Andrew Tate ordered to spend another 30 days in detention after third extension
21 February 2023, 18:08
Influencer Andrew Tate will be held for another 30 days in Romania after his detention period was extended during an ongoing investigation into allegations of sexual assault and exploitation.
Listen to this article
Loading audio...
Tate's detention was extended for the third time on Tuesday, meaning he will remain in custody until at least the end of March.
A court in Bucharest extended the arrest warrants of him and his brother, Tristan Tate, after they were detained on alleged rape and human trafficking offences.
Tate lost his appeal to end his detention earlier in the month. It had previously been upheld until 27 February, and has now been extended for a further 30 days.
READ MORE: Andrew Tate loses appeal against 30-day detention over sex trafficking charges in Romania
Two Romanian women detained at the same time - Georgiana Naghel and Luana Radu - will be held under house arrest. All four deny the charges against them.
Tate, 36, a former kickboxer, who once referred to married women as “property” their husbands own, has been imprisoned in Romania since late December.
The self-proclaimed misogynist, who has reportedly lived in Romania since 2017, was previously banned from various prominent social media platforms for expressing misogynistic views and hate speech.
He claims there is "zero evidence" against him in the case and alleged that his arrest is a political attack to silence him.
After the Tates and the two women were arrested, Romania's anti-organised crime agency, DIICOT, said in a statement that it had identified six victims in the human trafficking case who were subjected to "acts of physical violence and mental coercion" and were sexually exploited by the members of the alleged crime group.
The Tates are alleged to have recruited their victims by seducing them and falsely claiming to want a relationship or marriage.
Prosecutors said the women were transported to properties where they were forced to produce pornographic content for social media sites under duress.
Andrew Tate first gained prominence in 2016 when he was removed from TV show Big Brother over a video which appeared to show him attacking a woman.
Twitter banned him for saying women should "bear responsibility" for being sexually assaulted but has since been reinstated. He currently had 5.1m followers on the platform.
In a poll by Hope not Hate, reported in the Independent, eight in 10 boys aged between 16 and 17 in the UK had either read, listened to or watched content from Tate.
An online petition launched in January to free the brothers has received over 180,000 signatures.
