Blue Singer Lee Ryan Loses Appeal Over Racially Aggravated Assault On Black Flight Attendant

Blue singer Lee Ryan has lost a High Court challenge over his conviction for racially aggravated assault after “flirting” with a black flight attendant while he was drunk on a British Airways flight from Glasgow to London in July 2022.

Ryan, 43, had drunk a bottle of port in the airport lounge before boarding the plane and making comments about flight attendant Leah Gordon’s looks.

He called her “my chocolate cookie”, “my chocolate darling”, and told her: “I’m going to have your chocolate children”.

When she told him to ‘stay away’, he grabbed both her wrists, which is what prompted the racially aggravated assault charge. Which might sound a bit harsh for just grabbing a black person’s wrists after referencing their blackness, but that’s the legal wording it falls under.

Ryan originally received a 12-month suspended sentence in September 2023. However, a series of appeals resulted in certain lesser charges being altered while his core conviction for racially aggravated assault stood firm. He’s now tried to appeal that and lose the ‘racist’ tag, but it’s been dismissed.

Ryan tried to claim that he merely ‘touched’ Leah Gordon’s wrists and didn’t ‘grab’ them, but this was inconsistent with his initial police interview where he admitting grabbing her.

Not to mention – he was completely off his face, so it’s hard to trust his version of events, especially when he’s changing the details.

Because this final legal avenue to clear his name has been completely shut down, Lee Ryan will now return to the Crown Court to face final sentencing, which means he may have made things even worse for himself? D’oh.

At the time of his original sentencing, Lee said: ‘I’m sorry. My band member is black, I’m not racist, I’ve had black girlfriends, mixed-race girlfriends. It was banter, just drunk banter I suppose, there was no malice or intention to upset anyone.’

‘I didn’t mean to cause any distress to anyone or be racist, it was just a poor choice of words I suppose.

‘I am sorry that I touched her, but that’s all I did, touch her lightly.’

I kinda feel bad for Lee Ryan because it definitely was just banter in his mind, but at the same time you can’t be getting so hammered that you end up harassing women and putting your hands on them, on land or 30,000 feet up in the sky. That’s what a bottle of port can do to a man, I suppose.

For the backlash Lee faced while pushing Covid conspiracy theories a couple years back, click HERE.