He was accused of threatening revenge porn and leaving a man ‘paralysed’ in a street attack before finding fame on Sophie Monk’s season of The Bachelorette.
And Blake Colman has admitted he didn’t leave the house for two months when his chequered past was exposed last year.
The ‘villain’, who returns to reality TV in Bachelor In Paradise on Sunday, said he had a social media ban and refused to go to events for fear of being judged.
‘I didn’t leave the house for two months’: The Bachelorette ‘villain’ Blake Colman admitted he became a recluse after his chequered past was exposed
‘A lot happened to me after the show and there are some things I can’t change and I made some mistakes,’ he told the West Australian.
‘I just sort of took that time away from social media and I didn’t actually leave the house really for two months.’
He continued: ‘I was invited to all of these events and I couldn’t go because I was just thinking how… I can’t change the past but how can I make the future better.’
Blake hit the headlines last year when he was investigated by police after his ex-girlfriend, The Bachelor’s Jen Hawke, accused him of threatening to leak nude photos she had sent him when they were dating.
Scandal: Blake hit the headlines last year when he was investigated by police after his ex-girlfriend, The Bachelor’s Jen Hawke (pictured), accused him of threatening to leak nude photos she had sent him when they were dating
‘Blake and Jen called it quits following a rocky romance earlier this year, but things really went south after Jen told Blake that she had found somebody else,’ a source told Daily Mail Australia at the time.
‘It was two days after she told Blake she’d moved on. Blake had made his debut on The Bachelorette as the show’s ‘villain’ character that day, and Jen’s friends couldn’t believe she had dated such a horrible guy.’
‘Jen posted to her private Facebook page that her phone was going crazy with people sending messages about her former boyfriend, who was one of Sophie’s contestants on the show. She also posted that she was happy to get rid of her ‘douche’ ex,’ the insider went on.
Oh dear: A source close to Jen told the Daily Mail that Blake sent her a barrage of insults and threatened to sell nude photos of her to the media, after seeing a Facebook post about being happy she was rid of her ‘douche’ ex
‘After reading Jen’s post Blake completely lost it. He started sending her a barrage of insults, accusing her of the ultimate betrayal. Then, he threatened to sell nude photos of her to the media,’ the source claimed.
They continued: ‘These photos were sent to him while they were still dating- so you can imagine how upset Jen was by these threats.
This isn’t Blake’s first brush with the law, as in April 2017 he was convicted of a horrifying Perth assault which took place in August 2015.
Failed romance: Jen made the claims after Blake appeared on The Bachelorette in a failed attempt to win Sophie Monk’s heart
Perth Now reported that Blake pleaded guilty to the sickening street attack, which left his victim, Tristan Cooper, ‘unconscious, paralysed and bleeding from the head’.
According to the victim, the incident took place after a night out when Tristan tried to intervene in an argument between two groups of men.
‘He just came running up and with all his body weight sort of grabbed me in the back of the head,’ Tristan, 31, told the paper.
Blake released a statement via a Channel 10 publicist on Friday stating ‘I am truly remorseful and accepted full responsibility for my actions’, News Corp reported.
Vicious: This isn’t Blake’s first brush with the law, as in April 2017 he was convicted of a horrifying Perth assault in 2015, which left his victim, Tristan Cooper, ‘unconscious, paralysed and bleeding from the head’