John Leslie (television presenter)

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For other John Leslies, see John Leslie

John Leslie (born Leslie John Stott on February 22, 1965) is a Scottish former television presenter, best known as a presenter of BBC1's Blue Peter and ITV1's This Morning.

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[edit] Career

Leslie's first television job was on Yorkshire Television's The Music Box on ITV, in which he presented until the show's demise in 1987. In April 1989, he captured a coveted role as presenter of the BBC's flagship children's programme Blue Peter, staying until January 1994.

A series of other programmes followed, including This Morning, Wheel of Fortune (made by Scottish Television) and Scavengers. In 2001, following the departure of Richard Madeley and Judy Finnigan, Leslie became a full-time presenter of This Morning.

Since then, it has been reported that Leslie would be offered a deal to present a talk show on Sky One; this turned out to be false. He has also been unable to return to This Morning since being sacked from the programme in 2002 amid false rape allegations (see below).

Leslie was last seen playing in goal for the Scottish team in the Celebrity World Cup Soccer Six tournament, which took place on the 14th May 2006 at Birmingham City Football Club.

Leslie has returned to his native Edinburgh and is reported to be working as a property developer (June 2006).

[edit] Personal life

Leslie was born in Edinburgh, and is the brother of Grant Stott, a presenter on stv's Scotsport, and on 97.3 Forth One. Leslie is a former boyfriend of Catherine Zeta-Jones and Abi Titmus.

[edit] Alleged rape

In October 2002, Ulrika Jonsson said in her autobiography that a television presenter had raped her. Amid rife media speculation, Matthew Wright, a one time columnist for the tabloid newspaper Daily Mirror, infamously disclosed - supposedly by accident - on his television show The Wright Stuff, that Leslie was the alleged person. Jonsson refused to tell the public or the police whether the correct person had been named. As a result of the publicity, several other women made accusations relating to indecent assault by Leslie, who was promptly arrested, and charged with assaulting a woman twice between 25 May and 28 May 1997. He was never charged with offences against Jonsson. The police dropped the charge against Leslie on 31 July 2003, after the complainant brought additional information to the attention of the prosecution service. The information, which has never been made public, was sufficient to convince prosecutors to drop the case against Leslie. On the court steps after his clearing, Leslie said that he had 'been to hell and back' and that he had 'maintained [his] innocence throughout'. The prosecution said that Leslie should leave the court 'without a stain on his character'. Despite this, Leslie's career never recovered, although he and Wright did make light of the situation by appearing together in the video for Bo' Selecta's Christmas 2003 single, "Proper Crimbo".

[edit] References


Preceded by:
Mark Curry		 Blue Peter Presenter No. 18
1989-94		 Succeeded by:
Tim Vincent
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