Rape arrest of ‘toxic’ TikTok influencer
After spat with Greta, Andrew Tate is accused of trafficking
AS a man who has infected millions of young minds with his violent image of toxic masculinity, Andrew Tate didn’t disappoint his callow admirers when police finally ran him to ground in his concrete Romanian compound.
Masked officers wearing tactical gear filmed themselves pouring into the expensively decorated property in Bucharest on Thursday and arresting the British-American social media personality and three others, including his brother, on allegations of human trafficking and rape.
Prosecutors claim they formed an organised crime gang that operated from Romania to Britain and the US, for the purpose of trafficking. They allegedly
Six victims were ‘sexually exploited’
kept six young women under ‘house arrest 24/7 like prisoners’.
Images from the raid offered a glimpse of his lavish lifestyle – including his collection of luxury cars. Officers also photographed an arsenal of weapons including handguns, swords and knuckledusters.
Interior shots posted on his and brother Tristan’s Instagram pages flesh out this designer violence image, showing glass cases displaying the former martial arts champion’s kickboxing belts.
His arrest was the culmination of a bad week for Tate, who made the mistake of goading climate change activist Greta Thunberg over Twitter. ‘I have 33 cars,’ he tweeted on Wednesday along with an offer to send her a complete list of their ‘enormous emissions’.
When Miss Thunberg responded with a reference to his ‘small d*** energy’ he hit back with ‘how dare you’ in an attempt to mock her iconic catchphrase.
But in one tweet he posted a picture of himself sitting at a table bearing a pizza box and following his arrest, the Swedish eco campaigner had the last laugh. Responding to rumours that the pizza box gave away his location, she tweeted triumphantly: ‘This is what happens when you don’t recycle your pizza boxes.’
Tate, 36, who clearly revels in his image as the internet’s ‘king of toxic masculinity’, is a classic celebrity of the digital age.
Before the self-described misogynist’s TikTok account was taken down it had racked up more than 12billion views.
The son of former US chess champion Emory Tate and British catering assistant mother Eileen, he is said to have made £100million from monetising his vile attitude to women and life in general. ‘It’s bang out the machete, boom in her face and grip her by the neck. Shut up b **** ,’ he said in one video, acting out how he’d attack a woman if she accused him of cheating.
From a production studio at the site where he was arrested, he made scores of videos and podcasts. He also runs Hustlers University, a subscription service in which 127,000 people – mostly young men and boys – pay £39 a month for his dubious advice on life and making money.
His more immature fans clearly buy into his carefully cultivated playboy image. He posts images of himself smoking cigars, reclining on yachts, driving supercars and flying on private jets.
The value of his lifestyle advice, not to mention the wisdom of his public boasts about violence against women, looks distinctly uncertain while the Romanian authorities consider charging him with being part of an allegedly criminal ring along with Tristan, 34, and two Romanians, one of them their female assistant, the other an ex-policewoman.
Following raids on five homes across Romania, the four have been held on suspicion of human trafficking, rape and organised crime. All four have been remanded in custody for 30 days.
The raid is a blow to Tate’s previous insistence that he moved to the Eastern European country five years ago to behave as he pleased and not be hounded by the authorities. Romania’s Directorate for Investigating Organised Crime and Terrorism said the brothers had ‘recruited’ the six victims who were later ‘sexually exploited’ and, say investigators, forced to perform in sleazy videos posted on adult content platform Only Fans and video-sharing site TikTok – under threat of violence.
Investigators also claim one suspect raped a victim on two separate occasions in March 2022. ‘We have information based on what they said on social media, that one of the girls brought in up to €50,000 a month,’ said a source close to the investigation. ‘They were given no money from what they earned.’
The women include an American, a Moldovan and four Romanians. ‘The abuse was physical and emotional,’ claims the source. ‘They were essentially kept under house arrest 24/7 like prisoners.’
Romanian officials told the Mail that undercover police have been following the Tates for months.
Born in Chicago, Tate’s parents separated and he and his two siblings moved with their mother to a council estate in Luton.
There, he took up kickboxing and went on to become a fourtimes world champion.
He first came to mainstream public attention in 2016 with a TV appearance on Big Brother. He was the first housemate to be expelled from the reality show after videos surfaced of him beating a woman with a belt and asking her how many bruises she had. He later claimed the footage was part of consensual BDSM (bondage, discipline, sadism, masochism) sex-play.
Tate – who describes himself as an ‘expert on all male-female interactions’ – has always denied being a criminal. If he was, he’d be in prison, he reasoned.
His spokesman said: ‘Andrew and Tristan Tate have the utmost respect for the Romanian authorities and will always assist and help in any way they can.’
Beating video was ‘part of sex-play’