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SBS drops episode of Who Do You Think You Are with Coronation St. actor

Exclusive: SBS dumps an episode of Who Do You Think You Are? featuring William Roache after he was charged with rape and indecent assault.

2013-08-23_1414EXCLUSIVE: SBS has abandoned plans to screen an episode of Who Do You Think You Are? featuring Coronation Street actor William Roache.

Roache, 81, was arrested in the UK in May charged with the rape of a 15-year-old girl in 1967, seven years after he began working on the British soap. A month later he was also charged with five counts of indecent assault against girls aged 12 to 16.

He has been bailed until trial next year and, though he has not yet entered formal pleas, his lawyers say he will contest the charges.

Roache’s character, the longest-serving in the show, was written out of the soap whilst the investigation is ongoing.

SBS begins the 9th season of genealogy show Who Do You Think You Are? in September, which aired a year earlier in the UK, before the charges emerged.

An SBS spokesperson has confirmed to TV Tonight, “We’re not screening this episode.”