ZeRo unbanned from Twitch nearly 5 years after allegations of sexual misconduct with minors

After five years, Twitch has unbanned a controversial Super Smash Bros. content creator and pro who was previously accused of sexual misconduct, which he was banned from the platform for in 2020.

Gonzalo Raúl Barrios, also referred to as ZeRo, was a professional Super Smash Bros. player and streamer, competing in a plethora of tournaments. Barrios was considered by many as one of the best competitive Smash 4 players of all time, and the creator even secured a record-breaking 56 consecutive tournament wins during his career before becoming an extremely successful content creator with the launch of Ultimate.

Barrios announced his retirement from the scene in 2018 after claiming he wanted to focus on his streaming career, but he lost many of his sponsors in 2020 after he admitted to allegations levied against him. The allegations involved the infamous “Sky House” where many different Super Smash Bros content creators lived. By 2020, a series of different sexual misconduct allegations were made against creators who all lived in these homes, including allegations against Barrios.

The claims against Barrios include that he allegedly showed his former roommate Jacqueline “Jisu” Choe sexually explicit pictures without her consent and he allegedly solicited sexually explicit acts from a third party who was a minor at the time. Following the allegations and his admission, Twitch permanently banned Barrios’ account and the creator took a break from posting any content.

However, just a year later Barrios posted a video on his YouTube where he retracted all his previous admissions and claimed he didn’t have proper evidence to back up his side of the story when he made his original statement. Barrios claimed the allegations levied against him were false, and said that he would be pursing legal action to defend himself and his career. A year after this video was posted, Barrios filed a defamation lawsuit against Choe, which eventually led to a settlement between the two parties.

Following all this news, Barrios announced his return to YouTube and started a digital campaign to get unbanned on Twitch. While it took five years, Twitch staff have reversed the ban on Barrios’ account, meaning the Super Smash Bros. player can now stream on the website whenever he wants. Even though Barrios was unbanned, he is currently not a Twitch partner, as his status was removed when he was banned back in 2020.

It’s currently unclear why Twitch staff have decided to reverse the ban on Barrios’ account after all this time, but the streamer may go live in the future or post about the situation. There has been public backlash following the news of the unban, but it’s unclear if Twitch staff will cave to the pressure and strike the account down again.

Until then, we’ll keep you updated on all the latest news coming out of this situation.