‘Rust’ Jury Chosen After Questions About Guns, Movies and Alec Baldwin

Picking an impartial jury to hear the trial of Alec Baldwin, a movie and television star who inspires strong feelings from both his fans and his detractors, is a particular challenge. So as jury selection began on Tuesday, Judge Mary Marlowe Sommer started things off by turning a standard question on its head.

“How many of you have not seen or heard anything about this case from any source whatsoever?” she asked a pool of 70 potential jurors.

Only a couple indicated that they had not.

“I don’t have cable or internet or anything like that,” one outlier noted.

The case, as a vast majority of prospective jurors had heard, involves the shooting death of the cinematographer Halyna Hutchins on the set of the film “Rust” in 2021. She was killed when a gun that Mr. Baldwin, one of the film’s stars, was rehearsing with fired a live round.

The prosecution argues that Mr. Baldwin, 66, was criminally negligent, and he was charged with involuntary manslaughter. He has denied responsibility, saying that he had no reason to believe that a gun on a film set would be loaded with a live round, and that he had been told the gun was “cold,” meaning it should have been impossible to fire.

A jury of 16 was sworn in on Tuesday afternoon. Twelve will ultimately decide the case, and four will serve as alternates.