by their own rules.

[Interviewee]

In a panel discussion, Randall Miller actually boasted about stealing a shot in the New York City sub for his 2013 movie CBGB. You're not allowed to shoot in the New York subway. So I don't know if you know that, but you're not allowed to.

And on the DVD extras from cbgb, Randall Miller joked about pulling off some questionable scenes in Savannah, Georgia, where most of that movie was filmed.

[Narrator]

He actually would laugh and brag about breaking these safety protocols. Whether it was having a child, a little child running around in a pasture with cotton.

[Interviewee]

I mean, I don't think it's dangerous at all to have a little kid run through cows. Do you think?

[Narrator]

No, no. Or throwing a piano down the stairs. This is a real house.

[Interviewee]

And I don't think they fully knew that we were going to drop a piano down their staircase. We had more complaints about the activities of this film than we did in any previous entire year. Jay Self, who was then the head of the Savannah Film Commission, said that during the filming of cbgb, a stop sign was removed by the production, another was painted over, and cars were parked in front of fire hydrants or in handicap spots. He would say, but we're trying to make a movie here. As if that somehow outweighed the safety or the welfare or the business of other people. When CBGB was over, we were like, I can't believe nobody got hurt.

There were people involved with this that were allowed to get by with things that they should not have. They thought they could make up their own rules and.

They pushed it too far.

[Narrator]

The audacity put someone else's life in such danger.

The entire crew was put in a situation where we all had to basically run for our lives.

[Interviewee]

There were so many lives at risk. And when Randall Miller is put in the hot seat, he tries to pass the buck.

[Narrator]

You didn't ask CSX how many trains.

[Interviewee]

Were coming down that trussel. That's not my job.

[Narrator]

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The crew had no idea that the filmmaker was there stealing a ship shot.

[Interviewee]

Fortunately for investigators, there was video later used in court of the Midnight Rider accident.

[Narrator]

The train comes through the set at about 58 miles per hour. It was pandemonium.

[Interviewee]

A camera mounted on the locomotive shows the crew on the trestle had a lot less time than they thought to get off the tracks.

26 seconds before impact. The engineer starts to blare the horn continuously.

As members of the cast and crew try to flee to safety.

Three seconds before impact, it's too late to get the bed off the tracks. William Hurd and Wyatt Russell, the actors, along with two crew members, are scrambling just to make it off the trestle.

One second before impact, People cover their ears. They're clinging to the bridge for their lives because the bed on impact becomes a deadly weapon. The train hits the bed and the bed flies up and apparently a portion of the hospital bed strikes Sarah and pushes her into the train.

[Narrator]

There were several injuries on that track that day. It wasn't just the death of Sarah, but there were seven people injured.

[Interviewee]

Joyce Gilliard, the hairstylist, she needed a plate and 10 screws put in just to reconstruct her arm.

[Narrator]

It's not just my arm that was hurt. I suffered such a traumatic experience seeing my co worker friend.

Lose her life because of someone else's negligence.

It wasn't simply the accident. It's a lot of the aftermath. I don't think I have to explain.

What it feels like to suddenly be a little more afraid of everything.

[Interviewee]

It's clear that certainly the producers and director, they messed up and they messed up real bad.

[Narrator]

It was a live truck.

There were tracks elsewhere in the vicinity that were not live tracks that could have been used.

Randall Miller visited me in my hospital room a couple days after the tragedy happened. He didn't say anything. He just cried.

He just cried.

In the months following Sarah's death, the authorities in Georgia indicted Ranald Miller and his wife, Jody Savin, and another producer, Jay Sedrish, and first assistant director Hilary Schwartz, for involuntary manslaughter and trespass.

[Interviewee]

They plead not guilty. They'd have just followed the emails or followed the safety requirements by the film industry. Sarah Jones would be alive today.

[Narrator]

Randall Miller actually wanted to go ahead and finish the movie Midnight Rider, but Greg Allman filed suit to try to stop the production from going forward. And it worked for him to want to keep making a movie where someone died under his watch. It seems so cold hearted.

[Interviewee]

The suit filed by Greg Allman compelled Randall Miller to testify about the tragedy on video, where he said one phrase three times. Did you even employ anyone to go down the railroad track maybe three or four miles down to warn people of when the train was coming? Unfortunately, that's not my job. Do you know where anybody was down that track before that train accident occurred? Again, it's not my job.

[Narrator]

You didn't ask CSX how many trains were coming down that trestle, did you?

[Interviewee]

Again, that's not my job. That is his job. He's the director. Now, the first assistant director is responsible in the industry traditionally for safety. But Randall Miller's ultimate job is to make sure that what he's doing as director is not putting his crew or the cast for that matter, in jeopardy. And he did not do that. As first assistant director, what are your responsibilities?

[Narrator]

I am one of the people that have safety, responsibility, responsibilities on set. Hilary Schwartz, she was responsible for having a medic on set. She was responsible for the safety bulletins out that they were going to shoot on live train tracks. Didn't do that.

[Interviewee]

I heard that if they train we're to come, at the very least we'd have 60 seconds. You actually believe that you can get.

[Narrator]

A metal bed off the track and the people off the track and 60 seconds?

[Interviewee]

But I think I didn't.

[Narrator]

Yes. Did you seek a written permission from CSX to put those people on that track?

[Interviewee]

That's a simple question. I did not do the permits.

[Narrator]

You didn't see any permit before you.

[Interviewee]

Asked those people to get on the train track? I did not see permits, no. I was in the middle of the track and I almost died.

[Narrator]

Randall fell on to the track and so I dropped my camera and grabbed him.

[Interviewee]

Randall Miller's life was saved. But Sarah Jones died on those tracks. The people who made poor choices that day need to be held fully accountable for what they did. But would Randall Miller be the first director ever to go to jail for a death on a movie scene? In the Midnight Rider case, it was clear who'd made the decision to go to the railroad tracks. In the Rust case.

The question is just who was responsible for it?

[Narrator]

Could Alec Baldwin be criminally charged?

[Interviewee]

Not. Not trying to be a mask at all. But I want to see that train.

[Narrator]

One of the hardest things for anybody to do after a tragedy is to go back to the place where their loved ones were killed. And Richard and Elizabeth Jones did that. They went back to the bridge to see where their little girl was killed by a train.

[Interviewee]

But I want to experience it. I want to see what it's like.

[Narrator]

Oh, my God. How fast is that going?

[Interviewee]

In a way, I felt like Elizabeth and I needed to do that, but it was hard. And to see. See the spot where she lost her life, it's heartbreaking. They couldn't get out of the way.

[Narrator]

The arrogance of someone putting my baby on the track.

And the fear she must have felt. I can't imagine.

Several of the supervising crew from Midnight Rider were brought to trial for criminal trespass and involuntary manslaughter and the death of Sarah Jones in a very small town, Jessup, Georgia.

[Interviewee]

If convicted, Miller, along with two other producers and the first AD, stood to serve as much as 10 years in prison. But as the trial was about to get underway, there was an unexpected turn of events in the courthouse. The prosecutor came to us and said that if we agree that they had a plea deal, the defendant will be sentenced to a 10 year term. He will serve two years in custody in the county jail. He will pay a fine of 20,000. Randall Miller became the first director in the history of the movies to go to jail for a death on the set. He cannot serve as a director, producer, first assistant director, or supervisor on any film where he has a responsibility for the safety of other people for the entire 10 years.

[Narrator]

The first AD, Hillary Schwartz, and the unit production manager, Jay Sedrish, both got 10 years probation.

[Interviewee]

I believe it sends a message, frankly, that if you do not respect those that you're in charge of, that you may end up behind bar.

[Narrator]

Something went horribly wrong here in Santa Fe on the set of Alec Baldwin's new western film. Rust, a young and hopeful cinematographer, is dead.

It has been seven years since the tragedy on Midnight Rider, when Sarah Jones lost her life and I was severely injured. Hearing about what happened on the set of Riders, it just brought back a lot of painful memories for me. After the shock, I became angry. Such a horrific tragedy of someone losing their life again.

[Interviewee]

It just felt like a knife in my heart. When Sarah died, we'd hoped that her death might save someone's life, would have prevented Alita's death, but it didn't. And it hurts.

[Narrator]

Nobody should die making a movie.

I would be on set and I couldn't understand why I was crying so much.

And then I realized that it was traumatic for me. PTSD is a very difficult thing to deal with. I'm sure that Joyce has gone through a lot of mental health anguish. Still, to this day. Unfortunately, I think the crew of Russ will endure the same path. You can't know what this feels like. And I don't know. Most of us are going to be dealing with this for the rest of our lives.

[Interviewee]

Man, to this day, I still am so shocked that this happened. It's unbelievable. Joel said the director was right over Helena's shoulder. He was shot.

[Narrator]

There are two victims out there, Helena Hutchins and Joel Sousa, and they deserve justice. Joel is still recovering and Helena's gone and we can't get her back.

[Interviewee]

In the Midnight Rider case, it was clear who'd made the decision to go to the railroad tracks. Here in the Rust case, there are still questions about who was responsible and how it happened.

[Narrator]

We want to know how that live round got on the set, but what's more important is how that live round got into the gun. The fact that it was on the set was obviously a failure, but how it then went from just on the set to into the gun without any of those levels of protection working is the more important inquiry that my office is focused on. I'm not commenting on charges, whether they will be filed or not or on whom.

[Interviewee]

The criminal investigation is ongoing. Civil lawsuits have already been filed. More are coming. There is scrutiny on both the first assistant director, David Halls, and the armorer Hannah Gutierrez Reed, but also on. On Alec Baldwin's role.

[Narrator]

This was clearly an accident, but just because something is an accident doesn't mean that a criminal act didn't occur.

[Interviewee]

I've been told by people who are in the know, in terms of even inside the state, that it's highly unlikely I would be charged with anything criminally.

[Narrator]

Could Alec Baldwin be criminally charged? Everything is on the table and nothing is off the table. Enormous questions remain about who will ultimately be held responsible in Helena's death.

[Interviewee]

The reason we still use real firearms on set is because we have to. Should they just stop using real guns on sets?

[Narrator]

A California state senator intending to introduce legislation in Hutchinson that would ban live ammunition, producer of the ABC crime drama the Rookie, has announced they will no longer use live weapons on set, saying they will ban all live gunfire on set immediately.

[Interviewee]

There is a movement happening in Hollywood right now in the wake of the Rush tragedy to ban real firearms from set. Any movie that we have moving forward with Seven Bucks Productions, we won't use real guns at all. We're gonna switch over to rubber guns. If we are going to see any change in Hollywood about the use of guns, it's going to have to come from big names and Dwayne Johnson is the biggest star in the world right now, and that's a big deal because it's not like the Rock makes a lot of rom coms. He makes action movies that could start the process for real change. Are you kidding me? Should they just stop using real guns on sets? Someone else can determine what is the safest, best. What do we come out of this learning? What do we come out of it? What changes can be made if you're going to wind up where the guns are going to be, plastic or rubber? I've used rubber guns before. You're going to CGI everything eventually. If I aim the gun and I point the gun and go bang. And it CGIS the explosion, then that's great. At Barnstorm vfx, a visual effects house here in la, muzzle flashes are simulated in post production for shows like the Big sky and the man in the High Tide.

I would say that a simulated muzzle flash, if it's done correctly, can get pretty close to looking like a real gunshot.

[Narrator]

A muzzle flash is a light source, essentially.

[Interviewee]

I have taken a stock element of a similar gun muzzle flash.

[Narrator]

I have illuminated my knuckles and the.

[Interviewee]

Front of the gun and my face.

[Narrator]

For just one frame.

[Interviewee]

I've even added a reflection of the.

[Narrator]

Muzzle flash in the eyes.

[Interviewee]

The actor mimed the action of shooting it slightly kicking my wrist back.

[Narrator]

And then we composite that in over.

[Interviewee]

Everything else to make it realistic.

[Narrator]

Okay.

[Interviewee]

The reason we still use real firearms on set is because we have to. There's a certain amount of physicality to this prop, and an actor has to react correctly to the gunfire. There's reaction to the gunfire, eyes flinching, things like that. You just can't duplicate that with cgi. We've fired billions of rounds of blanks over the years, and it can be done in a safe manner.

[Narrator]

There probably should be laws or stronger rules than industry standards. It clearly needs to change because something like this happened and it has happened before, and we've got to protect lives. Nothing's more important than.

[Interviewee]

Than that never again let someone's daughter die.

Never again someone's son. It's never, never worth a life.

I see many similarities and parallels between Sarah and Helena. They both love the camera and cinematography and all that comes with it. They bosh and showed such promise. Their deaths were so senseless, so unnecessary. It should not have happened.

[Narrator]

We are, we are, we are.

[Interviewee]

Sarah Jones.

[Narrator]

Sarah Jones. Sarah Jones.

[Interviewee]

When Sarah Jones lost her life seven years ago, many people in the industry added her name to the same slates that she once held so that every shot was a tribute to her. And now Alina Hutchins name is being added right next to Sarah.

How many more names need to go on a slate before the needed changes are made in this industry so it just will not happen again?

[Narrator]

How many I'm here to explain today what I believe we're all feeling about the loss of a vibrant, gifted, unique visionary. That is Helena Hutchins last week an.

[Interviewee]

Emotional tribute to Halina and her work at the Power Women Summit in Los Angeles with her husband Matthew in attendance.

[Narrator]

So let's take a moment to take a look at her work.

Her work was exquisite. Her framing of the shots, her colors were beautiful. She really cared a lot about the scenes.

[Interviewee]

Filmmaking for her was really a higher calling. She had the soul of a poet. Holidays mean feasting. From cheddar biscuits to French toast bakes, Herobred has you covered with 0 to 5 grams net carb and high fiber options. Options to ensure your holidays stay delicious and balanced. Like their 3 grams net carb pan, a chocolat, Herobread is offering 10% off your order. Go to Hero Co and use code fall25 at checkout. That's fall25hero co. All figures are per serving of Hero Bread contains up to.

[Narrator]

17 grams of fat per serving.

[Interviewee]

See the product nutrition panels on Hero Co for more information. So much integrity as an artist.

[Narrator]

She was an incredible cinematic and she's a great friend, a mother, a wife, a daughter. And she is our sister.

You've been listening to the 2020 True Crime Vault Friday nights at 9 on ABC. You can also find all new broadcast episodes of 2020. Thanks for listening.