In the fall of 2017, so many predators and evil men were finally outed. Kevin Spacey was one of those predators. There were so many credible and disturbing accusations against Spacey, spanning back decades, all of them involving teenage boys or young men in their 20s, across LA, New York, London and wherever else Spacey worked for thirty years. Anthony Rapp told his story, but many of the accusers asked for their names to be withheld. During Me Too, some of Spacey’s victims even went to the police to file charges. Last year, a federal jury found Spacey not-liable of battery on Anthon Rapp, which was a huge bummer. So is this news: a British jury just found Spacey not guilty of nine charges involving multiple victims, all related to the period of time when Spacey was in charge of the Old Vic.

Kevin Spacey broke down in tears on Wednesday as a U.K. jury found him not guilty of nine charges of sexual assault, indecent assault and – the most serious charge – causing a person to engage in penetrative sexual activity.

This means that Spacey, on his 64th birthday, has been cleared of all charges against him in the U.K. It took the jury two days to come to their decision. The former “House of Cards” actor has spent the past four and a half weeks at Southwark Crown Court in London fighting his case.

During the course of the trial, the jury heard from the four men who had made the complaints against the actor (none of the men can be named for legal reasons). A jury dismissed each of the counts relating to the men’s accounts.

Originally, Spacey was charged with 12 counts, plus an addendum to one of the counts, but these were reduced to nine last week due to a “legal technicality.”

The acquittals are yet another victory for Spacey, who won a $40 million civil lawsuit brought by actor Anthony Rapp last October. Rapp had accused Spacey of sexual battery, which took place in 1986 but a New York jury dismissed the claim.

[From Variety]

Variety has additional details about all of the victims and their accusations against Spacey. It sounds like there were some technicalities in certain cases and “reasonable doubt” in others. It’s just a reminder that patriarchy hurts men too – many of these men didn’t come forward until Spacey had already been outed as a serial predator. The same arguments used against female victims of sexual crimes were used against Spacey’s victims – what were the men wearing, what did they say when he did this or that, did they say “no” clearly, why did they continue to communicate with Spacey after the alleged assault, had they been drinking, why can’t they remember the exact date and time of their assault. And it worked, because it usually works. Because the system was built to protect men like Kevin Spacey.

Photos courtesy of Backgrid.