Russell Brand's social media accounts disabled by Meta

Russell Brand's social media accounts on platforms owned by tech company Meta have been disabled.

It comes after the 51-year-old former entertainer was sentenced to 10-and-a-half-years in jail for one count of rape and three counts of sexual assault earlier this week.

He was found guilty of the charges involving four women and relating to offences between 2004 and 2009.

Meta owns social media platforms including Instagram and Facebook.

Brand is currently in prison and is expected to serve seven years of his sentence behind bars before being released on licence.

On Thursday evening, a post appeared on his X account, which remains active. "There was never a Russell Brand, according to @meta," it read.

"Thank God for @elonmusk," the message added, referring to X's owner. "Stay tuned," it concluded.

The post included what appeared to be screenshots showing Brand's Instagram account having been disabled.

Meta's community standards policy says that "in order to maintain a safe environment and empower free expression" it restricts or removes accounts that are "harmful to the community".

That includes accounts owned by convicted sex offenders.

In 2023, after a media investigation revealing allegations about Brand's behaviour - which he denies - YouTube suspended his channels from making money from adverts for "violating" its "creator responsibility policy".

At the time, the video platform said it was taking action "to protect" its users.