Romanian court places Andrew Tate under house arrest for 30 days

Social media influencer and brother among six detained for crimes including trafficking and sexual exploitation of minors

A Romanian court has ordered Andrew Tate to be placed under house arrest, his representative said, after he was among six people taken into custody in an investigation into human trafficking and sexual exploitation.

The former professional kickboxer and his brother Tristan were among six people detained on Wednesday for an initial 24 hours after Romania’s anti-organised crime prosecuting unit, Diicot, conducted four house searches in Ilfov county and the Bucharest municipality.

Diicot asked the Bucharest court to arrest the Tate brothers for 30 days, but the judge decided to place Andrew Tate under house arrest and Tristan under judiciary control for that period, their representative Mateea Petrescu said on Thursday.

“The Tates salute the decision and firmly deny all allegations levelled against them, emphasising that the accusations are baseless and unsupported by substantial evidence,” Petrescu wrote in a statement.

The Tate brothers were previously indicted in mid-2023, along with two Romanian women, for human trafficking, rape and forming a criminal gang to sexually exploit women, allegations they denied.

Before their latest detention the brothers had been subject to a travel ban, under which they were free to travel within Romania but not leave the country.

A self-described misogynist, Andrew Tate has gained millions of fans on social media by promoting an ultra-masculine lifestyle that critics say denigrates women.

A post on Tate’s account on X said: “All they try to do is damage my name with complete bullshit,” without specifying who was being referred to.

Diicot said in a statement that it had ordered the detention of six people for crimes including forming an organised criminal group, human trafficking, trafficking of minors, sexual intercourse with a minor and money laundering.

It said it had asked that three of the suspects remain in custody while another be put under house arrest.

According to Diicot, two of the accused used the “loverboy” method, which involves convincing people they are in a romantic relationship, to force 34 victims into making pornography which was then sold online for proceeds of more than $2.8m (£2.1m) and 887,000 crypto tokens.

Diicot alleges that one of the defendants forced a 17-year-old minor to produce pornography in Britain and Romania, creating profits of $1.5m. It also alleges the same defendant repeatedly had sexual relations with a 15-year-old victim.

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