Shimon Yehuda Hayut, the convicted fraudster who became notorious as the “Tinder Swindler” following a Netflix documentary, has been arrested in Georgia. Authorities said he was detained on Sunday after arriving at Batumi International Airport in the southwest of the country.
The Georgian interior ministry confirmed that Hayut, also known by the alias Simon Leviev, was arrested on the basis of a red notice issued by Interpol. It is not yet clear which state requested his detention, or on what grounds. A ministry spokesperson, Tato Kuchava, confirmed only that he was “arrested at Batumi’s airport at Interpol’s request”.
Hayut’s lawyer told Israeli media that the reasons for his arrest remain unknown. “I spoke with him this morning after he was detained, but we don’t yet understand the reason,” they said, adding that he had been “travelling freely around the world”.
Between 2017 and 2019, Hayut allegedly used the dating app Tinder to impersonate the son of billionaire diamond mogul Lev Leviev. He is accused of conning women into giving him an estimated £7.4m by luring them into emotional and financial dependency.
The 2022 Netflix documentary The Tinder Swindler detailed how Hayut created a false persona to win the trust of women, often taking them on lavish dates using private jets and bodyguards. After establishing relationships, he would claim his credit cards had been compromised and persuade victims to open new ones in their own names for his use.
Hayut denied the allegations, describing himself as a “legitimate businessman” who had built wealth through bitcoin trading. In 2019, he was convicted in Israel on charges of fraud, forgery and theft, following his extradition from Greece. He was sentenced to 15 months in prison but served just five months due to the Covid pandemic. He was also ordered to pay £35,000 in compensation and fined for using a false passport.
Victims continue to pursue him through the courts. Cecilie Fjellhøy, a Norwegian graduate student who appeared in the documentary, said she gave him more than $270,000 during their relationship after being flown to Bulgaria on a private jet for their first date. Last year, another woman, Iren Tranov, filed a claim in Israel for 414,000 shekels (£91,000), alleging she lent him over £31,000 which he never repaid.
