Prosecutors overseeing the case of the on-set fatal shooting of a cinematographer during the filming of Alec Baldwin’s “Rust” movie in 2021 have added a new charge against the film’s armorer, who was already facing an involuntary manslaughter charge.

Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, the 25-year-old daughter of stuntman Thell Reed, now faces a charge of tampering with evidence, special prosecutor Kari T. Morrissey said in a statement, according to The New York Times.

Gutierrez-Reed was in charge of the weapons used in the movie Western, including the gun Baldwin was using in rehearsal on October 21, 2021, when the gun went off — he says he did not pull the trigger, and it should not have held live ammunition — wounding director Joel Souza and killing cinematographer Halyna Hutchins, as CrimeOnline has reported.

The new charge against the armorer “relates to the transfer of narcotics to another person” on the day of the shooting “with the intent to prevent criminal prosecution,” the statement said.

Gutierrez-Reed’s attorney, Jason Bowles, released a statement that began, “Something is rotten in Denmark,” KOAT reported.

“It is shocking that after 20 months of investigation, the special prosecutor now throws in a completely new charge against Ms. Gutierrez Reed, with no prior notice or any witness statements, lab reports, or evidence to support it,” Bowles said. “This comes on the heels of the state letting its lead investigator go, and the investigator raising serious concerns about the investigation in an email. This stinks to high heaven and is retaliatory and vindictive.”

In the last half of the statement, Bowles was referring to an email he was sent erroneously by Robert Shilling, an investigator who worked the case for months for the district attorney’s office but was removed from the case, the Times reported. Bowles, the former head of the New Mexico State Police, wrote the email after he was taken off the case, sharply criticized the Sante Fe County Sheriff’s Office.

“The conduct of the Santa Fe County Sheriff’s Office during and after their initial investigation is reprehensible and unprofessional to a degree I still have no words for,” Schilling wrote in the email sent to Morrissey, District Attorney Mary Carmack-Altwies, another member of the district attorney’s office and Bowles. “Not I or 200 more proficient investigators than I can/could clean up the mess delivered to your office in October 2022 (1 year since the initial incident … inexcusable).”

Schilling told the Times he sent the mail to Bowles by mistake because he has the same first name as one of his supervisors — likely Jason Lewis, who was appointed along with Morrissey to oversee the case after Carmack-Altwies stepped back and the original special prosecutor, state Rep. Andrea Reeb, resigned because New Mexico law bars working for an executive branch of the government while serving in the state legislature.

Schilling declined to elaborate on his email when asked about it by the Times, and Morrissey defended the sheriff’s office’s work in her statement.

“We disagree with Mr. Shilling’s evaluation that any gaps in the investigation conducted by the Santa Fe County Sheriff could not be cured and we are diligently working with the sheriff’s department and our own investigative team to conduct any necessary follow-up that we, as special prosecutors, deem necessary,” she said.

Earlier this month, Morrissey and Lewis said in a court filing that there was “some evidence” that Gutierrez-Reed may have brought live ammunition onto the movie set, Reuters reported. Reeb’s lengthy report on the shooting had not determined how live ammunition came onto the set, let alone how it was loaded in the prop gun Baldwin was using. And charging documents had said that the armorer was responsible for the weapons but not for bringing in live ammunition.

In their June 8 filing, Morrissey and Lewis wrote that “criminal charges may follow” if they confirm their theory that Gutierrez-Reed brought in the ammunition.

But this week, the only new charge is tampering with evidence.

Gutierrez-Reed is currently the only person charged in the deadly shooting. Baldwin had initially been charged with involuntary manslaughter, but that charge was dropped in April without prejudice, meaning the prosecutors could reinstate it. The manslaughter charges against both Baldwin and Gutierrez-Reed contained a weapons enhancement that would have increased a sentence if they were convicted, but that was dropped when Baldwin’s attorneys pointed out the state legislature passed it after the shooting took place.

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[Featured image: Hannah Gutierrez-Reed/Santa Fe County Sheriff’s Office]