TBILISI, September 17. /TASS/. A court in Batumi ruled that Israeli conman Simon Leviev, of Netflix fame, be jailed for three months, the Georgian city’s news portal Batumelebi reported.
Leviev, whose real name is Shimon Hayut, was arrested at Batumi Airport on Monday. In 2022, Leviev was depicted in "The Tinder Swindler," a true crime documentary film that was released on Netflix. It tells the story of women who became entangled with Leviev, who, posing as a wealthy man, charmed them and then conned them out of their money. In 2019, he was arrested with a forged passport in Greece and extradited to Israel.
The three-month prison sentence was slapped on Leviev by Judge Nino Sakhelashvili. The New York Times (NYT) reported, citing Leviev’s lawyer, Sagiv Rotenberg, that he was arrested at Batumi International Airport after several hours of questioning and that Germany had asked Interpol to issue a warrant for his arrest. Prosecutors in Germany have accused Leviev of stealing 44,000 euros from a woman and also incurring thousands of euros of expenses using her credit card, the newspaper wrote.