Russell Brand is getting ready to spend his second night in London’s notorious HMP Wandsworth after being found guilty of rape and sexual assault.
The 51-year-old disgraced comedian was driven from Southwark Crown Court in the back of an armoured van, swarmed by photographers, to the fearsome clink on Thursday.
Brand had been found guilty of raping a 21-year-old fan and sexually assaulting three women during the height of his celebrity career.
At trial, the judge warned he would face a “significant custodial term”.
Upon arriving at Wandsworth, south London, Brand was said to be “petrified” as he underwent a strip search and medical examination before being issued a prison tracksuit.
Previous inmates of the Victorian prison include Ronnie Kray, Charles Bronson, Ronnie Biggs, Rolf Harris and Gary Glitter.
After screening, he was escorted to the facility’s Care and Separation Unit, where he would be kept isolated from all other prisoners and monitored continuously throughout the night, the Daily Mail reports.
The CSU, referred to by inmates as “The Block” or “The Seg”, sits largely beneath ground level in what is known as the “bowels” of the 1851 prison.
Conditions in the CSU are considered among the grimmest in the entire jail, with the smell currently reported to be especially foul due to a fellow prisoner carrying out a dirty protest or the deliberate smearing or hurling of bodily waste around a cell or at staff.
Inmates held in the segregation unit are confined to their cells for virtually the entire day, with strictly limited movement, minimal social contact and little access to educational programmes.
Prison staff determined Brand’s level of fame made the Vulnerable Prisoners wing, where convicted rapists and sex offenders are typically housed, unsuitable for him.
Having arrived after the evening meal service, Brand was given a basic packed-lunch-style supper in his cell.
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He also received a standard first-night pack containing toiletries such as a toothbrush and toothpaste, along with food supplies including cereal, tea, milk and sugar, plus small extras like Polo mints, juice sticks and digestive biscuits.
A single toilet roll and two sets of prison-issue clothing, jogging bottoms, T-shirts, sweatshirts and underwear, completed his provisions.
Brand spent the night on a thin mattress laid over a fixed concrete slab, with his cell furnished only with a stainless steel lavatory and washbasin, plus a table and stool bolted to the floor.
Previously, he had voiced his dread of imprisonment well before the jury reached its decision.
In an episode of his Sunday Service podcast recorded on October 11, just one day before jury selection began, he told his wife, Laura Gallacher: “I don’t like things where it’s like you might have to go to prison.”
She responded: “Yeah, I know, but that is just the nature of what a trial is.”
Prison authorities are said to be eager to transfer him from Wandsworth to a facility better equipped to hold sex offenders.
While it is not yet known how long Brand will spend behind bars, a rape conviction can carry a life sentence of up to 19 years.
Sexual assault offenders face a maximum of 10 years per count.
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