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Alec Baldwin's 2017 tweet wondering 'how it must feel to wrongfully kill someone' is being reshared following fatal shooting on 'Rust' set

Alec Baldwin
Alec Baldwin in September 2021. AP Photo/John Minchillo
  • Alec Baldwin fired a prop gun that killed one person and injured another on the set of "Rust."

  • In the aftermath, a tweet Baldwin wrote in 2017 reacting to a police shooting has resurfaced.

  • "I wonder how it must feel to wrongfully kill someone...," the actor wrote in the original tweet.

Actor Alec Baldwin fired a prop gun that killed one person and injured another on the set of the movie "Rust" on Thursday in Santa Fe, New Mexico. The film's director of photography, Halyna Hutchins, was shot and killed. Director Joel Souza was also injured in the incident and later released from the hospital, according to a tweet from "Rust" actor Francis Fisher.

In the aftermath of Hutchins' death, a tweet Baldwin wrote in 2017 in response to a police officer fatally shooting a suspect outside of a 7-Eleven convenience store in Huntington Beach, California, has resurfaced.

"I wonder how it must feel to wrongfully kill someone..." Baldwin's four-year-old tweet reads, along with a link to a Los Angeles Times report about a bystander's video of the 2017 police shooting. People on Twitter immediately began sharing the actor's old tweet in conjunction with the recent "Rust" shooting news.

-AlecBaldwin (@AlecBaldwln____) September 23, 2017

According to the Los Angeles Times report, a video of the 2017 incident depicts 27-year-old Dillan Tabares reaching for an object on officer Eric Esparza's belt. The officer then "unholstered his pistol, moved quickly away and began firing," according to the publication.

The 2017 incident Baldwin tweeted about is currently still being litigated. The Orange County District attorney's office declined to prosecute in 2018 and in 2019, a US district judge wrote she found no evidence the officer had used excessive force. However, in February of this year, appellate judges ruled in favor of Tiffany Tabares, the mother of the deceased, who was pursuing a $10 million civil rights lawsuit against the city. The judges recommended the case be remanded for further proceedings.

"Rust" - a western starring Baldwin as a father who travels to Kansas to help his 13-year-old estranged son escape from prison after the boy receives the death sentence for an accidental murder - has halted production in the aftermath of the shooting incident, according to The New York Times.

An email from the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees Local 44, obtained by IndieWire, states that the prop gun Baldwin fired contained a "live single round."

"A live single round was accidentally fired on set by the principal actor, hitting both the Director of Photography, Local 600 member Halyna Hutchins, and Director Joel Souza," the email said, according to IndieWire. "Local 44 has confirmed that the Props, Set Decoration, Special Effects and Construction Departments were staffed by New Mexico crew members. There were no Local 44 members on the call sheet."

Hollywood is reacting to the news, with film stars and crew paying tribute to Hutchins. Baldwin himself released a statement on social media saying his "heart is broken."

Legal experts told Insider it's unlikely that Alec Baldwin will face criminal charges.

Read the original article on Insider