Russell Brand: Does the Defense Hold?

Becca HartwellOkay, so get this. A man walks into Southwark Crown Court, sits in the witness box, and says nobody else is going to testify for him.

MilesNobody?

Becca HartwellNobody. Russell Brand, October 28th, taking the stand in his own trial.

MilesHold on. He's the whole defense?

Becca HartwellVariety reported he denied all the accusations against him and that no one else will testify on his behalf. Every charge, denied.

MilesThat's a short witness list.

Becca HartwellI'm Becca, that's Miles, and this is Star Witness, where apparently the star is also the only witness.

MilesOkay, but I'll say this, a defendant who takes the stand takes a risk. Once you're under oath, every answer is on the record, and you can't hide behind a publicist.

Becca HartwellSure, but you're skipping the context. This is a guy who says the documentary wrecked him. The media machine is part of the story here.

MilesAnd I'm not letting the court off the hook for that either. The court cares about what was said in that room, not what the documentary did to his career.

Becca HartwellOoh, fair.

MilesSo I'm watching one thing. How does he come across when somebody is actually questioning him?

Becca HartwellAnd I've got a second one. A judge has already changed one of the charges mid-trial. What does that mean for the rest?

MilesWait, we're not answering that yet.

Becca HartwellNot yet. Last time, we covered the prosecution's opening. This is the defense's turn.

MilesRight. So let's start with what he actually said when he sat down.

Becca HartwellThe first thing Brand's own barrister wanted on the record was a negative. Ian Winter KC asked if he'd persuaded anyone with relevant evidence to come testify.

MilesAnd the answer?

Becca HartwellNo. Flat no. Tribune's report of that day has the exchange, and it's a strange kind of exhibit because the defense is basically showing the empty chairs.

MilesHold on, though. A defendant doesn't have to call anybody. Silence from the gallery isn't evidence of anything.

Becca HartwellSure, but jurors are human. They watch who walks up to that stand.

MilesFair.

Becca HartwellAnd to be clear, all we have there is a question and a no. The reporting doesn't tell us how anyone in the room took it, so I'm not going to pretend I know.

MilesGood. Empty chairs can mean a dozen different things, and most of them are boring.

Becca HartwellThen comes the part where he talks about himself. Brand called the Channel 4 documentary devastating. He called being accused devastating. Same word, twice.

MilesWhich is a pretty telling word choice, Becca. Devastating is about what happened to him.

Becca HartwellRight. And Deadline's account of the first day of the defense case says he told jurors his life has been consumed by the allegations since the 2023 press reports. He also said he's devoted himself to getting to the bottom of them.

MilesOkay, I'll give him this. If you've spent years around people whose reputations took a hit, that sounds like a man describing a wreck. I've watched a collector lose a whole dealer network over one bad rumor. It's quiet and it's total.

Becca HartwellArguably, a rumor about a Ferrari, Miles. Not the same.

MilesNo, no, fair. Different stakes entirely.

Becca HartwellAnd that's the thing a jury has to sort out, because a man can be genuinely wrecked and still be guilty. Both are possible.

MilesHmm. Sympathy isn't a verdict.

Becca HartwellNow, this next bit, oh, you're gonna love it. Deadline says Brand told jurors that consent is more important than sex itself.

MilesWow. Say that in a courtroom where the whole case is about consent.

Becca HartwellExactly. It's either a thesis statement or a gift to the prosecution, depending on who's listening.

MilesDid he stick to it when pressed?

Becca HartwellDeadline describes his demeanor in the doc and says he denied every charge put to him by Winter. Every one.

MilesSo he's agreeable on the principle and flat on the specifics.

Becca HartwellThat's the tension. Words about consent, then no, no, no down the list.

MilesWhich is its own caution, because a friendly round of questions lets a witness set out his own framing without anyone leaning on it.

Becca HartwellAnd the framing is that the accusations took over his life. A jury weighs that against everything else it hears, not in isolation.

MilesAnd that was only his own barrister asking. The harder questions are coming.

Becca HartwellWhich we'll get to. But there was a second plot line the day before he testified, and it came from the bench, the judge.

MilesRight, the judge. Let's hear it.

Becca HartwellVariety's Elsa Keslassy reported on October 27th that the judge dismissed an indecent assault charge against Brand.

MilesDismissed, but careful. It wasn't just wiped off the sheet.

Becca HartwellRight. The judge directed a not guilty verdict on that count and replaced it with attempted indecent assault.

MilesWhich sounds like a technicality until you ask what the judge was actually deciding.

Becca HartwellGo on.

MilesAt the close of the prosecution case, Mr. Justice Bennathan only asked if there was enough evidence for a jury to reach a verdict. GB News laid out the procedure. He wasn't deciding whether the evidence was true.

Becca HartwellOh, that's a huge difference. So nobody ruled that she was lying.

MilesNobody ruled anything about truth. It's a gate, and this count didn't clear it as charged.

Becca HartwellOkay, but that makes a directed not guilty verdict sound strange. Why say not guilty if no jury weighed anything?

MilesThe label is formal. The judge decided the count couldn't go forward as charged, and the not guilty verdict is how that gets recorded. It's a legal result, not a finding about what happened.

Becca HartwellWait, so which count are we talking about?

MilesThe 2001 MTV incident. The allegation is an arm grab and an attempt to pull a woman into a toilet.

Becca HartwellHmm, that's a very specific scene.

MilesIt is, and the AV Club described that same MTV bathroom incident as the one behind the attempted count.

Becca HartwellSo the replacement charge is about the same night, just a lower rung on the ladder.

MilesSame incident, per the AV Club's description. The legal label changed.

Becca HartwellEven the headlines wobble on this. One says the judge drops the charge, and the longer version adds that it's replaced with attempted assault count. Both are true, and they feel like different stories.

MilesRight. Dropped does a lot of work in a headline. What actually happened is that one charge changed shape.

Becca HartwellAnd then the formal part, which I love because it's so British, a juror delivered the not guilty verdict.

MilesA juror stands up and says the words, even though the judge had already made the call.

Becca HartwellSo the jury becomes a mouthpiece for a decision that wasn't theirs.

MilesExactly. And the AV Club quotes the judge saying the decision was his, not the jury's.

Becca HartwellWhich matters for how we talk about it. This wasn't the jury deciding anything about her account.

MilesNo. Whatever the jury ends up doing, it hasn't weighed in on any of this yet.

Becca HartwellFair. Then Brand gets to plead again.

MilesHe pleaded not guilty to the replacement count.

Becca HartwellCue every fan online declaring victory.

MilesWhich skips that the lower rung is still a charge he's pleaded not guilty to.

Becca HartwellFair. Enough procedure. Onto the hard part of his testimony.

MilesOh, you're gonna wanna hear this.

Becca HartwellThe part of the testimony that actually made me sit up, Brand was asked about going to a complainant's hotel room.

MilesAnd?

Becca HartwellHe said he thought there was at least the possibility of sex. He conceded he was likely to fool around.

MilesHold on. That's a defendant volunteering the thing most people assume the prosecution has to drag out of him.

Becca HartwellRight? Plot twist. The cross-examination style stuff is where he gave ground, not where he dug in.

MilesMm, but look at what he's conceding, a possibility of sex. Going to a hotel room expecting to fool around is not the charge. The charge is what happened after she, by her account, didn't want it.

Becca HartwellSure, but Miles, you don't think it shades the picture? He walks in with one expectation, and the complainant says he left with something else.

MilesIt shades it. It doesn't write it. Honestly, I read that as a man not playing games. He could've stonewalled, and he didn't.

Becca HartwellOr he knew a stonewall would look worse than the answer.

MilesCynic.

Becca HartwellOkay. Here's the harder one. Her account is that he said it was fun during the rape.

MilesOh, man. That's a brutal line to have to answer.

Becca HartwellAnd his explanation, as reported, was inexperienced approval-seeking. Basically, he was seeking her approval out of inexperience.

MilesWhich is an unusual thing to have to put to a jury.

Becca HartwellWait for it, because that's exactly my problem. It's a claim about his own state of mind in the moment, and a state of mind is hard to test.

MilesExcept people are often different at a particular age, in a particular moment. I've watched confident dealers go quiet and weird in a room they didn't understand.

Becca HartwellDid they say fun?

MilesNo. They overpaid for a Jaguar. Different crime.

Becca HartwellFair, but the explanation is the claim to test, and we only have it as reported, so I'm careful not to say more than that.

MilesAgreed. It's his account against hers, and the jury's the one who has to sort it out.

Becca HartwellThen there's the police statement. Brand said he had sexual encounters in countless locations and scenarios, often with people he had just met.

MilesThat's the line behind the headline about a very promiscuous life.

Becca HartwellRight, and it cuts two ways. It's candid, but it also reads like a pattern being entered into evidence by the man himself.

MilesOr it's context. Nobody's alleging he was a monk. The question is whether this specific night crossed a line, and being open about his history makes him credible on the rest.

Becca HartwellCredible or conceding the easy stuff so the hard stuff sounds reasonable?

MilesYou can't read his mind from a transcript.

Becca HartwellNo, but the jury can watch his face. I won't guess what they made of it.

MilesFair. We don't know, and it'd be silly to pretend.

Becca HartwellSo honesty or concession? Where do you land?

MilesHonesty with a cost. Every answer helps in one way and hurts in another.

Becca HartwellI'm at concession. A careful one, but I'll give him this, he didn't hide behind vagueness.

MilesProgress. We agree on something.

Becca HartwellDon't get used to it. Now, back to the ruling and what it leaves standing. So the arithmetic, Miles, how many charges are actually standing still after that ruling?

MilesSeven. Three rape, three sexual assault, and one attempted indecent assault. The Express Tribune's writeup of the testimony lists them that way.

Becca HartwellSeven, not six.

MilesSeven, because the dropped one got replaced. One came off, one went on. That's why I keep saying downgraded, not deleted.

Becca HartwellHuh. Fine. That's cleaner than how I've been saying it.

MilesAnd Brand denies all of them, the replacement included.

Becca HartwellHmm. So the AV Club says flat out that this is not an exoneration. One count downgraded, the others still there.

MilesRight. And I'll be the sympathetic one for a second. He did get something. A charge got smaller.

Becca HartwellSmaller, like a coffee order.

MilesOkay, okay, but the other six didn't move an inch.

Becca HartwellSo what does the ruling tell us about them?

MilesNot much. A dropped count makes a clean headline, but a ruling on one count doesn't convict anyone on the rest, and it doesn't clear anyone either.

Becca HartwellOkay, and the other open question, how he came across.

MilesWait for it. I don't think the testimony settles anything either.

Becca HartwellOoh, go on.

MilesThink of it as one exhibit in a trial that's still moving. The Tribune says it's expected to run several weeks.

Becca HartwellSeveral weeks. And remember, Variety reported that no one else will testify for him, so his own answers carry a lot of the defense.

MilesWhich is exactly why one day can't settle it. What the testimony does give us is what he says happened in his own words under oath. What it doesn't give us is who the jury believes once everything is in.

Becca HartwellSo everything we've picked apart today, the hotel room, the answers to Winter, it's a middle chapter.

MilesExactly. A strong day or a shaky day on the stand, and there's still a lot of trial left.

Becca HartwellWhich is annoying for a podcast, honestly. We like endings.

MilesWe do.

Becca HartwellSo what do we actually watch for then? If the testimony is a middle chapter, what tells us something next?

MilesConsistency, I think. He's given his account in his own words, and what we can watch is whether that account holds together as the weeks go on. I'm not predicting how it lands, just saying where the pressure will be.

Becca HartwellAnd I'd add a caution for us. Every outlet we've quoted today is describing one slice of one courtroom. None of them can tell us what the jury is making of it.

MilesRight. And that's a good rule for listeners too. When someone online declares the defense is winning or collapsing after one day, ask what they're actually citing.

Becca HartwellBesides vibes.

MilesVibes are not in exhibit.

Becca HartwellBut there's a bigger claim sitting under all of this, and he's been making it since the start, that the exposé cost him everything.

MilesYeah, and that one's worth testing on its own.

Becca HartwellA line from his testimony first. Brand says colleagues and friends now won't touch him.

MilesWon't touch him. That's the whole social ledger in four words. Phone goes quiet, the invitations dry up.

Becca HartwellYahoo's write-up of the testimony records that claim, and I'll be honest, part of me hears it and thinks, "Yeah, that tracks. That's how this industry works."

MilesHmm, headlines since the 2023 press reports will do that to a guest list.

Becca HartwellWow, a car guy with a guest list metaphor.

MilesI contain multitudes. Mostly valuation tables, but still.

Becca HartwellThen there's the other thing he told jurors. Deadline's report of the first defense day says he has devoted himself to getting to the bottom of the allegations.

MilesDevoted himself. Okay. To the bottom of what exactly? Because that sounds like a man investigating a mystery that happened to somebody else.

Becca HartwellOr a man who says he's been living in it since 2023 and can't look away.

MilesSure, but the people who aren't returning his calls may be doing it because of what's alleged, not because of a documentary.

Becca HartwellRight, and that's a fair cut. But the media machine matters here. Whatever happens in that courtroom, the verdict online landed before the trial.

MilesWhich is a real cost. Nobody's disputing a career can die before a jury sits.

Becca HartwellThank you.

MilesBut hold on. The charges are rape and sexual assault. Against that, a ruined diary is small.

Becca HartwellSmall, sure. Is it irrelevant, though? If he's acquitted, who gives that back?

MilesNobody. And if he's convicted, nobody should. That's the uncomfortable math.

Becca HartwellYeah. Sympathy for a career and weight for the charges, both sitting in the same dock.

MilesSame dock, different scales.

Becca HartwellOoh, I'm stealing that.

MilesPlease do. I've got no use for it at auction.

Becca HartwellOne thing I'll add, though. Everything he said about being cut off is his account. It's a claim on the record, not a finding. And the jurors are being asked about specific allegations, not about his guest list.

MilesAgreed, and that's the discipline here. It can be completely true that his life has fallen apart and still be beside the point of any one night.

Becca HartwellBeside the point legally, maybe. Culturally, it's the whole story, and that's why I can't leave it alone.

MilesAnd culturally is where the sympathy lives. But a jury isn't asked to be cultural.

Becca HartwellOkay, enough circling. Verdicts?

MilesTime for the verdicts. Becca, you first.

Becca HartwellOkay, my verdict, and I'll say it up front, this is opinion, and the jury hasn't decided anything yet.

MilesFair. Mine too.

Becca HartwellI think the defense case gets oversold by whoever's loudest online. A mid-trial ruling answers a narrow legal question, and it says nothing about what a jury will make of everything else.

MilesMm.

Becca HartwellOkay, but I'm gonna stay on the testimony. Whatever you think of him, he sat there and took the questions. That's a long exposed stretch for anyone.

MilesExposed, sure. Careful, too. You're not letting me have this.

Becca HartwellJust keeping the receipts.

MilesHere's where I land. Some of what he said helps him, and some of it hands the prosecution material. And the part that matters hasn't happened. The rest of the case is still in front of that jury.

Becca HartwellRight, and he denies it all, which is worth saying out loud, since denial is where the defense starts, not where it ends.

MilesSo does the defense hold? Today, it's standing. Whether it's still standing when the jury goes out, I can't tell you, and neither can anyone posting about it.

Becca HartwellThat's my read too, honestly. Different route, same parking spot.

MilesLook at us agreeing.

Becca HartwellDon't get used to it. The jurors have the case now, or they will soon enough, and we're just two people with microphones. So take our takes as takes and wait for the people who actually heard it all.

MilesAnd that's the case file for now.

Becca HartwellOkay, quick housekeeping before we let you go. The trial still has several more weeks to run, so nothing here is decided. Everything we've said is commentary on a trial that hasn't reached its end.

MilesNothing, which means we'll be back with more.

Becca HartwellAnd you can steer us. Got a case you want us to look at? Drop it in the reviews or tag @StarWitnessPod.

MilesYes, please. I keep a notebook for this. The weirder the angle, the better.

Becca HartwellOf course you do.

MilesHave it. I write down everything, even the stuff I'm not sure I'll use.

Becca HartwellNew episodes land every Wednesday, so hit Subscribe, and you'll have the verdict the moment we do.

MilesRight, and if the jury surprises us, I'll owe you a coffee.

Becca HartwellMake it a large one. Thanks for listening, everybody, and we'll see you next Wednesday. This was Star Witness.