Russell Brand’s Defense Argues Channel 4 Film “Poisoned Well Of Justice Deliberately”

Editor’s note: This story contains details of alleged sexual offenses that some readers may find distressing.

The 2023 Channel 4 documentary about Russell Brand “poisoned the well of justice deliberately” and “fundamentally corrupted” his accusers, according to the closing defense argument of Brand’s lawyer.

Ian Winter leaned on a phrase, coined by a mid-19th century Catholic philosopher, to argue that the Dispatches film, plus reporting in The Times, were responsible for six women coming forward to police with allegations about the Despicable Me star from two decades prior.

Making his closing argument at London’s Southwark Crown Court before the jury is sent away to reach a verdict, Winter was heavily critical of the journalists behind the reporting.

“They poisoned the well of justice deliberately to bring about a prosecution of Mr Brand for sexual assault and for rape,” the barrister said. “And they did so not in respect of any single one of the complaints that were in the heart of the [Channel 4] programme, who were anonymous and who were not prepared to put their names to those allegations. They poisoned the well in the hope and intention that other people would come forward and make allegations against him.”

The six accusers therefore came forward “not because they themselves determined to do so independently of anything else, but each one was exposed to the poison they had seen in the TV programme,” Winter said.

Winter said the documentary has had a “truly devastating effect” on Brand, pointing to his evidence when he said he had been banned from visiting his son in hospital after the film aired.

Winter continued returning to the “poisoning of the well” argument as his defense of each allegation was made. He went through each of the complainants, who have a lifelong right to anonymity, and noted how he believed they had been influenced by the film.

He said many accusers in the trial had “never told a soul” until after the doc came out. Complainant 5, who alleges Brand anally raped her after they had consensual sex, “had told lots of people different stories over the years,” added Winter. “But it wasn’t until she saw the programme that she said, ‘I know personally from watching it that it was the first time I truly felt a monumental change.’ One wonders what her evidence would have been if she had not seen [the documentary]?,” he questioned.

Brand faces three charges of rape, three counts of sexual assault and one of attempted indecent assault, reduced from indecent assault, based on allegations made by six women, all of which he denies. Deadline has been reporting daily from a live video feed of the courtroom since the trial began.

Winter argued that each accuser has been “contaminated by the programme” and the “very existence of them as complainants, let alone what they have actually now said, is fundamentally corrupted by that programme and publicity, and renders it fundamentally unfair.”

The prosecution has also referenced the documentary, but argued last week it was not a “magic force” that caused six separate women to “recast” their memories. But Winter said the prosecution does not have a “case thesis” as to why he allegedly raped and assaulted these women compared to the hundreds of others that Brand had consensual sex with between 1999 and 2009. Late last week, the judge in the case urged the jury to ignore the doc, adding: “Do not think that a few women making anonymous complaints in a TV show adds any support at all to the prosecution.”

“The best [the prosecution] has been able to do is say that he was manipulating and calculating and wanted to bed a very large number of women, possibly 5,000,” said Winter. “So what? We know that. That is the given. He devoted himself for many years to a highly promiscuous life. That is not a case as to why he raped these ones. Being flirty and telling women what they want and being manipulative in pursuit of consensual sex is completely lawful and this case had nothing to do with that.”