Academy Award winner Kevin Spacey faces a civil court Thursday for allegedly sexually assaulting a boy 36 years ago.
Anthony Rapp is suing Kevin Spacey in New York. He claims the actor touched him inappropriately at a party in 1986 when he was 14 years old.
In the United Kingdom, 63-year-old Spacey is facing five separate sexual assault charges. The “House of Cards” actor has stated that the allegations against him are false.
Kevin Spacey Facing Trial On New York sex Abuse Claim
Rapp, now 51 and also an actor, and Spacey are both expected to appear in federal court in Manhattan on Thursday when the trial begins with jury selection.
Rapp says he met Mr. Spacey at a party at his Manhattan apartment when he was about 26 or 27.
In an October 2017 Buzzfeed article, Rapp said Spacey picked him up, put him on a bed, and then partially laid on top of him.
“I knew he was trying to have sex with me,” Rapp said.
His lawsuit states that the alleged encounter lasted no more than two minutes and that there was “no kissing, no undressing, no reaching under clothing, and no sexual comments or innuendo.”
The lawsuit was filed in September 2020 against Mr. Spacey, whose real name is Kevin Spacey Fowler. It accuses him of assault and intentional infliction of emotional distress.
The judge in the case, Lewis A. Kaplan, had already dismissed a sexual assault charge because the deadline had passed.
Five years ago, the Buzzfeed article was published, and the next day Spacey declared on social media that he could not remember what Rapp had said.
“If I behaved at the time as he claims, then I owe him a sincere apology. That would have been very bad, drunken behavior on my part,” he wrote.
“And I am sorry for the feelings he says he has had over the years,” she said.
According to the news site Law & Crime, in a videotaped deposition he took with lawyers in January, Spacey denied that the incident ever took place.
He said Mr. Rapp’s story “can’t be true” because “I don’t care about boys and I don’t touch people in strange ways.”
Rapp is one of the stars of the Paramount+ series Star Trek: Discovery. Before that, he starred in the Broadway musical Rent.
Separate sexual assault charges alleging Spacey groped an 18-year-old at a restaurant in Nantucket, Massachusetts, were dropped in 2019 after the actor’s lawyers said the accuser changed text messages on his phone.
In August, a judge ruled that Spacey must pay the producers of “House of Cards” $31 million to cover the costs they incurred in firing him.
Must Read:
Loretta Lynn, Country Music Icon Dies At The Age 90!
In July, he pleaded not guilty in London to charges that he sexually assaulted three men more than a decade ago. The trial will begin in June 2023.
There could be some surprising witnesses in the trial of Kevin Spacey. In July, a California judge agreed to the actor’s request to keep secret the names of his accusers and the “details” of their sexual harassment claims in a $31 million arbitration over his time on House of Cards. Court documents indicated that people who starred in the popular series could be called witnesses.
Meanwhile, the allegations have caused great damage to the actor’s career. After being fired from House of Cards, Christopher Plummer reprised his role as oil tycoon J. Paul Getty in Ridley Scott’s All the Money in the World.
In May, jurors in the defamation trial between Amber Heard and Johnny Depp learned that Kevin Spacey’s finished Netflix biopic about Gore Vidal has been shelved for good.
Spacey also turned down a role in 1242: Gateway to the West, in which he was to play Genghis Khan.
“No matter how sexually inappropriate it is, if it’s against the law, the person who did it should be held accountable if the allegations are true,” said Mitchell Garabedian, an attorney who has helped people abused by Catholic clergy in Boston.
“I can say that it takes a lot of courage for a victim of sexual abuse, male or female, to come forward and say what happened. People who say something about sexual abuse should be greatly admired.”
Read More:
Where Is Jan Broberg From ‘A Friend Of The Family’ Now?
Who Is Nazanin Mandi? Miguel’s Wife Files For Divorce After Three Years Of Marriage
