If you're a fan of a true crime documentary, The Tinder Swindler should already be on your radar. The feature length doc tells the story of Israeli fraudster Shimon Hayut, who targeted women on dating apps and after making them believe they were in a relationship, duped them out of huge sums of money.
The documentary gives a voice to three of his victims, Cecilie Fjellhoy, Pernilla Sjoholm and Ayleen Charlotte, who were all systematically manipulated by Hayut for his own financial gain.
Who is the 'Tinder Swindler' Shimon Hayut?
Hayut used the alias Simon Leviev to reel in his victims, pretending he was a billionaire playboy and son of the Russian-Israeli diamond mogul, Lev Leviev. In reality he had no connection to the Leviev family, and had changed his identity after serving two years in prison in Finland for defrauding three other women in 2015.
Following his release in 2017, he started his con again. After matching with women on Tinder, he'd take them on lavish dates to five-star hotels and the opera. Pretending that his 'work' meant that he had to travel abroad constantly, he would bombard his victims with romantic messages and voice notes every day, making them feel as if they were in loving long-distance relationship with a jet set CEO.
How did the Tinder Swindler con his victims?
To convince the women of his lavish lifestyle he hired a team of fake assistants and a body guard, sending pictures of himself in Ferraris and closeups of his designer watches. Emotionally, he deceived the women by giving them endless attention, and talking about their future married life together.
Then would come requests for money, which he promised to pay back. Having seen evidence of his 'billions' the victims assumed there would be no problem getting the money back. Norwegian graduate student Cecilie Fjellhoy was left in $200,000 of debt after taking out credit cards, which Hayut used to fund his lifestyle, on the promise that he would pay her back. He even faked a letter from his bank to say he was transferring the money to her account.
With another victim - Pernilla Sjoholm from Sweden - he repaid a $45,000 loan she gave him with an expensive watch that turned out to be a fake. Pernilla only realised she's been swindled when a reporter got in touch to say they were investigating a serial fraudster: the man she thought she was in love with.
Where is Simon Hayut now?
Hayut was eventually arrested using a fake passport in Grace in June 2019 following a joint operation between Interpol and Israeli Police. He was convicted of four charges of fraud and sentenced to 15 months in prison however he was released after serving only five months under an Israeli program to reduce the prison population to prevent Covid outbreaks amongst prisoners.
'I was in shock from the decision to release him. I’m really disappointed by [Israel’s] justice system which gives a man like that a reduced sentence. He deceived people and left prison after five months?' Pernilla told Israel's Channel 12. 'Where is the justice?'
Stream The Tinder Swindler on Netflix from 2 February.
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