Misogynistic online influencer Andrew Tate has lost a bid to end his detention in Romania following allegations of his involvement in human trafficking and rape.
On Tuesday, a Romanian court rejected his appeal as “unfounded” and ordered Tate, his brother, Tristan, and two other Romanian female suspects to remain in Romanian police custody for their 30-day period.
Well-known for normalising violence against women to his billions of viewers on social media– most notably impressionable boys and young men– Tate was first arrested on 29 December 2022 after Romanian police said they’d identified six people who were allegedly “sexually exploited” by what they called an “organised criminal group”.
Prosecutors have alleged the Tate brothers recruited their victims through false promises of a relationship only to later force the victims to perform pornographic content under a threat of violence. They’ve called it the “loverboy” method of human trafficking.
Tates’ lawyer has said his clients reject all the allegations and argued that Tate had been playing a particular kind of character on social media.
A former professional kickboxer, reality TV star and holder of both US and British nationality, Tate has said he chose to move to Romania because he liked living in countries “where corruption was accessible”.
This was after he’d been investigated in the United Kingdom on charges of sexual assault.
Tate has also said he believes women are partially responsible for being raped, and that they belong to men.
All major social media platforms have banned Tate, but his Twitter account was reinstated late last year after Elon Musk took over the company.
The saga of Tate’s arrest became entangled with his Twitter activity after he picked a fight with climate activist Greta Thunberg, unprepared for her quick-witted reply that racked up nearly 4M likes and 300M views.
Tate taunted Thunberg saying his 33 cars had “enormous emissions” and asked where he could email her a list of his car collection.
In reply, Thunberg told Tate to “enlighten” her about his vehicles’ emissions by emailing her at “[email protected]”
Later that same day, Tate posted a video rant showing him smoking a cigar and sitting next to two pizza boxes, which he told Thunberg he “vowed not to recycle”.
Many on social media speculate that the image of a Romanian chain on the pizza boxes could have tipped Romanian authorities off to his location since he was arrested soon after.
Romanian authorities had been looking for Tate and his brother after launching an investigation into their alleged human trafficking back in April 2022.
Fifteen luxury cars belonging to Tate and his brother– including those he’d bragged to Thunberg about– were seized by the authorities along with 10 properties. The Romanian organised crime agency has said the belongings were confiscated to prevent them being concealed, to help pay for the investigation and to pay damages to victims if the suspects are convicted.