Detained social media personality Andrew Tate has insisted he will be cleared of accusations of organised crime and human trafficking in a heated interview.
Tate, who is under house arrest in Romania with his brother Tristan, said he is “absolutely and utterly sure” he is innocent.
The 36-year-old British-US citizen instead said he is a “force for good in the world” and a “positive influence”.
In an interview with the BBC in his home, he said: “We have an open criminal investigation, I am absolutely and utterly sure I’ll be found innocent.
“I know the case better than you, I know it intimately and you don’t, I have seen all the criminal files and the evidence against me and you haven’t, I know the truth of what happened and you don’t.
“And I’m telling you absolutely and utterly, I’ve never hurt anybody, that the case that’s been put against me is completely and utterly fabricated and I’m never gonna be found guilty of anything.”
A number of campaign groups have claimed Tate’s views make him a danger to young men and boys who see his content online, while the National Education Union’s (NEU) annual conference heard pupils are becoming misogynistic because of him.
Told about this, he responded: “That’s very upsetting and the reason that’s very upsetting is because I know that’s not true, I’m genuinely a good person. I believe my impact on the world is positive.”
The former kickboxer added: “I preach hard work, discipline, I’m an athlete, I preach anti-drug, I preach religion, I preach no alcohol, I preach no knife crime, every single problem with modern society I’m against.
“I’m teaching young men to be disciplined, to be diligent, to listen, to train, to work hard, to be exactly like me.
“And I’m saying that if men grew up like me which are hardworking and diligent, with emotional control and stoic, we’re gonna have a better society, not a worse society.
“To sit here and say that schools in England, which is a failing nation, which has knife crime going through the roof, violence going through the roof, men’s mental health going through the roof, and they’re going to all blame me because I appeared on the internet is disingenuous.”
Tate, who has lived in Romania since 2017, was previously banned from various social media platforms.
After the Tate brothers and two Romanian women were arrested in December, the country’s Directorate for Investigating Organised Crime and Terrorism said in a statement it had identified six alleged victims in the human trafficking case who were allegedly subjected to “acts of physical violence and mental coercion” and sexually exploited.
The agency claimed the alleged victims were lured with pretences of love and later intimidated, placed under surveillance and subjected to other control tactics while allegedly being coerced into engaging in pornographic acts for the financial gain of the crime group.
Tate has claimed that Romanian prosecutors have no evidence and alleged their case is a political conspiracy designed to silence him.
After the interview, he said to his six million Twitter followers: “The mainstream media which vilify me beg me for interviews under the guise of ‘balanced’ journalism.
“The Matrix is desperate.”
