DIICOT expands the investigation in the case of the Tate brothers. Prosecutors are investigating in rem for money laundering

The investigation into millionaire brothers Andrew and Tristan Tate has been expanded. The prosecutors of the Directorate for the Investigation of Organized Crime and Terrorism (DIICOT) are investigating in rem for money laundering.

DIICOT prosecutors are expanding the investigation into the case of rape and human trafficking, opened in the name of Andrew and Tristan Tate and two other Romanian women.

Investigators are carrying out inquiries into the money laundering offence, and no individuals in the case are targeted at this stage.

Prosecutors fear the Tate brothers could flee

Brothers Andrew and Tristan Tate, together with Georgiana Naghel and Luana Alexandra Radu, received their first preventive arrest warrants on the 30th of December 2022, after they had been detained by the DIICOT prosecutors the day before, following searches of their villa in Pipera and their videochat studio.

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On the 20th of January, at the request of the prosecutors, the Bucharest Court extended their preventive arrest warrants for another 30 days, from the 29th of January to the 27th of February. Although the decision is not final and has already been challenged by the Tate brothers’ lawyers, they remain in custody at least until the 28 of January, the last day of the first arrest warrant.

On Friday, the Bucharest Court of Appeal is due to decide whether Andrew and Tristan Tate and their two accomplices will remain in pre-trial detention or will be released or placed under house arrest from the 29th of January.

DIICOT prosecutors succeeded in convincing the judge at the Bucharest Court to extend the Tate brothers’ arrest warrants, arguing that, left free, they „could exercise psychological control over the victims”.

Prosecutors also say that brothers Andrew and Tristan Tate could flee Romania if released from custody. In this context, the DIICOT prosecutors made use of an earlier statement by one of the two eccentric millionaires, in which he indicated that he had accounts in 19 countries around the world and could fly using several passports.

„If I’m wrong and England wants me in jail, I can fly with a Nigerian or American or English or Polish or Estonian passport. I have bank accounts in 19 countries.” prosecutors quoted the statement of one of the Tate brothers in their report.

The arguments and evidence presented by the DIICOT prosecutors convinced the Bucharest Court to extend their preventive arrest warrants for another 30 days, and the judge considered that their release „would create real risks for the proper conduct of the criminal trial”.

Victims were beaten and forced to do videochat

Andrew and Tristan Tate are accused of „establishing up an organized criminal group in 2021 with a view to committing the crime of trafficking in human beings on the territory of Romania and other countries such as the United States and the United Kingdom”.

„The victims were then transported and housed in buildings in Ilfov county where they were physically abused and psychologically coerced (through intimidation, constant surveillance, control and the allegation of debts), they were sexually exploited by members of the group by being forced to engage in pornographic acts with a view to producing and disseminating material of such a nature via social media platforms and by being forced to perform forced labor in order to obtain significant financial benefits consisting in sums of money obtained as a result of users accessing the material”, according to the DIICOT.