The bullet turned out to be a live round, despite safety protocols requiring only blanks or dummy rounds on set.
Legal experts and Hollywood insiders widely agreed the shooting was preventable. Prosecutors argued that Gutierrez-Reed, as the armorer, bore direct responsibility for the weapons’ safety on set.
“We may never know exactly how a live round got on that set, but we do know that Gutierrez-Reed failed in her duty,” prosecutors said during the trial, according to CBS News.
Hannah Gutierrez-Reed Emotional Plea at Sentencing
Despite the guilty verdict, Gutierrez-Reed expressed remorse and asked for leniency at her sentencing hearing.
“Your honor, when I took on Rust, I was young and naive,” she told the judge. “But I took my job as seriously as I knew how to. I beg you, please, don’t give me more time. The jury has found me in part at fault for this horrible tragedy, but that doesn’t make me a monster. That makes me human.”
However, prosecutors noted her lack of contrition throughout the trial and used that as part of their argument for the maximum sentence.
