OTTAWA — Until a month ago, Jian Ghomeshi was a celebrity with few peers at the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. His weekday arts and entertainment radio program, “Q,” had brought younger listeners to the public broadcaster and raised its profile in the United States through syndication. Separately, he hosted both the network’s annual competition to select a book for all Canadians to read and Canada’s most valuable literary award, the Scotiabank Giller Prize.

Now, Mr. Ghomeshi’s stardom has taken on a bizarre and sordid twist.

On Wednesday, a wedge of police officers was needed to push Mr. Ghomeshi, 47, and his lawyers through a crush of journalists packed into the Art Deco lobby of a Toronto courthouse. After a turbulent month during which he was fired by the CBC after managers said they saw “graphic evidence” that he had assaulted one woman followed by a string of allegations from others, Mr. Ghomeshi (pronounced ZHEE-ahn go-MESH-ee) was charged by the Toronto police with four counts of sexual assault and one count of choking.

After promising the court to live with his mother and not leave Ontario, Mr. Ghomeshi, his carefully maintained stubble shaved off and his trendy clothing exchanged for a sober suit and tie, was released on $89,000 bail. His lawyer, her voice barely audible over the din of the crowd and the clicking of shutters, said that Mr. Ghomeshi would plead not guilty but otherwise declined to comment.

Mr. Ghomeshi’s downfall seemed to have developed out of his preference for sexual practices that he described in a since-deleted Facebook post as “a mild form of ‘Fifty Shades of Grey.’ ”