Four British women who accuse Andrew Tate of violent sexual and physical assaults are planning to launch legal action against the misogynistic influencer.
Lawyers representing the alleged victims delivered a legal letter to Mr Tate, a former kickboxing world champion turned “success coach”, at his home on the outskirts of the Romanian capital of Bucharest where he is under house arrest for separate alleged sex and trafficking crimes, on Wednesday morning.
The letter outlines allegations made by the four women, including violent rapes, serious physical assaults, as well as controlling and coercive behaviour, with the women claiming they endured injuries and psychiatric damage.
Jack Beeston, an associate at McCue Jury & Partners, a UK law firm behind the pending legal action, told The Independent: “Mr Tate refused to accept delivery of the legal letter so we posted it through the gate so it was left on his premises. It was translated to us by a Romanian journalist that Mr Tate was instructing his security guard to tell us to f*** off.”
A spokesperson for Mr Tate told The Independent the influencer “categorically denies the veracity of the accusations” brought by lawyers on behalf of the women.
The alleged victims told Mr Tate that - depending on how he answers - legal proceedings will be initiated against him at London’s High Court in forthcoming weeks.
Two of the women claim they were recruited for Mr Tate’s webcam business, while the other women allege they had personal relationships with him.
One claimant said: “While this experience has been extremely traumatic for us, we have taken strength in the fact that we have decided to take a stand.”
It comes after one of Mr Tate’s alleged victims, involved in the pending civil legal action, who has accused him of raping and strangling her until she lost consciousness last week told The Independent she feared the social media star was going to kill her.
The 30-year-old said Mr Tate told her he owned her and wanted to kill her after they had sex.
Matthew Jury, a managing partner of McCue Jury & Partners, said: “Despite Tate’s outrageous claims that these women aren’t even real, on reading the papers, he should now recall how real they are. Talk of the ‘Matrix’ and ‘false flags’ hold no weight in court. The survivors look forward to seeing him there.”
A spokesperson for Mr Tate highlighted that three of the women had filed criminal complaints that the UK authorities chose not to pursue, and questioned: “What new evidence could have appeared nine years later that would overturn the court’s decision?”
The representative added: “Considering the collective approach of the four women, and the channels chosen for communications, the opportunistic character of this endeavour becomes obvious, as justice is sought in the court, not in the press.”
The spokesperson noted that “despite these alleged events taking place in 2014, no legal action has been taken to cover the alleged damages suffered and no proof of such damages has been brought forward until after Andrew became an international public figure.”
The claimants involved in the proposed UK civil legal action, who are aged in their late twenties and early thirties, claim the offences occurred between 2013 and 2016 while the controversial influencer was based in Britain.
McCue Jury & Partners have so far raised £18,500 to fund court proceedings via crowdfunding. The victims hope police in the UK will reopen their investigation into Mr Tate.
Mr Tate, who has been banned from a number of social media platforms for hate speech and voicing misogynistic views, was arrested in Romania in late December alongside his brother, Tristan Tate, and two other suspects. They are accused of human trafficking, rape and forming a criminal gang to sexually exploit women.
The influencer was released from jail with his younger brother at the beginning of April after they won an appeal to be held under house arrest. All four deny the allegations and none have been charged.
