Kevin Spacey’s was most known for his run as President Frank Underwood on Netflix’s first original series House of Cards when a slew of sexual assault and harassment allegations came out against him. Several claims could have led to criminal proceedings, which seemingly spelled an ending to Spacey’s stardom.
Spacey is now able to go free, however, after prosecutors dropped the last case against him due to lack of evidence. Spacey’s accuser in that case – who remained anonymous – suddenly passed away in September.
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Because so much of their case relied on evidence provided by the accuser, the Los Angeles District Attorney’s office finally dropped the case on Monday, officially ending the criminal procedure. The civil case can continue if the accuser’s estate continues the lawsuit posthumously.
Spacey came out as gay via social media in 2017 following actor Anthony Rapp’s allegations that Spacey had tried to molest him when the latter was 14 and the former was 26. He apologized for the incident while claiming he did not recall the incident and maintaining his innocence.
Since then, several recorded accusations of Spacey’s misconduct became public, ranging from Rapp’s in 1986 to several as recently as 2016, including this latest accusation that was just dismissed. From his 12 years as Artistic Director of The Old Vic theater in London arose over 20 allegations against him. The Metropolitan Police Service there reportedly questioned the actor at Scotland Yard over 6 reported assault cases.
However, the Los Angeles DA declined to bring one allegation against Spacey to court last year due to the statute of limitations, and a similar case in Massachusetts this fall also fell apart when a witness could not testify without incriminating themselves.
After the allegations, Netflix cut all ties with him, writing him out of the show he had led for five seasons and ending all contracts involving him. Several films he was in, including the John Paul Getty biopic All the Money in the World, either removed his roles or re-recorded them with new actors.
However, the highly decorated actor made headlines last winter after releasing a cryptic YouTube video, seemingly reprising his role as Underwood from the House of Cards where he promised that everyone would “soon enough…know the full truth.” He then made another public appearance, his first official performance since the accusations, this August when he performed a dramatic reading at Rome’s Palazzo Massimo alle Terme museum.
Now that he does not have any criminal proceedings against him, we may be seeing more of Spacey in the future.
