British police mentioned Monday that they’d acquired a sexual assault allegation after media retailers revealed claims by a number of ladies in opposition to Russell Brand. Promoters postponed the remaining dates in a string of stay gigs by the comic, who denies the allegations. A expertise company and a writer additionally parted firm with Brand over the claims, which have left the U.Ok. leisure business dealing with questions on whether or not the comic’s unhealthy habits went unchallenged due to his fame. Also learn: Katy Perry claimed she knew the ‘real truth’ about Russell Brand years before expose
Brand, 48, denies allegations of sexual assault made by 4 ladies in a Channel 4 tv documentary and The Times and Sunday Times newspapers. The accusers, who haven’t been named, embody one who mentioned she was sexually assaulted throughout a relationship with him when she was 16. Another lady says Brand raped her in Los Angeles in 2012.
London’s Metropolitan Police pressure mentioned that for the reason that allegations had been made public it had acquired “a report of a sexual assault which was alleged to have taken place in Soho in central London in 2003.” That is three years before the earliest of the alleged assaults reported by the media outlets.
The police force said “officers are in contact with the woman and will be providing her with support.” It didn’t determine the alleged perpetrator as Brand, however referred to the newspaper and TV allegations in its assertion. Police urged “anybody who believes they could have been a sufferer of a sexual offence, irrespective of how way back it was, to contact us.”
In a video assertion launched Friday in response to the media claims, Brand mentioned that his relationships had been “always consensual.”
The Times mentioned Monday that extra ladies had contacted the newspaper with allegations in opposition to Brand and they’d be “rigorously checked.”
Max Blain, spokesman for Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, mentioned the claims had been “very serious and concerning.” Conservative legislator Caroline Nokes, who chairs the House of Commons Women and Equalities Committee, urged police in each Britain and the United States to analyze the “incredibly shocking” allegations. “This merits and needs a criminal investigation, because for too long we have seen men — and the perpetrators of these sorts of crimes are almost invariably men — not being held to account for their behaviors and their actions,” she informed BBC radio.
The claims have renewed debate concerning the “lad culture” that flourished in Britain within the Nineteen Nineties and early 2000s, and the misogyny that also percolates on the web. The allegations reported by the newspapers and Channel 4 cowl the interval between 2006 and 2013, when Brand was a significant star in Britain with a rising U.S. profile.
Known for his unbridled and risqué standup routines, he hosted exhibits on radio and tv, wrote memoirs charting his battles with medication and alcohol, appeared in a number of Hollywood films and was briefly married to pop star Katy Perry between 2010 and 2012.
Brand was suspended by the BBC in 2008 for making lewd prank calls to Fawlty Towers actor Andrew Sachs by which he boasted about having intercourse with Sachs’ granddaughter. He give up his radio present within the wake of the incident, which drew 1000’s of complaints to the publicly funded broadcaster.
The BBC, Channel 4 and the manufacturing firm behind the Big Brother actuality sequence – spinoffs of which had been hosted by Brand — all say they’ve launched investigations into Brand’s habits and the way complaints had been dealt with. Brand additionally has been dropped by expertise company Tavistock Wood, which mentioned it had been “horribly misled” by him. Publisher Bluebird, an imprint of Pan Macmillan, mentioned it had determined to “pause” future publishing with Brand.
Victims on why they reported so late
Supporters of Brand requested why the allegations had been being made years after the alleged incidents. The ladies mentioned that they solely felt prepared to inform their tales after being approached by reporters, with some citing Brand’s newfound prominence as a web-based wellness influencer as an element of their choice to talk.
Victims and the media additionally should take account of Britain’s claimant-friendly libel legal guidelines, which put the burden of proof on these making allegations.
In current years Brand has largely disappeared from mainstream media however has constructed up a big following on-line with movies mixing wellness and conspiracy theories. His YouTube channel, which has greater than 6 million subscribers, has featured COVID-19 conspiracy theories, vaccine misinformation and interviews with controversial broadcasters together with Tucker Carlson and Joe Rogan.
He additionally has continued to tour as a comic, performing to a whole bunch of individuals in a London venue on Saturday night because the Channel 4 documentary was broadcast. He had been resulting from carry out Tuesday in Windsor, west of London, however promoters mentioned the remainder of the tour was being postponed.
Ellie Tomsett, a senior lecturer in media and communications at Birmingham City University who research Britain’s standup circuit, mentioned Brand was a product of a stay comedy scene that was riddled with misogyny – and nonetheless is, regardless of progress made by ladies and others to diversify the comedian panorama.
“When we’ve had a rise of popular feminism … we’ve also had a rise in popular misogyny epitomized by the likes of (social media influencer) Andrew Tate, but evident in all aspects of society, and definitely reflected on the U.K. comedy circuit,” Tomsett mentioned. “More and extra issues are springing as much as attempt to counter this, however the concept it’s one thing that occurred prior to now and doesn’t occur anymore is, fairly frankly, nonsense,” she added.Why