Kevin Spacey is a sexual 'predator', alleged victim tells UK court

LONDON, July 10 (Reuters) - An alleged sex assault victim said Kevin Spacey is a "predator" who performed oral sex on him as he slept in the Oscar-winning U.S. actor's London flat, a London court heard on Monday.

Spacey is on trial at Southwark Crown Court on a dozen charges of historic sex offences against four men, then aged in their 20s and 30s, between 2001 and 2013.

The 63-year-old has denied all the charges and his lawyer Patrick Gibbs said at the start of the trial that the jury were going to hear some "damned lies".

The trial, entering its third week on Monday, heard the evidence of a fourth complainant, who described Spacey as a sexual "predator" in a recorded police interview played to jurors.

The man, who cannot be identified, alleges that Spacey sexually assaulted him and then performed oral sex upon him while he was passed out in Spacey's apartment in the late 2000s.

Giving evidence in person behind a screen, the man denied suggestions by Spacey's lawyer that he consented to the sex.

He told police how he had written to Spacey to ask for advice on his own fledgling acting career when he was in his 20s.

The alleged victim said he received a call from Spacey while drinking in a pub and initially thought it was a prank by one of his friends.

Spacey asked him if he wanted to "meet up for a beer and I said 'yeah, of course'," the man told officers. He added that he was "star-struck by the idea of meeting essentially an idol".

The fact that Spacey was willing to meet him immediately made him feel "weirdly special", the man said.

"I wasn't even thinking that this was sexual (or) anything more than a professional relationship because I was just so star-struck by it all."

He said they met in central London before going to Spacey's flat, where the pair drank a beer, ate leftover pizza and smoked some cannabis.

'PREDATOR'

The alleged victim said he thanked Spacey for his help and the actor "opened up his arms and he went 'come here' and I didn't, I thought it was a bit weird".

He continued that he "didn't know him well enough to be hugging him", but Spacey then "was just rubbing his face into my crotch basically, and I thought this is incredibly weird".

The man was asked by police if he thought of leaving after that. He said he felt "vulnerable", but added: "There was also still that niggling doubt ... Maybe I'm being a dick here, maybe this is the theatre world."

He also said that he did not want to "annoy someone that powerful" in the acting world. "If he said someone wasn't going to work, I imagine they wouldn't work."

The man told the police that he then fell asleep, which he said was unusual though he added that he did not want to "wildly insinuate something untoward was going on because I don't know".

When he woke up a few hours later, Spacey "was just performing oral sex on me ... I woke up to it happening", the complainant said.

He added that he told Spacey to stop, after which the actor told him to leave and not tell anyone what had happened.

Later in his interview, the man said he had been told that Spacey liked "young, straight guys", but was then unconcerned as he "didn't know at that point that he (Spacey) was a predator".

Gibbs, Spacey's lawyer, told the court that Spacey's phone records showed the actor had called the alleged victim just before 1 a.m. on the day of the alleged assault, suggesting he left Spacey's flat "almost immediately after some very intimate contact" between him and Spacey.

Giving evidence in court from the behind a screen, the complainant replied: "No, that's not true. I woke up in the morning." He also said: "Nothing happened that was consensual."

Gibbs also said the man texted Spacey shortly after the alleged assault. The complainant said he wanted to record Spacey admitting what had happened, but they did not meet again.

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