Actor and writer Lena Dunham has admitted that she made “a terrible mistake” in defending one of the writers on her television show ‘Girls’ after he was accused of rape.

In article published in the Hollywood Reporter on Wednesday (December 5th), Dunham apologised for publicly speaking out in defence of Murray Miller in November 2017, after he had been accused of sexually assaulting actress Aurora Perrineau five years previously, when she was just 17 years old.

Murray immediately denied what he called the “outrageous” accusations, but Dunham and her ‘Girls’ showrunner Jenni Konner issued a statement the same day that the allegation emerged.

“While our first instinct is to listen to every woman's story, our insider knowledge of Murray's situation makes us confident that sadly this accusation is one of the three per cent of assault cases that are misreported each year,” their statement read 12 months ago.

Lena DunhamLena Dunham has apologised for her statement 12 months ago

In August this year, prosecutors decided not to pursue a case against Miller because of the expiry of the statute of limitations and “inconsistencies and the delay in reporting”.

Although she quickly retracted the statement in the face a backlash from feminist campaigners, Dunham is again attempting to backpedal on her original statement, saying, in her position as guest editor of the magazine’s Women In Hollywood edition, that she should not have defended Miller.

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“When someone I knew, someone I had loved as a brother, was accused, I did something inexcusable: I publicly spoke up in his defence,” the 32 year old wrote, admitting that she and Konner could not have known in such concrete terms that Miller couldn’t have committed the acts in question.

“There are few acts I could ever regret more in this life. I didn't have the 'insider information' I claimed but rather blind faith in a story that kept slipping and changing and revealed itself to mean nothing at all. It's painful to realise that, while I thought I was self-aware, I had actually internalised the dominant male agenda that asks us to defend it no matter what, protect it no matter what, baby it no matter what.”

Her essay also addressed and apologised to 24 year old Perrineau directly.

“To Aurora: You have been on my mind and in my heart every day this year. I love you. I will always love you. I will always work to right that wrong. In that way, you have made me a better woman and a better feminist.”

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