Russell Brand Convicted of Rape and Three Sexual Assaults in London

A London jury convicted Russell Brand on Thursday of rape and three sexual assaults after a four-week London trial at Southwark Crown Court. The 51-year-old comedian and actor was taken into custody immediately, and the judge said he should expect a significant prison sentence.

The jury unanimously found Brand guilty on four counts involving four women. It acquitted him of two additional rape allegations and one attempted indecent assault. Jurors heard accusations from six women covering events between 1999 and 2009, when Brand was becoming one of Britain's best-known entertainers.

Judge Joel Bennathan refused a defense request to let Brand remain free until sentencing so he could speak with his children. The judge cited Brand's financial resources and concluded he posed a meaningful risk of failing to return. Sentencing is scheduled for Monday at the same court.

One conviction concerns a woman Brand met after a stand-up performance at the Hammersmith Apollo in 2009. Prosecutors said he took her to his home and raped her. Jurors accepted that account while rejecting separate allegations made by other women.

The sexual-assault convictions involved an MTV employee at a birthday party in a Soho bar in 2004, a radio employee inside the Capital Radio building during 2004 or 2005, and a Channel 4 employee during a 2009 recording. The jury found that Brand groped the first woman, kissed and groped the second, and pressed his face into the third woman's groin after demanding a massage.

Jurors cleared Brand of raping the woman involved in the Soho incident. They also found him not guilty of raping a woman in a Bournemouth hotel during the 1999 Labour Party conference and rejected an allegation that he tried to indecently assault a woman at MTV's offices.

Brand denied the allegations and said his sexual encounters were consensual. He testified about his past promiscuity but rejected the prosecution's portrayal of him as a predator. His wife, Laura, appeared as a character witness. The defense argued that the delayed complaints and publicity surrounding earlier anonymous allegations weakened the women's accounts.

Detective Superintendent Andy Furphy said after the verdicts that Brand had used his celebrity and status to exploit women. Detectives said their investigation remains active and that officers have questioned Brand about rape complaints from two additional women. Those allegations are not part of Thursday's convictions.

The investigation required detectives to reconstruct events that happened years earlier without contemporary video or forensic evidence. Officers spoke with more than 100 witnesses, collected more than 400 statements and examined a documentary record exceeding 1,400 items. They also assembled timelines using old floor plans, photographs and recordings of Brand's performances, interviews and broadcasts.

Police interviewed Brand four times. Investigators said he initially maintained that he did not recognize the women and later changed his account as the case approached trial. Prosecutors used that shift to challenge his credibility.

Brand rose to prominence through television presenting, stand-up comedy and national radio. He later appeared in films including "Forgetting Sarah Marshall" and "Get Him to the Greek." His marriage to pop singer Katy Perry lasted two years, ending in 2012. He has publicly discussed his past drug and alcohol addiction.

More recently, after relocating to Florida, he amassed a substantial internet following with videos combining wellness, conspiracy theories and Christian faith. His public persona had shifted away from mainstream entertainment by the time the criminal case reached court.

The jury deliberated across two days, spending over eight hours in discussions. Brand closed his eyes when the rape verdict was announced but otherwise showed little visible reaction, courtroom accounts show. He told his lawyers he was all right before officers escorted him from the courtroom.