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Inside The Courtroom As Case Dismissed Against Alec Baldwin In Fatal Shooting Of Cinematographer
Santa Fe, New Mexico – A nearly three-year legal saga for Alec Baldwin in the fatal shooting of a cinematographer concluded Friday without a verdict, but with tears of relief for the actor and a small group of family members who had settled into a sad daily routine on wooden benches inside a windowless New Mexico courtroom during the trial.
In the morning, 16 jurors filed into the courtroom for a third day of taking notes and listening to testimony in Baldwin’s involuntary manslaughter trial in the 2021 shooting death of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins, only to be released for the day as the trial took an unexpected detour.
“Have a great weekend,” Judge Mary Marlowe Sommer stated.
Outside the jury’s gaze, Baldwin’s criminal case was teetering as his defense attorneys accused local detectives and prosecutors of hiding evidence that could throw light on the unconfirmed origin of live ammo on the set of “Rust.”
This was Baldwin’s fifth day in court. He arrived in a black SUV with his wife, Hilaria Baldwin, every morning to a phalanx of outdoor media cameras. Inside the courtroom on Monday, an animated Baldwin talked to a counsel, scribbled on a legal pad, and distributed post-it notes to his legal team.
Alec Baldwin | AP News Image
Inside The Courtroom As Case Dismissed Against Alec Baldwin In Fatal Shooting Of Cinematographer
The defense secured an early victory when the judge concluded Baldwin could not be held criminally accountable for his role as co-producer on “Rust.” The case would center on Baldwin’s gun handling as the major character.
On Tuesday, the defendant’s younger brother, Stephen Baldwin, appeared in the back of the courtroom for jury selection. He’d return every day, all day. Out of 70 potential jurors, all but three were familiar with the “Rust” shooting case. By the end of the day, a jury of five men and eleven women had been seated for trial.
The courtroom was packed for opening statements on Wednesday. Half of the gallery was reserved for news media, including local network TV and the Times of London, as well as a few designated photographers. The other half was filled by attorneys and members of the general public, including Baldwin’s friends and relatives, local curiosity seekers and traveling amateur trial enthusiasts.
As prosecutors presented opening remarks and overhead video monitors showed the aftermath of the fatal shooting at a movie set ranch, Baldwin sat in court, eyes fixed on a notebook and away from the jury.
Prosecutors said Baldwin broke the basic laws of firearm safety by aiming a real gun at Hutchins while pretending. Defense attorneys contended that Baldwin was simply doing his job as an actor, depending on other specialists to assure firearms safety, albeit with deadly consequences.
Elizabeth Keuchler, Baldwin’s older sister, cried in court as the comments were read. She embraced her brother over a courtroom railing and then sat close behind him.
Gloria Allred, a famous critic of Baldwin, took her seat at the front of the court gallery. She represents Hutchins’ sister and parents in a civil trial seeking damages.
Baldwin’s every expression during the trial was captured on a television feed relayed by CourtTV and The Associated Press. During Wednesday’s first full day of witness testimony, the A-list actor, who has had a decades-long career in cinema and television, from “The Hunt for Red October” to “30 Rock” and is a regular on “Saturday Night Live,” maintained a guarded and focused stare.
Baldwin ran out of the courtroom once but moved slowly and deliberately around the courtroom and courthouse, where impromptu interviews and photography were prohibited.
On Friday afternoon, Baldwin’s outward demeanor changed little, but tension was rising in the courtroom as Marlowe Sommer weighed a motion to dismiss the case and probed revelations that investigators failed to disclose the receipt of ammunition in March by a man who claimed it was related to Hutchins’ death.
Prosecutors claimed the ammo was unconnected and inconsequential, but Baldwin’s lawyers claimed they “buried” it.
Alec Baldwin | AP News Image
Inside The Courtroom As Case Dismissed Against Alec Baldwin In Fatal Shooting Of Cinematographer
During an afternoon break, Baldwin took steady, controlled breaths as he walked slowly out of the courtroom. The air whistled faintly as he exhaled, lips pursed. Hilaria Baldwin grabbed his arm and caressed his back as they paced the hallway.
Back inside, the audience laughed as defense attorney Alex Spiro sparred with the ammo supplier for “Rust,” Seth Kenney, who had formed a cooperative relationship with investigators in the aftermath of the massacre.
But the courtroom became hushed amid the clatter of laptop keyboards when the judge questioned a sheriff’s detective about the choice to keep the ammo in a separate evidence file from the “Rust” shooting case and if lead prosecutor Kari Morrissey was aware of it.
“When you say that there were discussions and the decision was made by all of you to put that ammo in a separate file, was Ms. Morrissey part of that discussion?” Marlowe Sommer stated.
The case was collapsing. The courtroom gasped as Morrissey revealed that her co-prosecutor had just quit.
Baldwin’s eyes welled up with tears and sobs as the judge explained her decision: “The sanction of dismissal is warranted in this case.”
SOURCE | AP
News
Canadian Man Arrested for TikTok Video That Threatened Trudeau
A TikTok video that went live earlier this week has led to a Toronto man facing charges of threatening Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland. Andrew Marshall, 61, is facing two counts of uttering threats.
On Friday afternoon, the Ontario Court of Justice granted him bail with a surety and restrictions after the RCMP charged him on Wednesday.
Following Monday’s upload to TikTok, CBC Toronto conducted its own independent investigation of the video. Marshall vehemently opposes what he perceives as restrictions on free expression in Canada in it.
“I get them taken down all the time— I make videos — or all my comments, that are just simple comments,” Marsh says in the TikTok. “It’s just getting ridiculous, Marshall said.”
According to the CBC more and more people are threatening politicians. The commissioner of the RCMP has hinted that further measures may be necessary to ensure their safety.
In the TikTok video, Marshall explains in great detail how he would brutally assassinate Trudeau and Freeland “if it was up to him.”
Marshall attacks multiple groups throughout the roughly 11-minute TikTok video, including the media, Muslims, migrants, and the police who defend the government.
Among Marshall’s bail terms are the following: he must not communicate with Trudeau or Freeland; he must not use the internet to make social media posts or comments; he must not own any weapons; and he must not apply for a firearms permit.
During the bail hearing, the prosecution provided all of the evidence that is often not published.
Nate Jackson, Marshall’s attorney, stressed his client’s liberties and privileges as a Canadian in an email message.
“He has the right to freedom of speech, the right to reasonable bail and the right to a fair trial,” he said. “Having secured his release from custody, we will continue to defend Mr. Marshall’s Charter rights as his case proceeds.”
Neither Freeland’s nor the prime minister’s office would comment on the allegations, according to the CBC.
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Canada’s Unemployment Rate Hits its Highest Point Since 2017
As the job market remains dismal, the national unemployment rate in Canada has risen to its highest point since 2017. This has led some analysts to question whether the Bank of Canada should be reducing interest rates more quickly.
In spite of a net gain of 22,000 jobs, Statistics Canada reported on Friday that the unemployment rate increased to 6.6% from 6.4% the previous month. The rise was due to an uptick in part-time employment and a fall in full-time employment.
Outside of the pandemic years, the national unemployment rate has reached its highest position since May 2017, according to StatCan.
Rapid population expansion in Canada has increased the overall labour pool, but the country’s unemployment rate has persisted in rising.
The summer job market was especially tough for students, according to StatCan. Not including the pandemic, the unemployment rate among students going back to school in the autumn was 16.7 percent, which is the highest level since 2012.
Two days after the Bank of Canada dropped interest rates for the third time in a row, reducing borrowing costs to alleviate economic pressure, the most recent reading of the Canadian job market follows suit.
According to TD Bank economist Leslie Preston, who wrote a note on Friday, the central bank is “giving the OK” to keep dropping rates due to the bad August jobs report. Preston predicts two more quarter-point decreases at the remaining decisions this year.
According to CIBC senior economist Andrew Grantham, there are indications that the labour market is quickly contracting more than initially thought, since the unemployment rate is nearly two percentage points greater than the record low of 4.9% in June 2022.
“Due to this, we believe the Bank should be contemplating a quicker rate of reductions in order to bring interest rates to less restrictive levels,” he informed clients in a letter on Friday morning.
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US Job Growth Falls Short of Expectations: Economy Struggles Under High Interest Rates
Last month, job growth in the United States was weaker than predicted, prompting concerns that the world’s largest economy is beginning to struggle under the weight of increased interest rates.
The Labour Department said that employers added 142,000 jobs in August, which was less than the nearly 160,000 economists predicted. It also stated that job gains over the preceding two months were weaker than expected.
However, the jobless rate went down to 4.2%, down from 4.3% in July.
The report is one of the most important indicators of the US economy and arrives at a vital time, as voters consider presidential candidates for the November election and the US central bank contemplates its first interest rate decrease in four years.
Analysts said the latest statistics kept the Federal Reserve on pace for a rate drop at its meeting this month, but did little to answer worries about the trajectory of the US economy or how much of a cut it should make.
“There has rarely been such a make-or-break number; unfortunately, today’s jobs report does not completely resolve the recession debate,” said Seema Shah, chief global strategist at Principal Asset Management.
Soaring prices in 2022 caused the Federal Reserve to hike its key lending rate to 5.3%, a nearly 20-year high.
Faced with increased borrowing costs for homes, vehicles, and other debt, the economy has slowed, helping to alleviate pressures that were boosting inflation but exacerbating market concerns.
As inflation has fallen to 2.9% in July, the Fed is under pressure to decrease interest rates to prevent additional economic deceleration.
Although job increases in August fell short of expectations, they were greater than in July, when a slowdown aroused anxieties and triggered several days of stock market volatility.
Last month, construction and health-care firms hired the most, while manufacturing and retailers laid off employees.
Ms Shah stated that the data in Friday’s report was mixed, but provided enough concerning indicators that the Fed should make a larger cut.
“On balance, with inflation pressures subdued, there is no reason for the Fed not to err on the side of caution and frontload rate cuts,” she told reporters.
Others, however, felt the advances were just steady enough to warrant a 0.25 percentage point decrease, as markets had long projected – though this could signal more cuts than expected in the coming months.
Paul Ashworth, Capital Economics’ senior North America economist, predicted that the Fed’s decision will be “close run.”
“The labour market is clearly experiencing a marked slowdown,” he said, adding that the new statistics were “overall still consistent with an economy experiencing a soft landing rather than plummeting into recession”.
Concerns about the economy are a major issue in the US election.
According to polls, a majority of Americans feel the US is in a recession, despite healthy 2.5% growth last year.
Donald Trump has declared that the economy is headed for a “crash,” and his team instantly latched on the latest data to criticise Vice President Kamala Harris, publishing a press release titled “warning lights flash as Kamala’s economy continues to weaken.”
Democrats have defended their performance, claiming that the United States survived the pandemic and inflation better than many other countries.
They believe the slowdown is a sign that the economy is returning to a more sustainable rate of growth following the post-pandemic boom.
“Although hiring has slowed, the US job market continues to generate solid job gains and wage growth that is consistently beating inflation,” the White House Council of Economic Advisors stated in a blog.
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