A court in the Romanian capital ruled Friday that the trial can begin for controversial influencer Andrew Tate, who is accused of human trafficking, rape and forming an organized crime group to sexually exploit women. The Bucharest court said prosecutors’ case against Tate met legal criteria but did not set a date for the trial to start, The Associated Press reported. Tate’s spokeswoman, Mateea Petrescu, said the decision will be appealed. The former kickboxer was indicted in June by Romanian prosecutors on charges of rape, human trafficking and being part of an organized crime group that sexually exploited women. Authorities say Tate and his brother lured victims by pretending to be in love with them. The women were then allegedly held captive and subjected to physical violence and mental coercion to perform in pornographic videos and engage in prostitution. The influencer has repeatedly said there is no evidence against him and that there is a political conspiracy to silence him. Tate and his brother were initially detained in December 2022. The influencer was released in March and placed under house arrest. In August, a court in Bucharest, Romania, ruled to free the British influencer. Tate and his brother were detained again in Romania in March this year over an alleged sexual assault that dates back to 2012 and 2015 in the United Kingdom. They were released from police custody after a court hearing in that case, but Romania’s Court of Appeal ruled that they should be extradited to the U.K. after their trial in Romania is completed. Tate, who amassed millions of followers on what was then Twitter, has repeatedly said that Romanian prosecutors have no evidence against him. Tate has been banned from several prominent social media platforms for expressing misogynistic views and hate speech. Read Also: Andrew Tate to be extradited to UK after Romanian trial (in Portuguese)