stripslashes function in PHP? Doesn't seem to work...

I've been trying to get the stripslashes() function in a PHP script to work but I'm not having any luck.  It seems like a very straightforward function but I'm still ending up with slashes in my comment/text area data.  Can anyone help?  I have some PHP books but they barely touch on the functionality.  (I'm new to PHP).  Thanks!  (BTW...  I removed the various attempts at calling the stripslashes() function).  The field I'm trying to remove the slashes from is the 'comment' variable.

Here is my short php script:

<?php // Script 1.0 - contactlist.php

if (isset($_POST['submit']) && !empty($_POST['submit'])) // Test if submit button named submit was clicked and not empty

{

          if (!empty($_POST['first']) && !empty($_POST['last'])  && !empty($_POST['email']) && !empty($_POST['phone']) && !empty($_POST['comment'])) {

                    $body = "First Name: {$_POST['first']}\nLast Name: {$_POST['last']}\nEmail Address: {$_POST['email']}\nContact Phone Number: {$_POST['phone']}\nContact Preference: {$_POST['contactvia']}\n\nBest Time To Contact: {$_POST['timepref']}\n\nComments:\n {$_POST['comment']}";

                    $body = wordwrap($body, 70);

                    mail('someone@somewhere.net', 'NEW Customer Inquiry Submission',$body, "From: {$_POST['email']}");

                    header('Location: index.html');  //Redirect to new url if form submitted

     }

}

?>