The Channel Seven crime reporter Robert Ovadia has confirmed he has been sacked after allegations of inappropriate behaviour.
“Yes I’ve been sacked and there will be more to say about that in the appropriate forum at the appropriate time,” Ovadia told Guardian Australia.
Two weeks ago the veteran Sydney reporter was stood down while Seven conducted an internal investigation into the allegations.
A spokesperson for the network confirmed Ovadia was on leave at the time but has not commented on the latest developments.
“Seven is conducting an investigation into allegations of inappropriate behaviour by Robert Ovadia,” the spokesperson said this month.
Ovadia has maintained the allegations are false.
“Seven had told me no current or former colleagues [have] made any complaint against me, as far as I am aware,” he said earlier. “Any suggestion I have been inappropriate at any time is false, malicious and will be defended.”
Ovadia said he had hired the workplace lawyer John Laxon of the Sydney law firm Laxon Lex to represent him.
Seven has been approached for comment.
The network’s news management has undergone changes in the wake of revelations from the Bruce Lehrmann defamation trial and the network’s naming of the wrong man as the Bondi Junction killer. Ovadia was not involved with either story.
The head of news and current affairs, Craig McPherson, and the executive producer of Spotlight, Mark Llewellyn, have both left the network.
On Friday the Seven West Media chief executive, Jeffrey Howard, who was appointed in April, told a parliamentary committee that the people involved in Spotlight’s Lehrmann story “are no longer with the organisation”.
The West Australian newspaper chief, Anthony De Ceglie, was appointed to the new role of director of news and current affairs and editor-in-chief of Seven West Media, and has made a rapid series of appointments in recent weeks.
On Thursday De Ceglie promoted Sean Power, the executive producer of Sunrise, to Sydney news director.
Power replaces the veteran news man Neil Warren who had to step aside for family reasons.
Sunrise’s supervising producer Jake Lyle takes over as executive producer of Sunrise and Holly Fallon as executive producer of Weekend Sunrise.
Last week the presenter Gemma Acton was appointed to the newly created national role of director of news operations.
Chris Dore, the former editor-in-chief of the Australian who lost his job after an incident at a Wall Street Journal event in Laguna Beach in California in 2022, has replaced De Ceglie as head of the newspapers in Western Australia.
