“Will you be a free man in two weeks Mr. Baldwin?” someone shouted, as arrived at the First Judicial District Court in Santa Fe, New Mexico Tuesday morning for the first day of his trial. Baldwin flicked the legal pad he was carrying at a journalist who had thrust a microphone into his path and silently walked through the scrum of photographers and reporters, led by his attorneys Luke Nikas and Alex Spiro.
The star stopped to speak with his wife, Hilaria, who had arrived at the courthouse in a separate black SUV and was standing in front of the line of photographers with one of their seven children balanced on her hip. On Wednesday, opening statements will start in a two week trial on whether Baldwin should be held criminally liable for involuntary manslaughter in the death of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins. The crush of cameras Baldwin has attracted is an unfamiliar sight at the Santa Fe courthouse, where 41 news organizations are credentialed to cover the event, the first celebrity trial ever in New Mexico — unless you count Billy the Kid’s 1881 murder trial, before the territory even became a state.
The attention on Baldwin’s case is already presenting some challenges to the legal system. After Judge Mary Marlowe Sommer assured the group of 70 potential jurors empaneled on Tuesday that their faces would not appear on a Court TV feed, she asked them to raise their hands if they were already familiar with Baldwin’s case. So many did so that Sommer re-phrased the.