Live from Music Row Monday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed John Harris of the Tennessee Firearms Association to the newsmakers line to weigh in on Alec Baldwin’s new movie set ‘Rust’ alleged gun prop that injured one crew member and killed another.
(Veteran DP Steven Hall clip plays)
Leahy: So that’s Stephen Hall talking about the particular circumstances. John, I know you’re very familiar with the use of guns and gun safety issues. And you started Tennessee Firearms Association, what, 30 years ago? How long ago do you start it? 26 years ago?
Harris: 26 years ago.
Leahy: That’s primarily an organization that lobbies the Tennessee General Assembly for gun rights issues. In essence, did describe that your organization properly?
Harris: That’s correct. That’s our main objective is to try to influence the law and public policy in Tennessee on Second Amendment issues.
Leahy: What’s interesting about this is that you are also very familiar as a gun owner and gun operator, and I wanted to kind of get your take on this awful situation in New Mexico with Alec Baldwin. Have you followed it? What are the gun safety issues and legal issues that may arise from this incident?
Harris: It is a difficult one to follow at this point, because although the announcements that are out about the horrible tragedy and the fact that one person was injured and another died, very few facts are actually out about what did happen other than that result.
But there are a few things we can know at this point in time. Anyone who’s ever trained seriously with a firearm is typically told by an instructor and it really doesn’t even take an instructor to tell you this just common sense would tell you, that you never point a firearm at anything or anyone that you’re not willing to damage or destroy.
And that’s because you don’t know what the status of the weapon is. Even if you think you do, there have been too many unloaded guns that have gone off and injured somebody over the years, including you might recall, a pretty well-known Nashville instructor a few years ago that was shot in his own classroom. So those things happen.
And that’s why we have the rule you never point a firearm at someone or something that you don’t intend to damage or destroy. The other thing that is sort of curious, and I think I know the answer, but it’s yet to be seen is we have two injuries.
Clearly, Baldwin was probably pointing the gun in an unsafe direction unless we’ve got some kind of really bizarre ricochet. But we’ve got two people injured with what might have been only one shot, but it could have been two. We don’t know yet.
Leahy: Yeah. There are so many questions of fact and what’s happened on the movie set. We just get dribs and drabs of the story, right? We don’t know if they’re complete. It’s going to be years of investigation and litigation on this.
There was a report out there that I saw that the union members of the crew walked out hours before the event because they were concerned over safety issues on the set. I’ve seen that report, so that, of course, is troublesome.
Harris: Yes. That is troublesome. And there are a number of various different reports, as I think, news agencies are scrambling for an angle on the story. But one angle that has not really been covered much, it has been covered some, is what are the law enforcement agencies looking for?
In this kind of situation, there are clearly two areas that we might see develop. And both of them simultaneously. One is some type of civil claim that Alec Baldwin or someone on the staff or the business itself was negligent by allowing live ammunition on the set or live ammunition in the gun, or for him to have possession of a firearm with a lot of ammunition in it without it being double-checked or absolutely certain that it was nothing but blanks. But the other issue is, will this potentially result in criminal charges against somebody?
I’ve seen them here in Nashville as a practicing attorney, plenty of instances where someone thought the gun was unloaded, was cleaning the gun, was doing something that was other than pointing it at someone and pulling the trigger, which may have been the case here, but they still get criminally charged.
And they get criminally charged, not with murder, necessarily, but maybe reckless homicide or reckless conduct of some context.
I think we’re going to see the news media and law enforcement shut down on this until they make a decision. Are we going to see a criminal charge come out of this case in some shape, form, or fashion?
Leahy: Yeah. And we see reports, dribs, and drabs of it. Apparently, on a movie set, there is a job description called the Armorer. And an Armorer’s job is to make sure that the guns used on the set are props and are safe. Here’s a story about this at Breitbart.
Hannah Gutierrez Reid, the head armorer on the set of Alec Baldwin’s ‘Rust’ Western, said she, ‘almost didn’t take her last job due to fears that she was not ready. I was really nervous about it at first, and I almost didn’t take the job because I wasn’t sure if I was ready.
But doing it like, it went really smoothly.’ She’s a 24-year-old armorer. She’s the daughter of a long-time Hollywood firearms expert Thell Reed. She added that she learned how to handle firearms from her father since she was a teen.
But of course, now you’ve got the famous statement from Alec Baldwin, who, by the way, is a producer of the film. Meaning he’s got some liability there it would seem to me. He said, who handed me a hot gun? Well, these are all very troublesome.
Harris: Absolutely. And you have to keep in mind, too, they’re shooting a Western. Okay. And we don’t know yet, because I’ve not seen a story that discloses it. It’s most likely that he was handed a hot revolver.
And if it was a hot revolver, it’s pretty simple to look in that cylinder without having to point the gun at yourself and see if you’ve got what looks like a live round as opposed to trying to determine that from a semiautomatic.
So the question, in that case, would be as the actor and he’s been on the set, he’s 63. He’s done 40 years of movies. There have been probably ten movies where he’s used a gun. There is a safety protocol that you’d have to go through as an actor.
And I think you’re right. It’s a period piece Western set in the 19th century so you would think a revolver would be the gun. And as you say, you would probably be able to take a look and see if it’s got a live round in it. Right?
Harris: Oh, absolutely. Because every revolver that I’m aware of and I’ve been shooting for a long time, the round that is discharged is usually depending on the rotation at the 9:00 or the 10:00 location. It’s not right under the barrel. When you cock the hammer, it cocks and rotates the cylinder.
Leahy: John Harris with the Tennessee Firearms Association, thanks for coming on. I know sometimes we have these stories that are interesting, but very bad situations. So thanks for giving us that enlightening information John. Come back again, please.
Harris: Thank you. Will do.
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to the Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
