By Isabel Vincent
Russell Brand was accused of raping, sexually assaulting and abusing four women over the course of seven years — and one victim was a 16-year-old he allegedly called “the child,” according to a bombshell report the British actor and comedian denied prior to its release.
The allegations against the 48-year-old stem from the height of his fame between 2006 and 2013, according to a joint investigation published Saturday by the Times of London and Channel 4 Dispatches.
One woman alleges the “Get Him to the Greek” star raped her against the wall of his Los Angeles home and was treated at a rape crisis center the same day, according to medical records cited by the outlets.
The woman later told Brand that she had been scared and felt taken advantage of, telling him, “When a girl [says] NO, it means no” — to which he responded he was “very sorry,” text messages cited by the report show.
Another accuser who was 16 at the time alleged that the then-31-year-old called her “the child” and assaulted her during their “emotionally abusive and controlling” three-month relationship, according to the report.
The woman — who is known only by the pseudonym “Alice” and was above the age of consent in the UK — said Brand was “grooming” her, an allegation a relative backed up to the Sunday Times during its investigation.
Alice said he told her to read Vladimir Nabokov’s salacious “Lolita,” save his number in her phone under the name “Carly” and even gave her “scripts” to lie to her parents.
“It was isolating,” she told the outlet.
Brand allegedly even sent a car to take Alice out of school and to his home, she said. On one occasion, his driver told her not to go into the comedian’s home.
“‘Please. I’m asking you not to go in there. You could be my little girl, and I would want someone to do this for her,” Alice recalled the chauffer saying.
Alice also accused Brand of once making her choke when he “forced his penis down her throat” and she allegedly punched him in the stomach to get him to stop.
A third accuser claimed the “Forgetting Sarah Marshall” star sexually assaulted her when she worked with him in Hollywood and threatened legal action against her if she went public with the allegations, and a fourth alleged victim said she was sexually assaulted and physically and emotionally abused by him, the outlets reported.
‘Coordinated attack’
Brand has incorporated stories of his sex addiction and alleged predatory behavior into his routines for years. He has had relationships with a number of high-profile women, including model Kate Moss, and married to pop star Katy Perry in 2010, but the relationship lasted only 14 months.
He is currently married to second wife Laura Gallacher, the mother of his two children. Gallacher, a writer, erased her Instagram page after news of the allegations emerged Saturday.
Brand would regularly have sex with women he met at events, the damning report claims. Two women he had separate dalliances with said he became threatening when they refused to have sex with him, causing one to leave in tears.
Most of the women who came forward with their stories wanted to remain anonymous in the exposé and a subsequent documentary that will be released Saturday on Channel Four’s Dispatches series.
Brand denied the allegations in a preemptively released video on YouTube and X, formerly Twitter, alerting fans to “serious criminal” allegations that he said would be made against him.
“I have received two extremely disturbing letters, or a letter and an email, one from a mainstream media TV company, one from a newspaper, listing a litany of egregious and aggressive attacks,” he said.
“Amidst this litany of astonishing, rather baroque attacks, are some very serious allegations that I absolutely refute.”
The actor said the allegations stem from a time when he was “very, very promiscuous,” which he said he wrote “about extensively in my books.”
“Now during that time of promiscuity, the relationships I had were absolutely, always consensual,” he said.
The “Arthur” actor said he believed he was the subject of a “coordinated attack” and he was going to look into the matter because it was “very, very serious.”
