Russell Brand sentenced to 10 years and six months for rape and assaults
A London court sentenced Russell Brand after convictions for rape and three sexual assaults. Here is how the prison term is structured.
By Georgia Hale · Staff Writer
2 min read
Russell Brand sentenced rape assault: The comedian and actor was given a prison term of 10 years and six months at Southwark Crown Court in London after being convicted of one count of rape and three counts of sexual assault, according to CBS News, DW and CBC.
Judge Joel Bennathan sentenced Brand to nine years for rape and imposed further terms for the three sexual-assault convictions. The judge described Brand as a “predator” in his sentencing remarks, according to DW.
How was Russell Brand’s 10-year, six-month sentence calculated?
The rape count carried a nine-year term. In court remarks reported by Scripps News, Bennathan imposed terms of nine months, 18 months and eight months on the three sexual-assault counts.
Those three shorter terms run at the same time as each other, but after the rape term, producing the total sentence of 10 years and six months, the Scripps News court-audio transcript reported. Time Brand has already spent in custody counts toward the term.
DW and CBC reported that Brand must serve two-thirds of the sentence in custody. He could then be released on licence or under supervision, with conditions.
What was Brand convicted of?
A jury found Brand guilty last week of raping a woman in 2009 and sexually assaulting three other women in incidents from 2004 to 2009, CBS News reported. The sexual-assault convictions concerned incidents at a London bar, a radio station and a TV studio, NPR reported.
Six women made allegations involving incidents from 1999 to 2009, according to CBS News and DW. The jury convicted Brand on four counts and acquitted him on other charges, including two rape counts and one attempted indecent-assault charge, CBS News reported.
Brand, 51, denied the charges and maintained that the encounters were consensual, according to CBC and NPR. His lawyer told the court before sentencing that Brand was a different person from the time of the rape, CBS News reported.
Four complainants gave victim-impact statements at the sentencing hearing, NPR reported. One woman addressed the court from behind a screen intended to protect her privacy, CBS News said.
Separately, London’s Metropolitan Police are investigating allegations of two further rapes involving Brand, CBS News and CBC reported. Those inquiries concern allegations that were not part of the convictions or sentence in this case.
This story draws on original reporting from CBS News.