[greenpeas]

> ... but needed some proof he was in Romania ...

I don't understand this. Doesn't a country keep records of who and when enters/exits it? Unless Andrew Tate has passports under different names, shouldn't Romanian authorities know whether he's in Romania or not?

[rsynnott]

> Doesn't a country keep records of who and when enters/exits it?

Not particularly _good_ records, particularly on exits, in many cases. And I assume Romania has borders that you can basically just walk across; most EU countries do.

[greenpeas]

Hm, that's a good point. I forgot about the free travel within the EU. Still I recall that 5 or 6 years ago, there were checks at the Romanian-Hungarian border.

After doing some research, it seems that while Romania is in the EU since 2007, it, together with Bulgaria are not yet in the Schengen Area, so there should still be a border between Romania and Hungary.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schengen_Area#Temporary_border...

But even if countries don't keep particularly __good__ records about persons passing their borders, I find it hard to believe that Romanian authorities used the video from a tweet to confirm Tate's presence in the country.

EDIT: Moreover, I've got the impression that the Tates are not the type of people to travel internationally by car. I imagined they flew in and out of Bucharest.

[rsynnott]

Yeah, I mean, it's not in Schengen, but if you're a criminal, you're probably not going to go "oh, it's not Schengen, I'd better not walk across it". I don't think it's particularly tightly controlled.

[greenpeas]

Are you suggesting that Tate was crossing the land border out of Romania clandestinely?

I guess I need to read up on him, I thought he was a grifter and a confidence man, getting rich of his social media influence. I thought all his criminal activity was limited to white-collar crime.

UPD: > ...Schengen... I don't think it's particularly tightly controlled.

I don't think that's right. I bet it's incredibly well controlled. That's pretty much the gateway to all other Schengen countries. There are very limited border controls within the Schengen Area, so I imagine the outer borders have to be secure.

[rsynnott]

I mean, he's just been arrested for, er, very much not white collar crime. He's just been detained for a further 30 days at the request of Romania's anti-organised crime prosecution unit. It would be, well, not unknown for people in that position to flee by means other than the official border crossing points.

[d1sxeyes]

Yes, but likely there are administrative and legal hoops to jump through to be able to access this, and the data may not be “real time” or centralised and easily searchable. Potentially this was all in progress already and then Tate saved them a bit of paperwork by proving he was in Romania.