LONDON — Actor-comedian Russell Brand was found guilty of rape and sexual assault charges on Thursday.
Brand, 51, was found guilty of one charge of rape and three of sexual assault after a four-week trial at London’s Southwark Crown Court, Reuters reported. He was acquitted of two rape counts and one count of attempted indecent assault, according to The Associated Press.
Brand had denied the accusations, saying the incidents had either been consensual, reinvented or reimagined, according ot the news outlet.
A jury deliberated for 9 hours before reaching a verdict, SkyNews reported.
Judge Joel Bennathan said that Brand would be sentenced on Monday, Reuters reported.
The case involved six women and allegations dating from 1999 to 2009, the AP reported.
The prosecutor said in court that the women, who do not know each other, were assaulted in “a hotel room, workplaces, a toilet cubicle in a bar and at his home address,” and that he had an “indiscriminate and voracious” desire and that “women were simply a means to an end.”
Attorney Riel Karmy-Jones had argued that Brand was “a flirt with a huge sexual appetite -- childlike in his expectation that his every desire should be met.”
She told the jury, “He is ruthless, he was calculating, he was manipulative. And, the prosecution say, he was a sexual predator.”
Thursday’s guilty rape verdict relates to a woman who met Brand at a 2009 Hammersmith Apollo, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Brand rose to fame during the early 2000s, appearing in films such as “Forgetting Sarah Marshall” and “Get Him to the Greek,” Variety reported. He also hosted his own show on the BBC and was briefly married to pop star Katy Perry.
The comedian would become famous for his risqué stand-up routines and his bouts with drugs and alcohol.
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