On Wednesday, Kevin Spacey cried as a jury in the UK found him not guilty of nine charges, including sexual assault and indecent assault. The most severe accusation of causing someone to engage in penetrative sexual activity was also ruled not guilty.
On his 64th birthday, Kevin Spacey has been declared innocent of all charges in the UK. The jury took two days to reach this decision. Over the past four and a half weeks, the actor from House of Cards has been defending himself in court at Southwark Crown Court in London.
The famous actor from Hollywood denied the charges, calling them ‘madness’, ‘absolute bollocks’ and ‘stab in the back’. He said the accusations were lies and a betrayal. He believed the men making the claims were only interested in money.
One of the men, who had interacted with Spacey regularly in the early 2000s when Spacey was a creative director at the Old Vic theater, claimed that Spacey had touched him inappropriately multiple times, including once while they were driving on a motorway.
The man said that Spacey’s action was so forceful that he almost lost control of the car. Spacey argued that he and the man had a consensual relationship that involved some touching, but he respected the man’s boundaries otherwise.
Spacey denied the near-crash incident and presented evidence that it couldn’t have happened during the time the man complained about.
Kevin Spacey has been found not guilty of all nine charges of sexual assault against him.
Harvey Proctor, Former Conservative MP said: “The torment Mr Spacey has endured will not end with the conclusion of the trial or the nine ‘not guilty’ verdicts. He will never get over this. I wish him, and his loved ones, well.”
At first, Spacey faced 12 charges, with an additional one later, but last week, the number was reduced to nine because of a legal technicality.
The not guilty verdicts are another success for Spacey, who previously won a $40 million lawsuit filed by actor Anthony Rapp in October. Rapp had accused Spacey of sexual battery that occurred in 1986, but a New York jury rejected the claim.
