"WHAT a friend we have in Ian," sang supporters of Crime Watch host, Ian Alleyne, as they held a candlelight vigil to protest his arrest last night.

From around 6 p.m. they gathered in the Brian Lara Promenade in Port of Spain outside Express House in red T-shirts as they voiced their disapproval over his arrest last Thursday and his overnight detention at the Port of Spain CID.

Up to press time last night. Alleyne remained at the Port of Spain CID where he was taken upon his release from the Mount Hope Medical Sciences Complex.

He is scheduled to appear before a Port of Spain magistrate this morning on four charges, three under the Sexual Offences Act and one for resisting arrest.

Dana Bandoo, who left her Gasparillo home to be at the vigil, said: "Ian is the people's saviour. Ian does things that the police couldn't do or said they could not do but Ian Alleyne did it."

Another man who only wanted to be identified as Barry said, "Ian is a good guy but they are treating him as a criminal. We know that he is not above the law but let me say this. The girl who got raped. Her mother came to Ian, you know. He did not go to them but they came to him seeking his help and if it was not for Ian them men who assaulted the girl would have still been outside."

Beverly Billy of Beetham Gardens smiled as she spoke about the talk-show host.

"I am here because what they are doing to Ian is unjust. He is for justice because without Ian we don't have a voice. What I want to know is that why a man who is for all the people, the black people, the Indian people, the Chinese people, the white people ... why it is they have to come down on him like that. Is he a rapist? Is he a murderer?" she asked.

Anderson Wilson, a Beetham Gardens community activist, said, "I am here because things are not going right. Things are not going right at all."

—Gyasi Gonzales