Of­fi­cials of the Caribbean Com­mu­ni­ca­tions Net­work (CCN) are ex­pect­ed to ap­pear with tele­vi­sion per­son­al­i­ty Ian Al­leyne in court next Mon­day to an­swer nine crim­i­nal charges re­lat­ing to the broad­cast of the rape of a 13-year-old girl. On his first ap­pear­ance in the Port-of-Spain Mag­is­trates' Court on April 24, Al­leyne plead­ed not guilty to three charges un­der sec­tion 32 (2) of the Sex­u­al Of­fences Act. He is cur­rent­ly out on $80,000 bail which was grant­ed by Chief Mag­is­trate Mar­cia Ay­ers-Cae­sar.

The leg­is­la­tion makes it an of­fence to pub­lish or broad­cast the iden­ti­ty of a vic­tim of sex­u­al of­fence. The of­fence car­ries a $25,000 fine and im­pris­on­ment for five years. A day ear­li­er, CCN's tele­vi­sion sta­tion TV6, which airs Al­leyne's dai­ly Crime Watch pro­gramme, was served with nine court sum­mons­es for their ap­pear­ance in court on May 14. The tele­vi­sion sta­tion faces three sim­i­lar charges as Al­leyne as well as six oth­ers charges un­der sec­tion 65 (b) of the Telecom­mu­ni­ca­tion Act 2001 for the al­leged breach of their li­cence.