Meta has removed Russell Brand's Instagram account, days after the comedian and actor was convicted of rape and three sexual assaults and jailed for more than a decade. Brand himself announced the removal, posting on Elon Musk's X that Meta had taken down his Instagram account.
Brand was found guilty at Southwark Crown Court of rape and three sexual assaults, and was sentenced to ten years and six months in prison. The conviction, which followed a trial that heard evidence from several women, ended a career that had made him one of Britain's best-known comedians and a Hollywood actor, and it has now cost him his presence on one of the world's biggest social media platforms.
The removal of his Instagram account is the latest consequence of the conviction. Social media platforms have increasingly taken action against public figures convicted of serious sexual offences, and Meta's decision follows the pattern of deplatforming that has become standard in such cases. Brand's account, which had millions of followers, is no longer accessible.
The case has also shaken the wider British entertainment industry. The UK government is now considering making safety rules mandatory for the media industry, after the Brand conviction and a separate set of allegations against David Walliams, who was named as the well-known celebrity accused of sexually inappropriate behaviour and grooming following an investigation by ITV and the Guardian. Walliams denies all wrongdoing and said in a statement: "I am not a sexual predator. I have not broken the law."
Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy is expected to meet industry leaders next week and warn that ministers could intervene if changes are not made. The government is looking at making membership of the Creative Industries Independent Standards Authority, known as CIISA, mandatory, if the industry does not step up on its own. Nandy has said the allegations against Walliams are the latest in a long line of reported abuses of power, and that the industry must do more to protect women and children.
Comedian Lucy Beaumont, who revealed herself as one of the whistleblowers on Walliams, has also called for better industry standards. The allegations against Walliams came just days after Brand was convicted and jailed, and the two cases together have forced a reckoning in British television, film and publishing about how complaints are handled and how power is exercised.
Brand's own downfall has been swift. Once a fixture of British comedy and a star of Hollywood films, he had in recent years reinvented himself as a social media figure, building a large online following with videos about politics, spirituality and conspiracy theories. That following was, in part, what made his Instagram account valuable, and its removal cuts off one of his main channels to the public.
The conviction has also revived earlier allegations against Brand. Jemima Goldsmith, the writer and producer, has accused him of violence and abuse and said she called the police in 2014, in an account that emerged as the case against him unfolded. The trial itself heard from women whose evidence the jury accepted, and the judge's sentence of more than ten years reflected the gravity of the offences.
For the entertainment industry, the question now is what changes. The government's threat of mandatory safeguarding rules, and the prospect of compulsory membership of an independent standards body, would be a significant shift for an industry that has largely policed itself. Whether the industry moves first, or waits to be forced, will be decided in the meetings Nandy has planned for next week.
Brand, meanwhile, will serve his sentence while the industry he once dominated tries to work out how to make sure that what happened to his victims does not happen again. The removal of his Instagram account is a small part of that reckoning, but it is a visible one: the platform where he built his second career has decided he no longer belongs there.
