“All we want are our lives back.”
Victims of the Tinder Swindler have set up a GoFundMe to compensate the money taken from them by the conman, Shimon Hayut.
The shocking story of three women’s experience with Hayut was told in the Netlfix documentary, which landed on the platform last week.
Hayut would seek out women on Tinder, pretending to be the heir to a billion dollar diamond company, win them over with his lavish lifestyle, and manipulate them into loaning him money.
It’s understood that he stole an estimated $10 million by conning women he met on Tinder over the years.
Netflix’s documentary focuses on Cecilie Fjellhøy, Pernilla Sjöholm and Ayleen Charlotte as they share their experiences of being conned.
All three women borrowed huge sums of money to give to Hayut, who they genuinely believed needed their help. They are still paying off their debts.
After receiving messages from people wanting to help them, the victims have now decided to set up a GoFundMe.
At the time of writing, they have raised £16,724 (€19,767) towards their goal of £600,000.
The page description reads: “You’re probably here because you’ve heard about our story, and we appreciate you taking the time to search and find this page.
“The past few days have been a whirlwind, and we three (Ayleen, Pernilla and Cecilie) have been completely shocked and floored by the flood of compassion and support from everyone.
“The sheer love is more than we ever expected, and we appreciate you all so much.
“We have decided to start this GoFundMe fundraiser. So many people reached out to us asking if we had one, and it hadn’t occurred to us to make one prior to this.
“However, we’ve spotted plenty of fakes, which makes us uneasy. We don’t want more people getting defrauded.
“We realise there are a thousand other worthy causes to donate to, and remain forever grateful if you choose to donate to this one. All we want are our lives back.”
Hayut previously spent two years in a Finnish prison for defrauding several women. Upon his release, things didn’t change and he quickly began conning people again.
He was eventually caught for using a fake passport in Greece in 2019 and sentenced to 15 months in prison for theft, fraud, and forgery of documents. He was released after five months on good behaviour.
He was never charged for the crimes he committed against Ayleen, Pernilla and Cecilie.
Following the documentary, Hayut promised to tell his side of the story before deleting his Instagram account.
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