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Woman says she 'couldn't speak or breathe' during alleged rape by Russell Brand - Published - Warning - this report contains graphic content A woman who says Russell Brand raped her at his home in London told police she "couldn't speak or breathe" during the alleged attack, a jury has heard. The 51-year-old entertainer is accused of raping the woman in 2009 after meeting her at London's Hammersmith Apollo, where he had been performing as a stand-up comedian. Brand faces seven charges in the trial in total - three counts of rape, three charges of sexual assault and one of indecent assault. The allegations, made by six female complainants, span a 10-year period between 1999 and 2009. He denies all the charges. In video evidence of her speaking to a police officer, the woman said she performed a sex act on Brand at the London theatre after being invited for drinks following the show. She said she gave him her phone number, explaining she was "a massive Russell Brand fan" and a "massive comedy fan" at the time. After that night, she said Brand messaged her and she went to his house in Hampstead knowing they would have sex. But she said a consensual encounter became rape when Brand started having anal sex with her and ignored her pleas for him to stop. She said when she arrived at his home, Brand told her she needed to have a shower "because my hair smelled funny". He then asked her to brush her teeth. "I was trying to make a joke of what he was making me do", she said. "All of those things made me feel, 'I don't like this'." The woman said a short while after getting on his bed, she was turned over. It was then she said she was allegedly raped. She told police: "From the very moment it happened, I felt I had willingly gone there and from what his reputation was, what did I expect?" She said Brand "hurt me and harmed me, and when I asked him to stop, he didn't". She added: "The horror in anyone that I told was not enough to make me believe I didn't deserve it." The woman said she told friends and family afterwards, and went through sexual health tests - believing that she had contracted a disease from Brand. Earlier on Tuesday, another woman who claims Brand sexually assaulted her described the alleged attack as "frenzied" and "violent". That complainant alleges Brand assaulted her at the Choice FM radio studios in central London in the mid-2000s. She said she came out of a small room in the building to find Brand outside. "He said 'aye aye'," she told the jury. "He grabbed me by my face, started to kiss me, and when he was kissing me he started pushing me - his body against me." The woman continued: "He was kissing me, it was very frenzied. There was no time for me to even understand what was going on. "He was running his hands over my body and I had my back against the wall at that point." From behind a blue screen, the woman described the kiss as "sloppy" and "very, very rough", when asked by the prosecution barrister about the alleged attack. "His hands at the same time were all over me," she said. "He touched my bum, my breasts, his body was pressed up against me." The woman said she pushed him off and swore at him. She said there were several people with him who she claims didn't say anything about what happened after the alleged assault. The woman - now in her 50s - said she had never met Brand before and that she believed he'd been in the building because he was on Channel 4 show Big Brother's Big Mouth. She told the jury: "His whole body was pressed against me - the kisses were hard and sloppy and going down my neck. "His hands were moving so much - the reason I used the word frenzied was because it was violent. He just wasn't stopping." She said she felt "dirty" after the encounter and "never told anybody", adding: "I felt shocked and stunned, shaken." Russell Brand on Trial You can follow the trial day by day on the BBC podcast Russell Brand on Trial - available on BBC Sounds, YouTube, iPlayer, or wherever you get your BBC podcasts When questioned by Brand's barrister on why none of the people who may have seen what happened raised concerns, the woman said: "It was not the present-day environment." "On the day it happened - and I ask myself this question - why I didn't share it," she said. "It wasn't the culture where something happened to you and you tell people." Asked by the defence barrister why she did not go to the police, the woman said: "I would have thought about a few things. Who would have believed me? "I could lose my job and I had a mortgage to pay," she said, adding that she "buried it for so long". The woman said she came forward with the allegation after watching a documentary on television about the TV star and his alleged behaviour. Another complainant also gave evidence to the jury - again from behind a blue screen to the right side of the court. The woman, who worked with Brand on a Channel 4 project in 2009, said members of the defendant's team asked her for a massage on his behalf while they were in the same space. She said after replying no, Brand "came into the room and lay his head into my lap, into my groin area". When asked by the prosecution counsel where exactly his mouth and nose were, the woman replied "in my vaginal area". The woman who worked for channel 4 at the time - said she was "so repulsed at the situation". She described him as "bony". She said she reported the alleged incident to her line manager at the time who then reported it further up the chain. Brand stared straight ahead as the complainants gave evidence - barely changing his posture. His hands sometimes resting on his lap. His wife Laura Brand remained sitting to his right side outside the dock - seeming to listen attentively to what the women were saying from the witness box. Brand denies all the charges and has pleaded not guilty. He has said that any sexual contact if it happened, would have been consensual. The trial continues. Related topics - Published5 days ago
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