A judge in London on Monday sentenced religiously influential British actor Russell Brand to 10-and-a-half years in prison after he was found guilty of rape and sexual assault charges in England last week.
Brand, the 51-year-old former bad boy star of comedies such as “Forgetting Sarah Marshall” and “Get Him to The Greek,” was convicted by a jury last week of one count of rape and three counts of sexual assault against four different women.
He was also acquitted of two counts of rape and one count of attempted indecent assault. The charges stemmed from his interactions with six different women in the United Kingdom in the early to late 1990s. He has denied all charges leading up to a three-week trial that began on October 12.
Brand was first publicly accused of sexual assault in 2023, when the Times of London and Britain’s Channel 4 aired a joint investigation into allegations involving multiple women between 2006 and 2013. Following the investigation, more women came forward with their accusations against Brand. These included a woman who alleged in a civil lawsuit filed in New York that Brand sexually assaulted her on the set of the 2011 movie “Arthur.”
British police first filed a criminal complaint against Brand in April 2025, charging him with single rape, indecent assault, oral rape and two counts of sexual assault spanning incidents from 1999 to 2005. Prosecutors accused Brand of raping a woman in England’s seaside town of Bournemouth in 1999. Authorities also accused Brand of indecently assaulting, verbally raping and sexually assaulting a second woman in 2001. The alleged sexual assaults of a third woman in 2004 and a fourth woman between 2004 and 2005 allegedly occurred in Westminster, according to UK authorities. Prosecutors filed two additional charges against Brand in December 2025, one of rape and the other of sexual assault, for incidents involving two other women in 2009.
He was convicted of sexually assaulting a woman during a birthday party at a London bar in 2004, but was acquitted of orally raping her in a toilet, the Associated Press reported. Jurors also found the actor guilty of kissing and touching another woman at a London radio station in 2004 or 2005, and of anally raping her at her home after meeting a fan backstage at a comedy show in 2009. His last conviction was for the comedian being found guilty of sexually assaulting another woman, who claimed she asked for a massage and pressed her face into his crotch while filming a commercial in 2009.
Shortly after the jury returned its verdict, police confirmed they had provided prosecutors with a further investigation into two rape allegations against the actor.
Prosecutor Riel Karmy-Jones described the comedian as ruthless, “calculating”, “manipulative” and “sexual predator” during the trial, while pop star Katy Perry’s ex-husband Brand denied forcing any of his accusers into sexual intercourse. “Consent is fundamental, essential, necessary, and in some ways even more important than sex itself,” he told jurors.
Brand also told jurors the personal toll of her high-profile rape and sexual assault allegations, claiming friends and accomplices had cut ties and no one with relevant evidence was willing to testify on her behalf. Laura Gallacher, Brand’s wife since 2017 and the mother of his three children, testified on the actor’s behalf, describing him as a devoted father.
Jurors also heard testimony from Brand’s former personal assistant and the actor’s former roommate, who spoke of Brand’s “insane sexual appetite” and ambitious sexual goals, respectively. The actor also acknowledged during cross-examination from Karmy-Jones that he had spent some of his former life working “beyond reckless womanizing” and had become “comfortable” using his fame to “facilitate sexual access”. He said it was “wrong”.
“My whole life has been spent with these events, these allegations, these accusations,” he said.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.