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Sept. 4 (UPI) — Embattled influencers Andrew and Tristan Tate faced new charges in Romania related to trafficking and sexual acts with a minor, prosecutors said Friday.

Andrew, 39, was indicted for the alleged sexual exploitation of a 15-year-old girl that the brothers moved from Britain to Romania. Tristan, 38, was charged with complicity and attempted obstruction of justice.

Romania’s Directorate for Investigating Organized Crime and Terrorism said in a statement the charges also include money laundering and pornography involving a minor.

The brothers are accused of luring a 15-year-old girl from Britain and coercing her into producing pornographic content through physical violence and psychological manipulation.

Prosecutors said the brothers used emotional blackmail, threats, physical aggression and constant surveillance to control the victim and make her produce sexual video chats to sell online.

They earned more than $1.25 million by selling the child pornography content, prosecutors said.

A Romanian lawyer for the brothers, Eugen Constantin Vidineac, denied the allegations.

“We will examine every aspect of it with the same level of scrutiny and we will challenge any evidential, procedural or legal deficiencies through the appropriate judicial process,” the lawyer told Newsweek.

“Our clients continue to reject the allegations against them,” he added. “They have the right to the presumption of innocence, the right to properly examine the evidence relied upon against them and the right to mount an effective defense.”

The new charges come as the brothers sit in a U.S. jail while they fight extradition to Britain, where they were charged in July with rape, human trafficking and child pornography.

The Tate brothers, who hold dual British-American citizenship, have twice been charged with sex crimes in each Romania and Britain.

They are former kickboxers with millions of followers on social media.

A federal judge in Miami is yet to make a ruling on the Britain’s request for extradition after the brothers appeared in court on Aug. 27.

A decade-long fight to outlaw child marriage in California is nearly at an end.

A bi-partisan bill that makes it illegal to issue marriage licenses to anyone under 18 cleared the state Assembly on Wednesday, drawing cheers from supporters who said the measure was a long overdue fix to an “archaic” piece of California law.

“The issue has evolved now because we have better stories, we have better data. We have a growing national movement … marriage is really something that can be reserved for consenting adults,” said Assemblymember Gail Pellerin (D-Santa Cruz).

The bill — whose chief authors include Republican Assemblywoman Diane Dixon and Democrats Caroline Menjivar and Cottie Petrie-Norris — glided through the state Senate and Assembly without major opposition. It now heads to Gov. Gavin Newsom’s desk.

Until the bill is signed into law, California remains one of three states in the U.S. without a minimum age to get married or enter into a domestic partnership. While the state has guardrails on the marriage process for minors, requiring them to gain judicial approval and the consent of at least one parent before receiving a license, advocates say children can still be easily pressured to wed by their parents or religious groups.

“All we’re doing with any judicial review process … is putting the onus on a terrified child,” said Fraidy Reiss, the founder and executive director of Unchained At Last, an advocacy group working on legislation to end child marriage across the U.S.

There were 88 marriage licenses issued in California where at least one party was a minor between 2019 and 2025, according to data collected by the state Department of Public Health. Some of those marriages involved weddings between girls as young as 15 and men in their 30s, according to a Senate analysis of the bill. In L.A. County, 51 licenses were issued to minors between 2014 and 2025, according to the county Registrar’s office.

“Even if the numbers are relatively small every child deserves protection,” Pellerin said. “And we don’t want to wait for a problem to become so widespread before we start protecting children.”

A 2020 study by the International Center for Research on Women shows underage marriages can have devastating long-term impacts on young girls.

“Marrying early has universally detrimental effects over a range of outcomes, including educational attainment; earnings; physical, reproductive, and mental health; experiences of violence; and likelihood of divorce, particularly for girls,” the study found.

Although consensual sex between a person over 18 and someone under that age is still considered statutory rape under California law, sex between those same two people becomes legal if they are married. Reiss said the state’s law allowing underage unions was essentially a shield for sexual abusers.

“It destroys almost any aspect of a girl’s life and it doesn’t deliver any benefit,” she said. “The only benefit it brings is to creepy guys who want to prey on teenage girls.”

The American Civil Liberties Union filed an opposition letter against the measure in June, warning the bill could have an unintended consequence of removing a minor’s autonomy over their own body.

“Just as minors have the right to decide to have an abortion or to carry a pregnancy to term (or to seek a restraining order) on their own, they should maintain the right to marry, with robust protections in place to prevent coercion and abuse,” the ACLU wrote.

But Pellerin, who previously served as Santa Cruz County Clerk, said it was the memory of a pregnant teen that helped push her to fight for the bill. She recalled issuing a marriage license to a 16-year-old girl and man in his late teens or early 20s, and felt that the girl’s parents were forcing them to wed.

Under California law at the time, Pellerin said, she had no evidence of coercion or force so she had no choice but to process the license. She hopes once Newsom signs the bill, no young girl will have to go through that again.

“I’m often haunted by that look on her face,” Pellerin said. “My kid is out at soccer practice and this girl is in here, pregnant, scared to death, signing up for a lifetime commitment.”

If signed into law by Newsom, the new minimum marriage age would take effect January 1, 2027.

The San Diego Padres minor league catching coordinator is in the custody of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and will remain so “pending removal proceedings,” a spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security said Tuesday in a statement.

Oswaldo Pirela, a former Texas Rangers minor league player, was detained Sunday morning at El Paso International Airport.

Pirela, 34, was flying to Phoenix, where he lives with his wife and two daughters. The Padres’ triple-A affiliate is the El Paso Chihuahuas, and Pirela was with the team during its home game Saturday night against the Salt Lake City Bees, an Angels affiliate.

The Department of Homeland Security spokesperson said Pirela came to the United States from his native Venezuela in September 2014 and that his permission to remain expired Feb. 10, 2018.

Homeland Security said Pirela was not carrying his work permit at the time he was detained. Pirela’s brother Juan Pirela presented Phoenix multimedia news organization Arizona’s Family with Oswaldo’s work permit, which indicated it was issued in 2024 and is valid until 2029.

“It’s very hard. He’s authorized to work in the United States,” Juan Pirela said. “So, the same department, Homeland Security, issues a work permit but then somehow it’s not enough.”

The Homeland Security statement addressed the issue: “To be clear, work authorization or a pending application do NOT confer legal status in the United States.”

“In violation of our nation’s laws, [Pirela] overstayed his welcome. When approached by law enforcement officers, he was not in possession of legal documentation granting him status in the country. He will remain in ICE custody pending removal proceedings and will receive due process.

As a roving catching instructor, Pirela is based out of the Padres’ spring-training complex in Peoria, Ariz., and travels to the organization’s minor league affiliates in San Antonio, Fort Wayne, Ind., and Lake Elsinore in addition to El Paso. He spent the 2024 season as bench coach for the Class-A Lake Elsinore Storm and became the organization’s catching coordinator in 2025.

“We recently became aware of the detainment of minor league catching coordinator Oswaldo Pirela in El Paso, Texas,” the Padres club said in a statement. “We are working to gather additional information and will not have any further comment at this time.”

Pirela was signed by the Rangers at age 17 out of Barquisimeto, Venezuela, and played catcher, first base and the outfield from 2009 to 2011 for the team’s Dominican Republic Summer League affiliate.