Kevin Spacey forced to pay $31m after losing sexual harassment lawsuit to House of Cards producers

Kevin Spacey has been ordered to pay nearly $31m (￡23m) to House of Cards producers MRC after violating their sexual harassment policy.

MRC ended their professional relationship with Spacey in 2017 after the actor was accused by multiple people of inappropriate sexual conduct.

The production company filed the confidential arbitration demand in 2019, in an attempt to recoup the costs of scrapping an entire season of the show due to the allegations against the star.

The American Beauty actor filed a counterclaim and accused MRC of wrongfully terminating his contract.

An eight-day arbitration hearing later took place with the arbitrator ruling in favour of MRC.

The petition states: “With one exception, the arbitrator found the third party witnesses to be credible, and found the allegations against Spacey to be true. The award finds that Spacey’s conduct at issue in connection with the testifying crew members was in breach of both the acting and executive producing agreements.”

Spacey was suspended from House of Cards in November 2017 following multiple accusations of sexual assault. Among the allegations were those from actor Anthony Rapp, who alleged that Spacey made sexual advances to him when he was 14.

Last year, Rapp sued Spacey for sexual assault, sexual battery and intentional infliction of emotional distress.