Former kickboxing world champion turned TikTok star Andrew Tate and his brother Tristan were reportedly detained in Romania as part of an investigation into human trafficking, organized crime, and sexual assault.
Investigators from the Directorate for the Investigation of Organised Crime and Terrorism (DIICOT) along with the Bucharest Organised Crime Brigade carried out search-warrant raids on five residences on Thursday, according to reports, including on the Tate mansion in the Romanian capital.
“So far, six injured persons have been identified who were sexually exploited by the organised criminal group. With regard to the crime of rape, it was noted that, in March 2022, an injured person was forced, on two different occasions, by a suspect through the exercise of physical violence and psychological pressure to have sexual relations,” a police statement read.
The statement didn't refer to Andrew and Tristan Tate; however, it does mention “two British citizens,” whom reports from Romanian media claim are the Tate brothers. The British-American social-media influencers were born in the United States before moving with their British mother to Luton, England, as children. They've since gone on to reside in Romania and Dubai.
In 2012, Andrew Tate became one of the most searched-for men around the globe after he became a viral success due to his anti-feminist and anti-globalist stances on TikTok and other social-media platforms. This eventually caused him to be banned from almost all platforms.
Andrew Tate has seen his account reinstated on Twitter following Elon Musk’s takeover of the Silicon Valley tech giant. https://t.co/12VXQA1Pnz
— Breitbart News (@BreitbartNews) November 21, 2022
The police stated that the victims had been hired under false pretenses to “perform demonstrations pornographic for the purpose of producing and disseminating through social media.”
“In the case it was noted that, at the beginning of 2021, 4 suspects (two British citizens and two Romanian citizens) constituted a criminal group organised in order to commit crimes on the territory of Romania, but also of other countries, such as the United States of America and Great Britain, of the crime of human trafficking,” the statement continued.
In relation to the charge of rape, the police stated that in April 2022, one victim was “forced, on two different occasions, by a suspect through the exercise of physical violence and psychological pressure to have sexual relations.”
Four people have been detained as part of the investigation, including two Romanian citizens. In a statement, the Directorate for the Investigation of Organised Crime and Terrorism stated they were all held for 24 hours.
After a raid on his house earlier this year, Andrew Tate claimed in an interview with Fox News' Tucker Carlson that the accusations of kidnapping and human trafficking made against him were not true and that he had been the victim of “swatting.”
Tate’s reported arrest occurred just a few hours after he was the subject of attention following his public spat with Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg over his huge collection of supercars powered by gasoline and concerns about “penis size.” There was speculation by news media outlets that it may have been his video message in response to the environmentalist that alerted Romanian police that the brothers were in the country, with Tate joking that he was not going to recycle two pizza boxes that happened to belong to a Romanian pizza-restaurant chain.
