The 35-year-old man went into the Albury police station to make a statement two days later and police alleged he was found to have been staying in the country illegally since 2008.

He has been locked up in Villawood Detention Centre since and a Department of Immigration and Citizenship official said yesterday he would be removed from Australia soon after paper­work was done.

His fiancee, who did not want to be named, said she had slept very little since and has been crying constantly.

“He’s stuck up for a woman being beaten and he was seriously beaten and now he’s in detention,” she said.

The pair met in Sydney two years ago while he was backpacking through Australia and they fell in love. She said he proposed at Christmas and they had been living in Albury for the past six months — he, once a bartender at Paddy’s Bar, and she, a contract worker for a market research 

company.

She said he was on the phone to her as he made his way down Dean Street in the early hours of Thursday after a night out.

“He saw a girl being beaten — she was on the ground being beaten. He went to stop it from happening,” she said.

His fiancee said she 

received a call about half an hour after the incident.

“He called me from the lane — ‘please help me, help me’,” she said.

She said she found him in Clarke Street, about 10 metres from their home, lying on the ground with the phone in his hand and a trip-fracture to his left cheek and a fractured nose and eye socket.

She called a taxi and they went to hospital.

Two days later, he was in Villawood in Sydney.

“What’s the point in looking after people?” she said.

She hopes he will remain in Australia — if not, she would follow him to Ireland.

“He’s a kind person, he’s not been a drain on society at all,” she said.

“He’s a gentleman — he’s a good guy.”