Georgia Film Safety Consultant Hopes ‘Midnight Rider’ Plea Will Send A Message
The director of the Gregg Allman movie, “Midnight Rider,” pleaded guilty Monday to charges related to the death of a camera assistant in February 2014.
The crew was filming a scene on a railroad bridge near Jesup, Georgia, when a train came by and hit a bed the crew had placed on the track; the debris killed Sarah Jones and injured six others.
Director Randall Miller will spend a total of two years in jail in connection with Jones’ death.
Safety consultant Chris Palmer worked on the civil case Jones’ family brought against Miller. Palmer spoke with Denis O’Hayer on WABE’s “A Closer Look.”
Palmer said, despite increasing regulations in the past three decades, some filmmakers still ignore safety.
“When you hear the reference to ‘guerilla filmmaking,’ that’s, you know, ‘ask for forgiveness not for permission,’” said Miller, “and that is something in our industry that’s got to stop, because it gets people hurt, and in this case, it got someone killed.”
“Will this change it?” O’Hayer said.
“It certainly should, and hopefully it will,” Palmer said.
Miller’s attorney, Don Samuel, said there’s no question the director should have taken more precautions.
“There was a lack of communication between people: how many trains were expected to come on the tracks,” Samuel told “A Closer Look” on Monday just moments after the guilty pleas were entered. “You know, whether he was allowed to be there or not, there was the expectation of everybody that there were no more trains coming that day.”
As part of Miller’s plea deal, prosecutors dropped charges against his wife and co-defendant, Jodi Savin.
A note of disclosure: attorney Don Samuel is related to our WABE colleague, Molly Samuel.
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