Kevin Spacey: UK police formally charge actor

US actor Kevin Spacey has been formally charged with four counts of sexual assault against three men, UK police said Monday.

Spacey is expected to appear before a London court on Thursday morning. The criminal charges were first announced at the end of May when the Crown Prosecution Service gave its authorization.

Besides the sexual assault charges, the 62-year-old actor "has also been charged with causing a person to engage in penetrative sexual activity without consent," London's Metropolitan Police said.

The charges date back to incidents that took place between 2003 and 2013. The investigation by the Metropolitan Police began following allegations that came out during the #MeToo movement.

Charges from #MeToo allegations

Spacey is one of the most high-profile figures to be accused of sexual assault during the #MeToo movement, joining the likes of Harvey Weinstein and Bill Cosby.

The actor has denied the allegations, however, an accusation in 2017 by fellow actor Anthony Rapp that Spacey assaulted him at a party in the 1980s when Rapp was a teenager, brought Spacey's career to a halt.

The Old Vic theater in London, where Spacey had been artistic director between 2004 and 2015, said in 2017 that it had received allegations of inappropriate behavior from 20 men who had come into contact with the actor at the theater between 1995 and 2013.

British police first questioned him in 2019. The two-time Oscar winner has previously said that he will voluntarily appear in court to face the charges.

A US court ordered Spacey to pay $31 million (€29.7 million) to the producers of the show "House of Cards," which he had been starring in when the allegations were made public.

The company behind the series said that he had "breached" its harassment policy which had forced them to fire him and cut short the final season of the show, for which they incurred financial losses.

ab, rs/wd (Reuters, AFP)