Click here to read the full article.
Six more women have accused Russell Brand of sexual misconduct in a new investigation by The Times and The Sunday Times, the newspapers whose earlier reporting on the comedian features in Netflix’s just-unveiled documentary
“Russell Brand: Open Secret.”
The accounts were published days after Brand was jailed for rape and sexual assault. The papers could not report them while his criminal case was ongoing, because of the risk of prejudicing the trial.
Brand did not respond to the new allegations. The papers said they reached out through his lawyers following his conviction, and that his lawyer reportedly mentioned the possibility of “injunctive relief” but sent no answer to the claims, even after being granted more time. Brand has denied wrongdoing in the past and has insisted that all his relationships were consensual.
According to The Times, the paper took “extensive steps” to corroborate what the women said, and none of them received payment.
The new allegations stretch from 2005 to 2015. The earliest comes from a woman, then in her mid-20s, whom Brand approached that year.
“Please I just need to have sex with you, I will pay you,” she said he told her.
After winning a BBC 6 Music competition in 2006, a woman then in her late 20s appeared as a guest on Brand’s show. The pair saw each other on and off over the following year, and she said that at one point he demanded she lick a toilet seat in his home. When she refused, “[He] seemed pissed off that I wouldn’t let him humiliate me,” she said.
A third woman was 19 in 2007 when she lined up with a friend to meet Brand. She said that when they later had sex, she told him it was painful and asked him to stop, but he did not, and that he insisted afterward that the night had been consensual.
Another woman said she and Brand had an on-again, off-again relationship in the late 2000s that began with a work meeting at his London home. She said that on one occasion she realized he had no condom on, asked him to stop and tried to pull away, but could not, and decided not to fight him. He later apologized to her, both in person and by text, she said.
In 2013, a fan in her late 20s met Brand after he played The Chapel in San Francisco. She said he handled her roughly and pushed his hand down her pants.
The most recent account dates to 2015. A woman employed at a London venue where Brand was a regular said one of his staff told her Brand wanted her and was waiting in the disabled toilets. She said the lights were off when she went in and that Brand, who claimed he needed toilet paper, grabbed her as she passed it to him.
The Metropolitan Police said that during and since the trial, it has heard from several people, some offering further information and some reporting potential crimes, and that detectives are assessing what they received. The force confirmed after the verdict that it is investigating rape allegations from two further women. Met chief Mark Rowley said he “wouldn’t be surprised” if more victims came forward.
Prime Minister Andy Burnham has called on the media industry to “look at itself” and “step forward” in protecting women and girls, following Brand’s conviction and separate allegations against comedian David Walliams that emerged from a joint Guardian and ITV News investigation. Walliams has rejected the claims.
Brand, 51, received a prison sentence of 10 and a half years on Monday. A Southwark Crown Court jury in London had found him guilty of three sexual assault counts and of raping a fan who was 21 at the time, while clearing him of a further two rape counts and an attempted indecent assault charge. The offenses took place between 2004 and 2009.
The first allegations against Brand surfaced in 2023 in a docuseries made by The Sunday Times with Channel 4’s “Dispatches.” Until then, he was known chiefly for his comedy and for film roles in “Forgetting Sarah Marshall” and “Get Him to the Greek.”
