Russell Brand has been sentenced to 10.5 years in prison for one rape and three counts of sexual assault. “It’s reminiscent of a fundamentalist religious court. England is completely fucked,” writes social commentator and writer Pål Henrik Hagen.
The sentencing at Southwark Crown Court in London was broadcast live. Hagen, who is a writer, freelance journalist and musician, watched it and went straight onto X.
– The judge describes the alleged offences against public decency and propriety (…) as if they were crimes against humanity. It’s reminiscent of a fundamentalist religious court. England is completely fucked, writes Hagen.
By Monday evening, the post had been viewed over 120,000 times.
According to Hagen, the convictions for sexual assault relate, amongst other things, to groping a woman at a party and resting his head in another woman’s lap at work, around 20 years ago.
– “These are offences that should have been dealt with on the spot, but have now led to 1.5 years in prison,” he writes.
In Hagen’s view, the rape conviction was based solely on allegations and witness statements, with no physical evidence of an incident that took place 17 years ago.
– Brand has been sentenced to 9 years in prison for this. It’s completely insane, writes Hagen.
Pål Henrik Hagen fired off this tirade on X following the verdict.
Bennathan sentenced him to nine years for the rape and 18 months for the sexual assaults. Brand can expect to serve at least seven years behind bars, according to CBS News. He will serve the remainder of his sentence under strict conditions, including wearing an electronic tag.
In passing sentence, the judge described Brand as a “sexual predator”. He said Brand had shown “staggering arrogance” and believed that his fame gave him the right to do as he pleased.
On Thursday, a jury consisting of eight men and four women found Brand guilty of raping a 21-year-old fan at his home in Hampstead in 2009.
The woman met the comedian after a show at the Hammersmith Apollo. She told the court that she had voluntarily taken part in a threesome with Brand backstage that same evening, and that a few days later she went to his home to have sex. There, he forced her to have anal sex and ignored her pleas for him to stop, she explained.
The woman also said that she later met Brand at the Edinburgh Festival. There, he apologised after she told him he had treated her like an animal.
The three incidents of assault involved three different women. Brand groped an MTV employee’s breasts during a birthday party at a bar in London in 2004. He pushed a woman against a wall, groped her and kissed her at a radio station in 2004 or 2005. In 2009, Brand’s entourage forced a young Channel 4 employee to give him a massage. Brand then pushed her head down into his lap.
The jury acquitted Brand of two other rapes, including one at the Labour Party conference in Bournemouth in 1999, and of an attempted indecent assault on a woman at MTV’s offices. The case involved seven charges and six women.
Brand pleaded not guilty. He explained that the encounters were either consensual or had been fabricated after the event. His defence team pointed out that the women only went to the police after Channel 4 and The Sunday Times published anonymous allegations against him in 2023. Brand himself suggested that he was the target of a coordinated attack because he had taken on a new role as an anti-establishment political commentator.
Following the verdict, the London police stated that they had referred the investigation into a further two rape allegations to the Crown Prosecution Service.
Brand showed no emotion as the sentence was read out. On his way down to the cells, he turned to his wife, Laura Gallacher.
“We’ll be fine,” he said, according to Bloomberg.
In the Keighley area, a number of girls aged between 13 and 16 were victimised by a Pakistani gang of rapists during the period 1996–1999. In January 2025, the sentences were finally handed down. Sajid Mahmood Khan (45) was sentenced to three years’ imprisonment for rape. Amreaz Asghar (47) was sentenced to four and a half years’ imprisonment for rape, and Zehron Razak (47) was sentenced to six and a half years’ imprisonment for rape.
The judge stated that the police and social services had treated the girls as if they were to blame for their own rape.
