In a windowed room somewhere above the cold stone of Southwark Crown Court, eight men and four women have been left alone with a question that three weeks of testimony could only frame, never settle. Russell Brand, the comedian, broadcaster and film actor who dominated British screens in the 2000s, denies every one of the seven charges he faces: three of rape, three of sexual assault and one of attempted indecent assault. The judge, Mr Justice Bennathan, has told the jurors that he can accept only a verdict on which all twelve agree. The allegations come from six women and stretch across a decade, from 1999 to 2009, a span that runs from a Labour Party conference in Bournemouth to a dressing room at the Hammersmith Apollo.

Prosecutors have portrayed a man who treated women as disposable, whose charm, the complainants say, curdled into something frightening. Brand, now 51, told the court that he had once been obsessed with sex and had used his celebrity to gain access to it, conduct he now calls wrong, but he insisted that it was never criminal and that every encounter was consensual. When asked directly about the claim of rape, his answer was a single word: no. Beneath the courtroom drama lies an older tension.

The defence has pointed out that none of the women went to the police at the time, and has argued that a 2023 television and newspaper investigation "poisoned the well of justice" by prompting others to come forward. The prosecution counters that the women, who do not know one another, were silenced for years by the very fame the defendant enjoyed. Courts in London, Los Angeles and Mumbai have all wrestled with how to weigh old memories against new publicity.