Russell Brand’s wife Laura Gallacher dumped him for ‘sleeping with other people’

Russell Brand’s rape trial has continued, with his wife, Laura Gallacher, giving evidence at Southwark Crown Court.

The 51-year-old former comedian denies seven charges he is facing, including rape and sexual assault against six different women from 1999 to 2009.

Talking of when they began dating in 2007, Ms Gallacher said: ‘I was not experienced, I had only had one partner before Russell.

‘I felt entirely cared for and looked after by Russell.’

She says she met Brand when she was 19 and he was 31.

She told jurors Brand ‘respected my view’ if she said she did not want to do something.

She said he accepted her wish not to have sex on their first date, telling the court: ‘I didn’t intend to, and I don’t remember him asking.’

She said Brand had been ‘totally caring’, and let the relationship progress ‘totally at my pace’.

Gallacher said they broke up in summer 2007 when she was ‘very aware’ of Brand’s promiscuity.

‘I wasn’t interested in having a relationship with him if he was sleeping with other people.

‘I was invested, we both had told each other we loved each other but it was clear it was difficult for him to be monogamous.’

She said they got back together again as a couple in 2015 and married in 2017.

Gallacher was asked about how much she saw Brand between 2007, when they split up, and 2014, when they met up again.

She says she ‘hung out’ with Brand, and they remained close.

She adds: ‘When he got married to Katy [Perry], I had not seen him during the marriage.’

Brand was married to the singer for 14 months from October 2010 to December 2011.

When asked for her view of her husband, Gallacher said: ‘Russell, my husband, is caring, he is kind, he is a wonderful father to our children.

‘He is amazingly attentive husband. He has got an eye for detail I’ve never known before.

‘The way he treats me is to really know me, I feel very seen by him in every way. I love him very much.’

The trial continues.