Miss Universe crown taken away from Colombia after botched announcement

The Miss Universe contestant from the Philippines is this year's winner,but for a few minutes,it appeared as if it might be a repeat win for Colombia.

Colombia contestant Ariadna Gutierrez Arevalo was already wearing the crown as this year's winner in Las Vegaswhen host Steve Harvey returned to apologize.

Harvey says it was his mistake and that he would take responsibility for misreading the card thatcorrectly named contestant Pia Alonzo Wurtzbachasthis year's winner, and Colombia as first runner-up.

A mystified Wurtzbach appeared stunned as she walked to the front of the stage alongside the crown-wearing Arevalo before last year's Miss Universe from Colombia, Paulina Vega, removed the crown and placed it on Wurtzbach's head instead.

"I will take responsibility for this," Harvey said. "It was my mistake. It was on the card. Horrible mistake."

He also took to Twitter after the East Coast broadcast to apologize again.

The high-profile flub madeHarvey the latest targetof the internet, with the incident and the comedian-actorinstantly mocked via social media.

Some, however, havespeculated that the entire mix-up was actually planned to fuel post-ceremony discussion about the pageant.

No Donald Trump

Contestants from Australia, France and the United States rounded out the final five. Canada's entrant was Paola Nunez of Toronto.

The competition started with women between the ages of 19 and27representing 80 countries. For the first time, viewers at home weighed in, with their votes being tallied in addition to four in-person celebrity judges.

The pageant was taking place without the participation of Donald Trump,who claimed early Monday that under his watch, an incident like this "would never have happened!"

NBCUniversal and Donald Trump co-owned the Miss Universe Organization until earlier this year. The real-estate developer offended Hispanics in June when he made anti-immigrant remarks in announcing his Republican presidential run.

That led Spanish-language network Univision to pull out of the broadcast for what would have been the first of five years airing the pageants and NBC to cut business ties with Trump.

The former star of the Celebrity Apprentice reality show sued both companies, settling with NBC in September, which included buying the network's stake in the pageants.

That same month, Trump sold the organization that includes the Miss Universe, Miss USA and Miss Teen USA pageants to entertainment company WME-IMG.