Russell Brand Trial: Radio Station Accuser Describes Alleged Assault to London Jury

Evidence focuses on an alleged encounter at Choice FM

A woman who worked at London radio station Choice FM told a jury that Russell Brand grabbed and kissed her during her workday in the mid-2000s, then touched her breast and bottom. She said she pushed him away and shouted at him as she escaped. Her account places the alleged encounter inside a workplace, where she says she was moving between rooms and Brand was accompanied by people from his entourage.

Brand, 51, has pleaded not guilty to three counts of rape, three counts of sexual assault and one count of indecent assault. The charges concern six women and alleged incidents between 1999 and 2009. He has previously told police he never engaged in non-consensual sexual activity. The women have lifelong anonymity under UK law, so their identities cannot be reported. The jury is hearing evidence that it must assess against the charges; the allegations remain allegations unless proved in court.

Accuser says colleagues were present

Giving evidence at Southwark Crown Court on Tuesday, the woman said she encountered Brand while moving between rooms at the station. She recognised him as a high-profile entertainer who was hosting a popular spin-off show about Big Brother. Her evidence described a brief passage through the workplace becoming an encounter she says she neither expected nor agreed to.

She told jurors he greeted her with “aye aye,” then approached. “He grabbed me by my face, started to kiss me, and when he was kissing me, he was pushing his body against mine,” she said. She described the encounter as “very frenzied” and said it happened so quickly that she had no time to understand what was happening. That detail is central to how she explained her immediate response: she said she reacted by pushing him away and shouting as she got free.

Brand’s entourage, which she said included three men and one woman, was nearby. The accuser said they did not intervene. “I remember looking at the woman and she didn’t say anything,” she told the court. The presence of other people forms part of the setting she described, though her evidence does not establish what those people saw or understood.

She said she felt “dirty, shocked and shaken.” She reported the incident to police in 2023 after seeing allegations about Brand in a documentary and a newspaper article. The gap between the alleged incident and the report became a subject of questioning in court, but it doesn't by itself resolve whether her account is accurate.

Under questioning from Brand’s barrister, Ian Winter KC, about why she had not reported the allegation sooner, she cited what she described as a “toxic” workplace culture. She said she feared she would not be believed, might lose her job and could struggle to pay her mortgage. Those concerns offer the jury her explanation for the delay, while the defence is entitled to test her account and the reasons she has given.

Jury hears evidence concerning two other women

The court also heard from a woman who worked at Channel 4 and described an alleged incident in 2009. She said Brand had become unhappy during a project they were working on, and that two male colleagues suggested she give him a massage. Brand then entered the room and rested his head in her lap, she told jurors. She said she felt “really uncomfortable, really confused and shocked,” and reported the incident to her line manager. Her account adds a separate workplace setting to the evidence heard by the jury, but it concerns a different woman and an alleged event of its own.

Jurors also began hearing allegations from a sixth woman through video of her police interview. She told a detective that she met Brand after a performance at the Hammersmith Apollo, where they had consensual oral sex in his dressing room. She said he invited her to his home the following week. Her account distinguishes between the earlier encounter, which she described as consensual, and what she says happened later.

In the interview, she said sex began consensually but changed into an act she had not agreed to. “He didn’t give me a warning, he didn’t ask,” she told the detective. She said Brand hurt her and continued after she asked him to stop. The distinction she drew is significant: consent to one act or encounter doesn't automatically establish consent to another. That is her allegation, and the jury will consider it alongside the other evidence in the case.

What the evidence means for the trial

The trial is in its second week and is expected to last at least six weeks. The jury is continuing to hear evidence from the women whose allegations form the case. Each account concerns different circumstances, and the court must consider them individually rather than treating them as a single event.

Here's the thing: evidence about how someone reported an incident, what they remember and who was nearby can help jurors understand the account, but none of those details settles the charges on its own. In cases involving alleged conduct from years earlier, the court must weigh testimony and the questions put to it carefully. (And this is the part most people overlook.) A courtroom account is evidence to be tested, not a verdict.

This is more significant than it looks for anyone following the trial: the testimony covers alleged conduct in professional settings as well as a private home, and the women describe different experiences of consent and response. If you're working in media or another public-facing industry, the workplace accounts may prompt questions about power, colleagues’ conduct and whether staff felt able to speak up. The jury's task remains narrower: to decide the charges on the evidence it hears.

Still, the trial has weeks of evidence ahead. The accounts reported so far are only part of the case, and Brand denies engaging in non-consensual sexual activity. For now, the testimony gives the jury competing material to assess. No easy answers.