A number of sexual abuse allegations against the Get Him to the Greek actor were first reported in 2023 as part of an investigation by Channel 4\u2019s Dispatches and The Sunday Times newspaper.<\/p>\n
Testimony from several women who encountered Brand between 1999 and 2005 revealed accusations against the comedian and broadcaster.<\/p>\n
DCI Tariq Farooqi, who is leading the investigation for the Metropolitan Police, said: \u201cThe women who have made reports, including those connected to the two new charges, continue to receive support from specially trained officers.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Met\u2019s investigation remains ongoing, and detectives urge anyone affected by this case, or anyone with information, to come forward and speak with police. A dedicated team of investigators can be reached via email at CIT@met.police.uk.<\/p>\n
\u201cSupport is also available through the independent charity Rape Crisis by contacting the 24\/7 rape and sexual abuse support line.\u201d<\/p>\n
Brand \u2013 who has three children with his wife Laura Gallacher \u2013 denied the allegations when he was first charged by the Metropolitan Police in April.<\/p>\n
He said in a video statement on social media: \u201cI\u2019ve always told you guys that when I was young and single before I had my wife and family… I was a fool, man.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was a fool before I lived in the light of the Lord. I was a drug addict, a sex addict, and an imbecile. But what I never was, was a rapist. I\u2019ve never engaged in non-consensual activity. I pray that you can see that by looking in my eyes.\u201d<\/p>\n
Brand added: \u201cOf course, I\u2019m now going to have the opportunity to defend these charges in court. And I\u2019m incredibly grateful for that\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A number of sexual abuse allegations against the Get Him to the Greek actor were first reported in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":243898,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[35678,74,27605,17704,19197,1558,4463,1873,1349,156,19196,35698,1619,117,111,139,69,90,1523,34458,11763,17703,416],"class_list":["post-243897","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-additional","tag-after","tag-appearance","tag-assault","tag-bail","tag-been","tag-brand","tag-charges","tag-court","tag-entertainment","tag-granted","tag-hearing","tag-london","tag-new","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-on","tag-over","tag-rape","tag-russell","tag-sexual","tag-video"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/243897","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=243897"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/243897\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/243898"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=243897"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=243897"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=243897"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}