Hours before Andrew Tate allegedly hit and choked his girlfriend in a suite at a Beverly Hills hotel, the former kickboxer posted a message on his X account, goading authorities. “I’m in LA. Please begin criminal charges,” he wrote on March 9.
Brianna Stern made a complaint to Los Angeles police and filed a lawsuit against Tate alleging sexual assault and battery shortly after, in the hope they might do just that.
That night at the hotel had not gone as Stern, a 29-year-old model, had expected. By her own admission the couple’s ten-month relationship had not been perfect. As Stern, the first of his accusers to go public by name, alleged in her lawsuit, Tate’s temper was quick to rise and hard to control. He was emotionally manipulative and often verbally aggressive, she claimed — but he had always stopped short of physical abuse.
Something had switched, Stern told The Times in an exclusive interview.
‘This goes very deep. He’s very powerful’
It was Stern’s misfortune that Tate — a 38-year-old British-American already facing charges in Romania and the UK for sexual aggression and human trafficking — was in her hometown that day, or indeed on American soil at all, after a Bucharest judge lifted his travel ban apparently under pressure from the Trump administration.
At first Stern was afraid to report the alleged attack, which she claimed in her lawsuit left her bruised and concussed, because of Tate’s influence and connections.
“Trust me, this goes very deep. He’s very powerful,” she said. “I was so scared to come out about this because I know that he sits ringside with Dana White [chief executive of UFC and a friend of Trump], he’s supported by Elon Musk and the president. The vice-president of the United States follows him on X. He had come to the hotel straight from an interview with Kanye [West, the rapper].
“They’re under his spell, just as I once was.”
Stern, who has a vast social media following of her own from her work with Maxim and FHM magazines, said she had not heard of Tate, or his younger brother and fellow influencer Tristan, when she was invited along with other models to Romania last June to participate in photoshoots to promote a cryptocurrency. She got on a flight from Los Angeles to Bucharest that same day.
“People ask me ‘how could you not know who he is?’ or ‘you didn’t hear about him?’” she said. “I’m like, I don’t read the news, his stuff is not what’s on my algorithm on Instagram — it’s all make-up videos.”
‘There was so much love-bombing. I was so dumb’
Tate had handpicked Stern to travel alone with him in a car for a three-hour journey to an Airbnb in Transylvania, during which time the pair talked about “everything”, she said.
“At the very beginning, he was super charming, loving, kind,” she said. “He said that everything he put out online was just a façade. He told me, ‘don’t pay attention to whatever you see about me, it’s not true’. He told me he respects women and that ‘the Matrix’ was out to get him.”
Tate frequently describes the Matrix — a reference to the 1999 sci-fi film — as “the systems which are being created by society that are deliberately designed to enslave”. Musk has adopted the phrase, suggesting on many occasions that humans are living in a simulation, and posting a meme featuring The Matrix after Tate’s arrest in 2022.
Tate has built a following of millions as the self-described “king of toxic masculinity”. He was once banned from Twitter for saying women should “bear responsibility” for being sexually assaulted before being reinstated by Musk after he took ownership of the platform.
Tate, who was raised in Chicago but spent his teenage years in Luton, Bedfordshire, has been singled out by the UK authorities for the effect he has had in spreading misogynistic thinking among boys and young men, as depicted in the Netflix drama Adolescence.
Affectionate poetry over text — but never in public
Within hours of meeting her, Tate was calling Stern his girlfriend. “He didn’t ask permission,” she said. “He said ‘you’re my girl now, we’re together, we’re going to be together for ever.’ There was so much love-bombing. I was so dumb. He promised financial security, said he’d take care of me and I could quit my job and never have to worry about anything. He was unlike anyone I’d ever met.”
He required monogamy from her, while affording himself the right to date as many other women as he wanted.
She ended up staying a week with him in Romania before returning home. The couple continued their relationship long distance, though Stern did sometimes visit. “We talked constantly every day, like all day, all night. We’d wake up in the middle of the night and text each other,” she said.
Tate insisted they communicate only on the encrypted messaging apps Signal and WhatsApp, using the disappearing messages function as it was “more secure”. She managed to save one of many poems she says he wrote for her:
Across the seas, across the skies,
Two pookies live with loving ties.
One in LA, where palm trees sway,
The other in Bucharest far away.
Though miles apart, they laugh and play,
With calls and texts to fill each day.
Tate was never openly affectionate around others, however, “never wanting any other man to see him being loving to a woman”, she said. He told her he wanted her to have children to “continue the Tate legacy”. Tate has claimed to have as many as ten children with different women.
A few months in and as she became more aware of the allegations made against the brothers that are now playing out in various courts, Stern shared her doubts with Tristan Tate’s girlfriend at the time. “We would ask each other, ‘are you sure they didn’t do this?’ We would always come to the conclusion that, no, they couldn’t have done that — they’re not monsters, they’re not capable of that,” she said. “But over time, obviously, I started to see that side.”
‘If I crossed him, he would ruin my life, rape me or kill me’
Stern alleges in her complaint that Tate had become aggressive and controlling, demanding she hand over her social media passwords and download a tracking app so he could see where she was at all times. Joseph McBride, Tate’s attorney, said: “Allegation denied. Even if true, not a crime.”
Stern claimed in the suit, filed at the Superior Court of Los Angeles, he had encouraged past girlfriends to tattoo “Property of Tate” in large font across their bodies. It is not clear if any did, and McBride said the claim was “absolutely ridiculous”, adding: “Andrew Tate is not the East India Company. Pure fiction.”
“He has told me on many occasions before that if I crossed him, he would ruin my life, rape me or kill me,” Stern claimed in her suit.
“Tate would typically follow his cruelty with words of love,” her lawyers added. “Like many abusers, Tate would often tell the plaintiff that his outbursts were her own fault.”
McBride said his client “firmly denies” the claims and accused Stern of a “blatant cash grab”. Both brothers deny all charges against them in the UK and Romania.
Around this time, the Romanian authorities were intensifying their investigation into the Tate brothers’ alleged human trafficking ring. They claimed the pair coerced dozens of women into doing webcam pornography, generating up to $600,000 a month in profits that they kept primarily for themselves. Both brothers deny the charges. In August they were put under house arrest.
Stern said Tate told her the Romanian Organised Crime Unit had identified her as a victim and she would be banned from contacting him unless she recorded a video denying that was the case. She agreed to make the video, which she alleged was directed by Tate. McBride said this allegation was “insanity”, adding: “Andrew Tate is not al-Qaeda.”
‘He said Trump was going to help him, and then he did’
Stern said Tate celebrated when Trump won the presidential election in November because “he was sure that he was going to be able to come back” to the US, she said.
“We were planning his trip here for months. He said Trump was going to help him, and then he did,” Stern said, offering one of the clearest suggestions yet that the administration paved the way for the Tates’ return to America after years in exile. Tate’s lawyer said this conversation was “impossible” because “Andrew Tate does not discuss politics with women”.
The Tates travelled by private jet to Miami on February 28. Ron DeSantis, Florida’s governor, and James Uthmeier, the state’s attorney-general, opened a formal investigation into allegations made against them by at least one woman in the state.
• Of course Andrew Tate went to Florida: it’s a Maga magnet
The Times revealed last week that British authorities ignored an offer made by Uthmeier to extradite Tate to face rape and human trafficking charges. Stern said it was “crazy” that the opportunity was missed.
‘I beat you because I love you’
Tate spent a few days in Miami before travelling to California. On March 10, Tate recorded an interview with Kanye West before heading to the Beverly Hills Hotel that evening.
Stern declined to speak directly about her complaint, on instruction from her lawyer.
In court documents, Stern alleged the incident happened after what began as a consensual sexual encounter. “Tate began verbally degrading plaintiff [Stern] as he routinely did — but this time it was much worse, more aggressive and more violent. Tate then began to choke plaintiff,” the lawsuit claimed.
He allegedly shouted things at her like “I beat you because I love you” and “you’re mine, why wouldn’t I be able to hit you?”
“Plaintiff began crying and begging for him to stop. He would not,” the documents allege. “Tate continued to choke plaintiff, harder and harder, making plaintiff nearly lose consciousness.”
Stern claimed Tate could not climax sexually unless he “verbally degraded her to the point of feeling worthless and crying”. She wanted to leave after the reported attack took place, but was too scared, she said. The next morning, she pretended nothing was wrong and then left.
“The last words he said to me before I left the hotel were ‘Shut the f*** up, bitch. You will never backtalk me, you are my property’,” she alleged.
She waited several days to report the alleged incident, until Tate had left the country for Dubai. She shared photographs on her social media showing her face with a red cheek. She also published medical records from a visit to a New York hospital five days later, where she claimed she was diagnosed with “post-concussion syndrome”.
“I considered many times just silently leaving Andrew and saying nothing, doing nothing,” she said, “because I was scared, and it was honestly hard for me to accept that I was being abused.” She did so, she said, to be an example to other victims who may not yet have come forward.
Claim, counter-claim and a torrent of abuse
“We stand ready to defend Andrew fiercely in court, where the truth will expose this baseless scheme,” McBride, Tate’s attorney, said. “Instead of seeking a private resolution, Ms Stern has chosen to air her false claims in the press, revealing her true motives: money and attention, not justice.”
Stern denied she was financially motivated, calling the suggestion “hurtful”.
Last week the Tate brothers were placed under federal investigation by prosecutors in New York, which their lawyers dismissed as a “formality”.
Stern told The Times she had received a torrent of harassment and abuse since filing her lawsuit, most of it from Tate fans. She hired a private bodyguard for the first few days but the expenses quickly climbed.
“Some people in my life are so scared of him that they just don’t want anything to do with me now, which is really upsetting. It’s so sad to see that this is what our society has come to,” she said, meaning a place where “men have a sense of superiority” and “violence against women” is accepted. “It’s scary.”
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