Overcharging
Alec Baldwin blew it big time when he carelessly shot his camerawoman on set, and shouldn't get kid-glove treatment just because he's a rich, powerful Hollywood celebrity. Still, "enhancing" his criminal charges because a firearm was involved looks to me like prosecutorial game-playing.We add firearms enhancements to other criminal charges on the theory that a firearm provides a criminal with a visible threat to use again his victims, and that its use converts an only moderately dangerous criminal enterprise into a deliberately deadly one. That reasoning shouldn't apply to an actor who is holding firearm as a prop on a film set. The prosecution hasn't argued that Baldwin intended to hurt the camerawoman, only that the gun had been negligently handled by a group of people that included Baldwin, partly because he should have checked it personally before pointing it at anyone, and partly because he was a principal in the production, rather than a mere actor with no effective control over safety procedures on the set. There was no alleged separate criminal enterprise for the firearm to enhance.
I'm satisfied, therefore, to see the "firearms enhancement" charge dropped.
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4 comments:
My understanding, based on a link in the linked-to article is that Baldwin never should have been charged with that dropped-charge bit in the first place. That charge was based on a law that didn't exist until after Baldwin shot and killed the woman and wounded the man.
Now we'll see whether the NM prosecutor will have the stones to reject plea bargains and bring the case to trial.
Eric Hines
I mean honestly just some kind of accountability would be fine. If a jury decides to turn him loose, that's fine. The only thing that's not fine is him killing a technician and walking because he's somebody, and she wasn't.
I'll accept the jury's outcome, but if they let him walk, that won't be fine with me.
He was blatantly criminally negligent--IMNSHO--in not personally checking the pistol in his hand as soon as it entered his hand and certainly before he pointed it at anybody. He killed one and wounded another with that lack of care, and he should fall for it. Hard.
Eighteen months is the max allowed under the remaining charge, and that's wholly inadequate, but that's for the legislature to correct, not a court.
Eric Hines
As a rule, I'm always ok with juries turning somebody loose. If in the judgment of 12 fellow citizens they don't deserve to be punished, then let them go.
The process is a kind of punishment itself. If you've been through the stress of the trial, and had your future held in the balance, you haven't gotten off scot free.
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