What the court has heard so far
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Russell Brand is in court facing three counts of rape, three counts of sexual assault and one count of indecent assault, in allegations dating between 1999 and 2009. He has pleaded not guilty to all the charges.
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Prosecutor Riel Karmy-Jones began the trial with her opening statement, telling the court the six alleged victims, all women, “did not know each other then and do not know each other now” and “came forward independently of each other”.
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Karmy-Jones said the allegations “punctuate” 10 years of Brand’s life when “his career was beginning to flourish”.
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The first alleged victim is a woman Brand allegedly raped in a hotel room during a Labour party conference in Bournemouth in 1999. The court heard the complainant, who was in her 20s at the time, said when she came out of the bathroom at her hotel room, Brand was topless and “prancing around the room – a bit like an ostrich, doing silly walks like Basil Fawlty”.
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The second alleged victim is a woman who worked at MTV at the time of the alleged indecent assault incident in 2001. Jurors were told Brand had allegedly tried to force her into a toilet and that she “resisted by struggling and pulling back”. The woman was felt “bewildered and shocked”, Karmy-Jones said.
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The third alleged victim is a woman who was also allegedly forced into a toilet by Brand during an incident at a bar in Soho in 2004. The court heard Brand “grabbed her arm and held her quite strongly and pulled her into the lavatory” where he allegedly orally raped her.
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The fourth alleged victim is a woman who was in her 20s and working at a radio station in 2004 or 2005 when Brand allegedly sexually assaulted her. Karmy-Jones said Brand “instantly grabbed her by the face with both hands” and “pushed her up against a wall, where he kissed her ‘sloppily and aggressively’”. The prosecutor added: “During this assault he also grabbed her body, at her breasts, sides and buttocks aggressively.”
Key events
Under cross-examination, Pinheiro said the events of 1999 were “quite memorable”, adding:
That was quite a big event that occurred, and not something you easily forget.
He told the court he spoke to the Sunday Times about Russell Brand in September 2023 for just under an hour, but did not talk about the alleged incident in Bournemouth.
“I don’t think that was the interest, and I was also quite careful about what things I did speak to the press about,” he said.
“They were talking more generally about the relationship with him, without specifically talking about these particular events.”
In his cross-examination of Mark Pinheiro, Russell Brand’s barrister Ian Winter KC probed the witness on whether he had “on many occasions” described the comedian as a friend.
Pinheiro responded:
I wouldn’t say so, I wouldn’t say there are many occasions on social media at all.
One of the things we talked about with Russell was he didn’t want private material making its way on social media outside of his professional persona.
Pinheiro recalled being invited to a preview of Russell Brand’s show Messiah Complex, in 2013, and seeing women lined up against a wall in the theatre.
“Russell would be networking, schmoozing, talking with various people backstage”, he said.
“There would be a moment he would break away from the networking, walk along the queue of girls, and ask a girl to come out and join him.
“The girl would join him and go off to a quiet area of the theatre, usually the toilet, and we wouldn’t see them for about 10 minutes.
“When he returned, he returned back to the schmoozing, time passed, and he returned to the queue, walked along the queue, picked another girl from the queue and repeat the same thing, go off to somewhere quiet.”
Russell Brand would have around two women a week come back to his flat for sex, Pinheiro told the court.
He told the court he asked Brand to move out after they had lived together for around a year, but said they stayed in touch and met up on holidays.
“I had many situations and occasions where I saw Russell pick up women,” he said.
“Russell approached a girl with a huge amount of enthusiasm and interest in them, which was enough to stop them in their tracks and hear what he had to say.”
Pinheiro said Brand gave women compliments and cracked jokes, including ones aimed at himself. He added:
He had a self-deprecating side to himself. He was able to laugh at himself.
He would say all the terrible things he might be like, or what he might like to do to them.
Girls found that shocking and were very surprised to hear someone being so brutally open and honest about how they were sexually.
Witness tells court Brand said he had ‘gone a bit too far’ with woman at fringe event
Pinheiro told the court that Brand had urged everyone staying with him in a flat in Bournemouth to return to London, without initially explaining why.
“He made it clear we needed to leave immediately,” Pinheiro said.
Brand then told him that he needed to return to London for a “really big audition”, Pinheiro told jurors. When Pinheiro questioned this further, he said Brand “kicked out” at him in anger and was “cowering” in the back seat of the car.
Brand finally admitted he had been with a woman the night before they left Bournemouth, Pinheiro told the court.
Pinheiro continued:
I had Russell finally say he did meet a girl on the Friday night he did … have sex.
He said that things got a little bit heated and a little bit out of hand, and he thinks that maybe he did go a little bit too far.
Those were his words: ‘I think I may have gone a bit too far.’”
Pinheiro said he and Brand were performing at a cabaret show at the conference fringe. When their final show ended, Brand said he was “going to go and get laid”, Pinheiro told the court.
Pinheiro continued:
We didn’t see Russell until the following morning.
We all wondered where he was because he hadn’t returned home.
Close to midday, we got a knock on the door and Russell just arrived back home. We asked him where he was, what happened overnight and he was clearly ruffled, discombobulated, his manner was all over the place – really flustered.”
Pinheiro alleged that Brand had told him “all you need to do is tell the woman what they need to hear” for a “successful pull”.
Pinheiro told the court that Brand’s aim was to “never leave a situation without having some kind of conquest, always trying to score in every endeavour”.
Pinheiro told the court that Brand had “boasted” about wanting to sleep with 5,000 women as they made their way to the Labour party conference in Bournemouth in 1999, where they performed at a fringe event.
Pinheiro said they talked in the back of the car about “meeting girls, pulling girls, picking up girls”.
“He hoped that one day he would have been able to have slept with over 5,000 girls, that was his target,” Pinheiro told jurors.
“He began boasting about certain strategies he would employ in his endeavour to meet women and pull women.”
Prosecution’s first witness takes the stand
The court is now back in session, with the prosecution to call its first witness, Mark Pinheiro.
Pinheiro is a former friend of Russell Brand.
Concluding the prosecution’s opening statement, Karmy-Jones said:
Six women, separate women with different allegations, they don’t know each other and when you hear them I have no doubt you will find their evidence compelling.”
The court has now adjourned for a break until 2pm.
The prosecution outlined the allegations made by the final woman in the case, who said she met Brand while working on a project for Channel 4 in 2009.
The court heard Brand had demanded a massage, walked up to a chair the alleged victim was sitting on and placed his head directly into her groin area. Karmy-Jones told jurors that Brand had said “come on then, do it”, leaving the woman feeling “startled and incredibly uncomfortable”.
She said the alleged victim “was given no time to react – she ‘froze’”.
Brand ‘apologised for treating woman like an animal,’ court hears
Brand allegedly sent a text message to the woman at a later date, to which she replied: “Why are you even messaging me?”, the jury was told.
Karmy-Jones said he responded: “Because you’re dirty, and I wanna push you further.”
The prosecutor continued:
She replied: ‘I think you pushed me far enough – you treated me like an animal.’
His response by text was immediate – he simply said: ‘I’m sorry.’
She didn’t hear from or see him again.”
Alleged rape victim ‘begged’ for Brand to stop, court hears
Continuing with the fifth alleged victim, Karmy-Jones told the court that the woman gave her number to Brand and he texted her later that week.
She was collected by a driver and taken to Brand’s address, where she said they had consensual sex, the court heard.
Brand then turned her over and raped her anally, Karmy-Jones said.
She told jurors: “She asked him to stop, at first quietly and then louder, a number of times, begging. He did not.”
Karmy-Jones said Brand had taken off his condom from the earlier intercourse, adding that “the whole thing did not last that long” and that he told her afterwards to “clean up the mess you have made”.
The alleged victim “blamed herself” and “hated herself for what had happened”, jurors were told.
Karmy-Jones is now taking the jury through the next allegation, involving a woman who met Brand after seeing his show at the Hammersmith Apollo in London in 2009.
The alleged victim said she remembered Brand telling the audience at the end of his show: “If you see me out in the foyer and you think ‘I really fancy him and would like to have sex with him, but I can’t because it is Russell Brand’, you probably can have sex with me. My age range is from 16 to death.”
The woman, who attended the show with a friend, said Brand pointed at them and they were invited backstage for drinks, the court heard.
Karmy-Jones outlined what the prosecution says happened at the bar:
On the way she bumped into Mr Brand. He stopped, he looked at her. They had a very brief exchange and then he just kissed her, there and then, on the lips in the middle of the bar.”
The prosecutor said the woman felt “star struck” and agreed to perform a sex act on Brand, which the court was told was consensual.
Karmy-Jones said the complainant was in a relationship at the time and felt “regret”.
What the court has heard so far
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Russell Brand is in court facing three counts of rape, three counts of sexual assault and one count of indecent assault, in allegations dating between 1999 and 2009. He has pleaded not guilty to all the charges.
-
Prosecutor Riel Karmy-Jones began the trial with her opening statement, telling the court the six alleged victims, all women, “did not know each other then and do not know each other now” and “came forward independently of each other”.
-
Karmy-Jones said the allegations “punctuate” 10 years of Brand’s life when “his career was beginning to flourish”.
-
The first alleged victim is a woman Brand allegedly raped in a hotel room during a Labour party conference in Bournemouth in 1999. The court heard the complainant, who was in her 20s at the time, said when she came out of the bathroom at her hotel room, Brand was topless and “prancing around the room – a bit like an ostrich, doing silly walks like Basil Fawlty”.
-
The second alleged victim is a woman who worked at MTV at the time of the alleged indecent assault incident in 2001. Jurors were told Brand had allegedly tried to force her into a toilet and that she “resisted by struggling and pulling back”. The woman was felt “bewildered and shocked”, Karmy-Jones said.
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The third alleged victim is a woman who was also allegedly forced into a toilet by Brand during an incident at a bar in Soho in 2004. The court heard Brand “grabbed her arm and held her quite strongly and pulled her into the lavatory” where he allegedly orally raped her.
-
The fourth alleged victim is a woman who was in her 20s and working at a radio station in 2004 or 2005 when Brand allegedly sexually assaulted her. Karmy-Jones said Brand “instantly grabbed her by the face with both hands” and “pushed her up against a wall, where he kissed her ‘sloppily and aggressively’”. The prosecutor added: “During this assault he also grabbed her body, at her breasts, sides and buttocks aggressively.”
Alleged victim said Brand ‘grabbed her by the face with both hands’ during assault, court hears
The court is told about the fourth complainant, a woman who was in her 20s and working at a radio station in 2004 or 2005 when Brand allegedly sexually assaulted her.
After she had left a room while at work, Brand “instantly grabbed her by the face with both hands” and “pushed her up against a wall, where he kissed her ‘sloppily and aggressively’”, Karmy-Jones told jurors.
She continued:
During this assault he also grabbed her body, at her breasts, sides and buttocks aggressively.
She tried to push him off, but he was too strong … it was rough, fast and frenzied.”
Karmy-Jones added:
While this was happening, she looked to the woman that he was with, hoping she would intervene but neither the men or the woman did anything.
She finally managed to push him away, saying words to him to the effect of ‘fuck off’.
Mr Brand stumbled backwards at that final push and just sniggered – like it was a joke.”
