Associated Press
[Source: AP]
Jurors began considering their verdicts on Tuesday in the trial of Russell Brand on charges of rape and sexual assault.
After three weeks of argument and evidence, judge Joel Bennathan told the jury at London’s Southwark Crown Court that they must reach a unanimous decision.
“I can only accept a verdict that is the verdict of all 12 of you,” he said.
After about an hour of deliberations, the jurors were sent home for the night with a warning not to discuss the case with anyone else.
Brand, who is free on bail, has attended court every day, accompanied by his wife, Laura Gallacher.
Six women, who don’t know one another, accuse the actor-comedian of sexual misconduct between 1999 and 2009, a decade when Brand went from rising stand-up comedian to major celebrity in the U.K.
Prosecutors argued that during that time Brand was “a sexual predator” who attacked the women in a hotel room, the London offices of MTV, the toilet of a London bar, a radio station, a recording studio and his home.
Brand, 51, has pleaded not guilty to three counts of rape, three counts of sexual assault and one count of attempted indecent assault.
Giving evidence, the entertainer acknowledged that he had been obsessed with sex as a younger man, but said his encounters were always consensual.
Brand’s lawyers argued that the claimants’ cases were undermined by the fact that they only went to police years after the alleged assaults, and following the broadcast of a 2023 documentary that contained anonymous allegations against Brand.
Brand’s lawyer, Ian Winter, said the “well of justice had been corrupted and contaminated” by the documentary.
