Gregg Wallace has been fired as a presenter on U.K. cooking show MasterChef after an inquiry into alleged misconduct, according to the BBC.
More than 50 people approached the British broadcaster with fresh claims about Wallace, including allegations that he groped a colleague and pulled his trousers down in front of another. The 60-year-old denies any wrongdoing.
In December, The Hollywood Reporter reported that Wallace was asked to step down from his TV presenter role while allegations of historical misconduct were investigated.
Production company Banijay U.K. had said at the time that he was co-operating with the internal investigation after it was alleged by 13 different people that Wallace made inappropriate sexual comments to co-workers over a 17-year period.
Now, more have come forward. The inquiry into the allegations against him, conducted by an independent law firm on behalf of Banijay, is expected to report back imminently, the BBC also said.
“I recognise that some of my humour and language, at times, was inappropriate,” Wallace said in a lengthy Instagram post on Tuesday. “For that, I apologise without reservation. But I was never the caricature now being sold for clicks.”
Wallace continued, accusing BBC News of “chasing slanderous click-bait rather than delivering impartial journalism.” He added that his autism diagnosis while filming MasterChef was ignored. “Nothing was done to investigate my disability or protect me from what I now realise was a dangerous environment for over 20 years.”
“I will not go quietly,” the statement ended. “I will not be cancelled for convenience. I was tried by media and hung out to dry well before the facts were established.”
In a BBC report published Tuesday, the outlet said it had not yet seen the Banijay report. It reported being told by a number of women — all of whom had their names changed for the article to protect their identities — that Wallace had groped and touched them inappropriately.
One woman, Alice, says she was “disgusted” when Wallace undid his trousers in front of her in a dressing room, and another said that, during a pre-filming dinner in 2002, Wallace touched her groin under the table and asked, “Do you like that?”
A university student told the BBC that upon meeting Wallace at a nightclub in 2013, she asked him for a picture before he reached under her skirt and grabbed her bottom. Another person alleged that he dropped his trousers in front of her in 2012 and was not wearing underwear. A number of men also contacted the BBC to say they witnessed Wallace making inappropriate sexual comments.
Many of the women who spoke to the BBC are young female freelancers and didn’t feel able to complain about Wallace’s behaviour at the time for fear of negative career repercussions.
Wallace is considered one of Britain’s most recognizable faces, leading the cooking show for over two decades alongside John Torode.
But in recent years, more allegations have come to light about the inappropriate behaviour of men working on Banijay or BBC productions, including Russell Brand — who now faces charges for rape and sexual assault after a Metropolitan Police investigation — and former Strictly Come Dancing professional dancers Giovanni Pernice and Graziano Di Prima, accused of bullying and harassment on the set of the show.
