Paul Burrell's Biography

The son of a lorry driver, Paul Burrell grew up in the Derbyshire village of Grassmere.

Paul Burrell entered the royal household in 1976 as a trainee footman. A year later he was personal footman to the Queen.

In 1984 Paul Burrell married Maria, a maid to Prince Philip, and they have two sons.

Paul and Maria joined the staff of Prince Charles and Princess Diana in 1986.

When Charles and Diana split up, Burrell stayed with Diana.

Shortly after Diana's death, Paul Burrell was awarded the Royal Victorian Medal by the Queen.

However, in January 2001 the police raided Paul Burrell's home and later arrested him on charges of stealing 342 items from Diana, the Prince of Wales and Prince William.

It was not until November 2002 that the trial eventually collapsed and Paul Burrell was acquitted.

Paul Burrell runs a florist in Holt, near Wrexham and close to there is Nightingale Hospice, which received more than £136,000 thanks to the former royal butler coming second to Joe Pasquale when he was a contestant in I'm a Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here.

In 2005 Paul Burrell was a special correspondent for ITV2 going behind the scenes of I'm a Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here.

In January 2008, Paul Burrell gave evidence to the inquest into Princess Diana's death and described his connection to Princess Di:

"I was at the hub of the wheel and everyone else was on a spoke. I connected all the princess's friends and all her world."

In February 2008, the coroner at Princess Diana's inquest recalled Paul Burrell to explain "discrepancies" in his evidence, after Paul Burrell had been secretly filmed saying: "I told the truth as far as I could – but I didn't tell the whole truth. Perjury is not a nice thing to have to contemplate. I was very naughty."

On 6 March 2008, the BBC reported that Paul Burrell had refused to return to the inquest into the death of Princess Diana to explain the discrepancies between his evidence and what he said during secret filming.

The coroner could not force Paul Burrell to give evidence again because he was in the USA and so outside the court's jurisdiction.

In his summing up, the coroner, Lord Justice Scott Baker, cautioned the jury, referring to Paul Burrell:

"You have heard him in the witness box and, even without what he said subsequently in the hotel room in New York, it was blindingly obvious that the evidence that he gave in this court was not the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth."

In 2015, he became one of the house guests on Celebrity Big Brother appearing from days 6 to 9.

In 2016, it was reported that Paul Burrell and his wife of 32 years Maria were getting divorced.