Actor Alec Baldwin’s civil rights lawsuit against the Santa Fe district attorney alleging malicious prosecution for pursuing criminal charges against him has been dismissed.
U.S. District Judge Kea Riggs dismissed the lawsuit on Wednesday, arguing that the prosecutor has qualified immunity while lamenting a “very disturbing picture of malicious prosecution.”
“Sometimes, it is better to leave unredressed the wrongs done by an allegedly dishonest prosecutor than to subject those who try to do their duty to the constant dread of retaliation,” Riggs wrote. “This is one of those times.”
On October 21, 2021, while filming the western movie Rust, Alec Baldwin shot cinematographer Halyna Hutchins during a scene rehearsal. Baldwin claimed the revolver that he had been given from the AD suddenly fired when he pulled back the hammer, consistently maintaining he did not pull the trigger. Subsequent analysis of the firearm from the FBI later concluded that “the trigger had to be pulled or depressed sufficiently to release the fully cocked or retracted hammer of the evidence revolver.”
Baldwin’s criminal trial for involuntary manslaughter was dismissed in the summer of 2024 after the judge ruled prosecutors had withheld evidence. Last year, a judge dismissed Baldwin’s initial civil rights lawsuit with prejudice, which allowed him and his attorney to file another lawsuit following a 30 day reprieve. Baldwin and his attorneys argued that Santa Fe district attorney Mary Carmack-Altwies and special prosecutor Kari Morrissey “manipulated evidence and elicited false testimony, with the aim of scapegoating him to secure a conviction,” per The Hollywood Reporter (THR).
At the heart of Wednesday’s dismissal: foreclosure of claims against the prosecutors because the alleged misconduct fell within the scope of their duties. Riggs concluded that Morrissey is shielded by “absolute prosecutorial immunity.”
That immunity, the court said, covers Morrissey withholding firearm analyses, one of which said there were unexplained toolmarks on the trigger mechanism of the discharged firearm, failing to disclose evidence and giving false testimony at trial. While nodding to valid claims against “dishonest or malicious government officials,” Riggs said that the functioning of the judicial system takes precedence.
“The doctrine of absolute prosecutorial immunity is worthwhile only if it applies to hard cases, occasionally shielding acts of gross misconduct,” the judge wrote.
Neither Baldwin nor his attorneys have issued a comment at press time.