Alec Baldwin Sued AGAIN! Slain ‘Rust’ Filmmaker’s Ukrainian Family Targets Hollywood Producers

The Ukrainian relatives of Halyna Hutchins, the cinematographer for the film “Rust,” have reignited their legal battle against actor Alec Baldwin and other producers, following her tragic on-set death in 2021 during the filming of the budget-conscious western movie.

Last week, Hutchins’ mother, Olga Solovey, her father, Anatolii Androsovych, and her sister Svetlana Zemko — all residing in the vicinity of Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv — lodged a civil negligence lawsuit in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

The lawsuit, filed on June 5, argues that Hutchins’ death was the result of reckless actions by Baldwin, who was both a producer and a star of the film, along with the film’s other producers, production managers, and several crew members, all of whom are named as defendants.

Authorities have stated that when Baldwin pointed his Colt .45 revolver at Hutchins, who was less than four feet away, the gun fired a live round. Baldwin was unaware that the gun contained a live bullet. The standard protocols in the film industry prohibit real ammunition on sets, and the assistant director of “Rust” had declared the gun “cold,” which means it was supposed to be devoid of any ammunition.

Hutchins succumbed to her injuries. The film’s director, Joel Souza, was also injured by the same bullet but survived the incident.

“The fact that live ammunition was permitted on a movie set, that firearms and ammunition were left unattended … and that Baldwin, one of the defendants, pointed and fired a gun at Halyna Hutchins, makes this a case where injury or death was not just a potential outcome — it was a highly probable result,” the lawsuit filed by Solovey stated.

This new lawsuit was filed just a month before Baldwin is slated to stand trial for an involuntary manslaughter charge in New Mexico’s First Judicial District Court. The actor was indicted on this single felony charge in January and has entered a plea of not guilty.

Attempts by Baldwin’s attorneys last month to get the indictment dismissed were turned down by a New Mexico judge. If found guilty, Baldwin could face a prison sentence of up to 18 months.

The latest lawsuit was filed on behalf of Hutchins’ family members in Eastern Europe by Gloria Allred, a victims rights attorney based in Los Angeles.

Allred’s other client involved in the “Rust” case, script supervisor Mamie Mitchell, has also joined the Solovey lawsuit as a plaintiff. Mitchell was merely four feet away from Baldwin during the rehearsal on October 21, 2021.

A representative for Baldwin declined to comment on the matter.

Lawyers for Rust Movie Productions were not immediately available for comment on Thursday.

Even though the fatal incident took place near Santa Fe, Allred had originally filed the Solovey suit against Baldwin and the “Rust” producers in Los Angeles Superior Court. The lawsuit was recently withdrawn in a bid to move the case to New Mexico, Allred stated.

Allred explained that the change in location was spurred after a judge in Los Angeles ruled that some key defendants in the case lacked “minimum contacts” in California, making it almost impossible to pursue the case against those defendants in the state.

Allred did not specify which defendants would have been exempted if the case had continued in California but confirmed that Baldwin was not among them. Baldwin’s production company, El Dorado Pictures, is located in California.

A separate wrongful-death lawsuit filed by Hutchins’ husband, Matthew Hutchins, on behalf of their son, Andros, was settled in late 2022.

In the wake of the settlement, Matthew Hutchins took up the role of an executive producer for the movie “Rust,” which was finished last year in Montana. The financial terms of the settlement remain undisclosed.

Hutchins, originally from Ukraine, had migrated to the U.S. to chase her dream of a film career, which was on an upward trajectory at the time of the tragic incident.

A 2015 alumnus of the American Film Institute Conservatory, Hutchins had been named one of American Cinematographer’s Rising Stars two years prior to her death.

Her family members in Europe have expressed their deep grief over the loss of Halyna Hutchins. During a court hearing in April, her mother, Solovey, testified that life has been “extremely difficult” since they received the devastating news of her death from Matthew Hutchins.

The tragedy has sparked several negligence lawsuits, including those filed by other individuals who were present at the shooting scene in a wooden church at Bonanza Creek Ranch.

The civil lawsuit filed by Solovey, Androsovych, and Zemko names Rust Movie Productions LLC; Baldwin’s El Dorado Pictures; producers Ryan Donnell Smith and Langley Allen Cheney and their Thomasville Pictures LLC; producers Anjul Nigam, Nathan Klingher, Ryan Winterstern, Matthew Delpiano and Emily Salveson; and line producers from 3rd Shift Media in Georgia as defendants.

Hannah Gutierrez, the armorer who has been found guilty of involuntary manslaughter, and assistant producer David Halls, who pleaded no contest to negligent use of a weapon, are also listed as defendants in the lawsuit.