Russell Brand.

Having read the article, I do think the '16 year old Alice' thing is a bit of a nothingburger.

Mainly because her mum seemed fine with it at the time, which is a bizzare parental decision IMO. This is a man going out with your teenage daughter.

However, the rape in LA is pretty serious and they have evidence she went to a rape crisis centre the same day and messages between her and Brand.
 
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Werewolf said:
Because possibly, he chose his victims in part for their age and inexperience (16 years old for at least one, and starting out in the industry for others*), and then threatened them with things like court action if they spoke out?

And possibly because even when it's caught on camera and shown live internationally people will still downplay assault and the victims have seen the same comments about cases time and time again?



*A fairly classic predator in the industry tactic that often stops people talking openly for years (something that's been seen in TV, film, radio, publishing, music, medical, political, basically pretty much every professions). It even works for non sexual assault, junior staff are very unlikely to put in a complaint about a senior for most things if they know that senior is likely to be on their performance and evaluation, or promotion boards.
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well that's the difference between you and I isnt it, I look at accusations from over a decade ago by people who wish to remain anonymous as a bit of a red flag, and as far as I'm concerned he's 'innocent until proven guilty' whereas I expect you/plenty of others here choose to believe all women and think they are credible.
 
Hope they are backed up by substantial witnesses and proof. One went to a rape crisis centre
VincentHanna said:
Having read the article, I do think the '16 year old Alice' thing is a bit of a nothingburger.

Mainly because her mum seemed fine with it at the time, which is a bizzare parental decision IMO. This is a man going out with your teenage daughter.

However, the rape in LA is pretty serious and they have evidence she went to a rape crisis centre the same day and messages between her and Brand.
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Which begs the question, why wasn't she supported at the time to go after him then?
 
Regardless of whether he's guilty or not I really ******* hate how these things always seem to be story first police action second. I personally wish we could somehow never have stories like this in the news until it's at least confirmed that the person has been charged.
 
I don't understand why remaining anonymous is considered a red flag ? I don't see any conflict between wanting justice whilst also wanting to remain anonymous to the public so your name and face don't get plastered all over the media/internet.

Just seems like common sense to me.
 
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Roar87 said:
lmaooo
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Your point other than being the typical "they must be lying"

If the reporters approached them it suggests that the reporters had heard rumours specifically about them (a reporter starts looking into a general rumour and might not get "yeah he did it" but "you might want to talk to...") - not at all unusual in this sort of case, I've read stories from the publishing industry where it was a very open secret amongst the women that X or Y who was very senior was a threat and it had become routine for women to quietly do things like warn any new (especially younger) women privately things like "don't get into an elevator with X"*.

And anonymity is again fairly standard because people don't want the abuse they know they'll get from certain parts of the public who at best never believe women, at worst actively go after them once they're named, and that's before the fact that women can feel ashamed of what happened or don't want their family to know about it.
Even in actual criminal cases the default can be for the victims to be anonymous, especially if the victim was legally a minor at the time, which at least one of these allegations is the case.

I'm going to hazard a bit of a guess and say that both the Times and C4 have passed this all through their lawyers who have very carefully looked at what they're saying and any evidence and have said "there is enough here to likely win any legal case". It's also worth noting that if C4 were involved in this it could well be that one of the journalists may well have been hearing the rumours from people who were working with Brand at the time of the allegations.


*Apparently it was a big enough problem that none of the employers (usually older men) or police ever took seriously that it wasn't at all uncommon at conventions for the older women to have a quiet word with any newcomers as part of the "welcome".
 
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RobHu said:
Regardless of whether he's guilty or not I really ******* hate how these things always seem to be story first police action second. I personally wish we could somehow never have stories like this in the news until it's at least confirmed that the person has been charged.
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Nah, they'll be 12 women coming forward by the end of the weekend using this tactic.
 
imtoooldforthis said:
Are people of the opinion that if you get raped and report it you then have to give up all privacy?
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Yes. Either you give privacy and anonymity to both parties until the court reaches a a verdict or you don’t give it to either.

Being able to anonymously make accusations against someone and publicly drag their name through the courts/media , whilst hiding in the shadows yourself, goes against the fundamental “innocent until proven guilty” foundation of our justice system IMO.

the law needs to be changed .
 
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A promiscuous individual who sadly also happens to be a victim of being sexually assaulted themselves and had a father who regularly got him prostitutes... Clearly someone with a tormented, chaotic relationship with sex, how anyone can say that such a person will not have made any mistake whatsoever with regards to relationships with others is surely a jest.
 
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silvagti said:
Yes. Either you give privacy and anonymity to both parties until the court reaches a a verdict or you don’t give it to either.

Being able to anonymously make accusations against someone and publicly drag their name through the courts/media , whilst hiding in the shadows yourself, goes against the fundamental “innocent until proven guilty” foundation of our justice system IMO.

the law needs to be changed IMO.
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I agree that both should receive anonymity until some kind of verdict is reached. I just don't think that wanting to remain anonymous (in the case of rape) is a red flag for someone being a liar.
 
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imtoooldforthis said:
I agree that both should receive anonymity until some kind of verdict is reached. I just don't think that wanting to remain anonymous (in the case of rape) is a red flag for someone being a liar.
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It looks to me like there's very little burden on the media companies/papers producing these programmes and investigations to provide "proof". It feels like it would be very easy to effectively take down anyone by finding/paying a group of people willing to anonymously make accusations against someone else. It feels like there should be some level of protection against making unproven anonymous accusations against someone. Otherwise it's far to easy to destroy someone's career and livelyhood.

Let's say for the sake of argument these accusations are false (or at least considered unproven). Does Russell Brand have any right to pursue "dispatches" or the anonymous accusers for damages and slander/libel? What's the burden on them to check their "anonymous" sources and verify that what their saying is factually true. Or can you literally make a programme/story claiming whatever you want about anyone because it's starting to look that way?
 
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silvagti said:
It feels like there's very little burden on the media company producing these programs to provide "proof". It feels like it would be very easy to effectively take down anyone by finding a group of people willing to anonymously make accusations against someone else. It feels like there should be some level of protection against making unproven anonymous accusations against someone. Otherwise it's far to easy to destroy someone's career and livelyhood.

Let's say for the sake of argument these accusations are false (or at least considered unproven). Does Russell have any right to pursue "dispatches" or the anonymous accusers for damages and slander/libel?
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Well a group of people who this country inexplicably elected willingly took the nearest thing to accountability for the press (Leveson's report) and threw it very quickly into the nearest bin.
 
It sounds like all the accusers were his girlfriends having consensual sex before the events with him and they met to have sex on the day the incidents where the events occured. Either they changed their minds and were forced where he either felt they were in agreement or purposely forced them or perhaps they had regrets after the event happened.

I think it's quite different to a violent rape by a stranger where it's cut and dry.
 
silvagti said:
It looks to me like there's very little burden on the media companies/papers producing these programmes and investigations to provide "proof". It feels like it would be very easy to effectively take down anyone by finding/paying a group of people willing to anonymously make accusations against someone else. It feels like there should be some level of protection against making unproven anonymous accusations against someone. Otherwise it's far to easy to destroy someone's career and livelyhood.

Let's say for the sake of argument these accusations are false (or at least considered unproven). Does Russell Brand have any right to pursue "dispatches" or the anonymous accusers for damages and slander/libel? What's the burden on them to check their "anonymous" sources and verify that what their saying is factually true. Or can you literally make a programme/story claiming whatever you want about anyone because it's starting to look that way?
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Yes he does.

And in the UK it's much easier to take a paper or news program to court for libel or slander for an unfounded allegation than most of the rest of the world, to the point where it's common for people from the US to choose the UK as a venue for such a case if they have any standing to do so at all.

UK papers when making specific allegations as opposed to rumours tend to actually be a bit cautious, as even the defence of such a case can be massively expensive, and the defence of a libel case is so expensive that it's a major reason for people to not come forward with allegations as they know the police often aren't interested and they can be bankrupted for speaking out, and offenders know the mere threat of legal action even when it's true will often be enough to scare someone from even going to the police at the time, especially if they're younger and don't know the law.
 
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