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Man Who Accused George Takei of Sexual Assault Changes His Story

The accuser has walked back parts of his story, admitting he may not have been sexually assaulted as he had claimed.

A man who accused George Takei of sexual assault is walking back parts of his story and has admitted he might never have been groped by the actor as he originally claimed.

Scott Brunton, a former model and actor, told The Hollywood Reporter in November 2017 that in 1981 he passed out on a bean bag chair in Takei's home after having a few drinks and becoming tired. He said he fell unconscious and came to with his pants down and Takei groping him.

The backlash was swift, tarnishing Takei's reputation despite his immediate and continued denials that there was any validity to the accusation.

Monica Schipper/Getty Images for Lucille Lortel Awards

NEW YORK, NY - MAY 07: George and Brad Takei attends 32nd Annual Lucille Lortel Awards at NYU Skirball Center on May 7, 2017 in New York City. (Photo by Monica Schipper/Getty Images for Lucille Lortel Awards)

George and Brad Takei attends 32nd Annual Lucille Lortel Awards at NYU Skirball Center on May 7, 2017 in New York City.

Now, in an interview with The Observer's Shane Snow, who noticed inconsistencies in the story, Brunton is admitting he can't be sure he was ever touched inappropriately.

Snow noticed Brunton didn't mention being drugged until two days after the story first broke, and in a CNN interview didn’t recount any groping.

So he asked Brunton directly:

I asked him to clarify the issue. “Did he touch your genitals?”

“You know…probably…” Brunton replied after some hesitation. “He was clearly on his way to…to…to going somewhere.”

We shared a pause.

“So…you don’t remember him touching your genitals?”

Brunton confessed that he did not remember any touching.

Details of his story have changed over time, including the way he framed it to friends he told about the encounter before he went public with the allegation of abuse.

Brunton admits that for years he was telling it as a funny anecdote, "a great party story," and that he didn't get upset about it until last year, when he read a story in which Takei criticized Kevin Spacey for deflecting an accusation of abuse against him by coming out of the closet as gay.

Snow also consulted medical toxicologists and legal experts in sex offenses who do not have reason to believe Brunton was drugged, nor that there is evidence of criminal wrongdoing on Takei's part.

Brunton said he doesn't think of Takei as a criminal or abuser. Still, and in spite of admitting he fabricated some elements of his story in an effort to be heard, he feels his former friend took advantage of him, and he wants Takei to offer him an apology.

Takei has taken to Twitter to comment on the report, expressing relief and a sense of vindication, as well as indicating that he harbors no ill-will toward his accuser.

UPDATE: Brunton has responded to Snow's report, saying what he told the reporter has been misconstrued.

"I did not change my story," Brunton told The Oregonian. "I'm baffled. I'm shocked."

He claimed Snow, who wrote in his original report that he undertook the investigation of Takei in part due to his inclusion of the actor's activism in an upcoming book he has authored, had a preconceived "angle."

Brunton said that over the course of several phone conversations, he felt that "there were certain points where I was describing what happened, and he kept trying to get me to discount it, to retract that it was an assault."

He also objected to the claim that he no longer felt he had been assaulted.

"I felt there was groping, there was attempt to get my underwear off, he was on top of me," he told the newspaper on Friday. "What more do you need?"

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