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The young man whose communications with former news anchor Huw Edwards began the fall from grace of one of the BBC’s best known faces, has broken his silence and given his first interview – detailing how he felt he was groomed and exploited by Edwards, and that on one occasion his parents pretended to be him to arrange a meet-up, and videoed the presenter arriving at the rendezvous.
The man, now 21, has not been named in his interview with the UK’s Mirror newspaper. In the interview, he details:
The young man’s account to The Mirror newspaper backs up all the allegations made by The Sun last summer. The newspaper initially didn’t name the broadcaster involved in the story, but Edwards’ wife subsequently identified him, and said he was receiving hospital care after “a serious mental health episode.”
Edwards was suspended by the BBC last summer pending investigation, and it has now transpired that he was arrested in November over a separate investigation into having images of underage abuse on his phone. He was subsequently charged with three counts of making indecent images of children, resigned from the BBC in April and entered a guilty plea in court this week. Sentencing will take place in September.
The BBC’s director-general Tim Davie this week defended the way the BBC had behaved in its treatment of Edwards, including a huge pay rise dating back to April 2023, money he received until his resignation a year later. Edwards’ salary increase was standard and in line with BBC policy, but the fact he worked so little after his suspension in June and now his complete disgrace has raised inevitable indignation about how many UK citizens’ BBC licence fees went into his pocket in that time.