the BBC has suspended a leading presenter who is alleged to have paid a teenager for sexually explicit photos.

The broadcaster said it was working to establish the facts of “a complex and fast-moving set of circumstances.”

The U.K.’s publicly funded national broadcaster was scrambling to head off a worsening crisis after The Sun newspaper reported allegations that the male presenter gave a youth $45,000 starting in 2020 when the young person was 17.

Neither the star nor the youth was identified. Though the age of sexual consent in Britain is 16, it’s a crime to make or possess indecent images of anyone under 18.