Cecilie Fjellhoy thought she had met her prince charming in the beginning.
Just just How A israeli conman’s alleged victim claims he swindled her out of $200K
Cecilie Fjellhoy thought she had been met by her prince charming whenever she matched on Tinder with Simon Leviev.
Fjellhoy, a 29-year-old Norwegian masters pupil residing in London, stated she had been swept off her foot to their very very first date, including a personal airplane trip to Bulgaria. Fjellhoy said Leviev shared with her he ended up being a millionaire that is israeli called himself the “Prince of Diamonds.”
“I happened to be texting my buddies in the same time like in an organization chat exactly like, ‘I do not understand what are you doing,'” she stated.
Exactly what started as a storybook relationship changed into a real-life nightmare, Fjellhoy said – the one that delivered her into debt and fearing on her behalf security. It is a tale that is cautionary the risks of internet dating.
“we hate him, he is therefore terrible,” she stated. “we have always been simply sick and tired of crying relating to this you realize? It is simply so painful. I recently hate myself that i did so this.”
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Leviev was created Shimon Hayut, a 28-year-old convicted Israeli con-man who served 3 years in Finnish jail for defrauding a few ladies in purchase to finance their luxurious life style of personal jets and quick cars, which Fjellhoy said he adored to exhibit down.
Fjellhoy said Hayut defrauded her out of significantly more than $200,000, finding by herself lulled into a sense that is false of by their grand intimate gestures and flowery declarations of love. She stated she dropped victim to “confidence fraudulence.”
In June, Hayut ended up being arrested in Greece for making use of a false passport after a joint procedure between Interpol and Israeli police.
Away from court Hayut told reporters from VG, a Norwegian socket that first broke the storyline, “we is certainly going back again to Israel, which is my home nation, and I also will face what exactly is waiting for me personally here and that is it, and we’ll sort every thing away. Whatever issues that people have actually, we shall sort it call at court.”
He now faces extradition to Israel, where he had been indicted last year on theft, forgery and fraudulence fees unrelated to Fjellhoy but he fled the nation before he had been set to face test.
Based on the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, internet-facilitated love frauds, also referred to as self- self- confidence fraudulence, may be the no. 1 form of customer fraudulence into the U.S. around the globe, victims of self- self- confidence fraudulence lose vast amounts of bucks every year, in line with the FBI.
Fjellhoy, whom shared her story with “Nightline” early in the day this current year, stated her relationship with Hayut started away innocently sufficient.
“this is the time that is first we felt like, ‘Oh my god i like him. Also it seems which he actually likes me personally straight back too,'” She stated. “He’s texting and he’s calling in which he appears to actually want to become familiar with me, and I also think i’m a little for that.”
Fjellhoy said Hayut informed her that their work as being a diamond dealer, working for a business called LLD Diamonds, kept him traveling constantly, so that they dated long-distance. She stated they delivered one another love notes over text, in movie declarations and sound recordings.
She stated he arrived to check out her in London as he could, but generally, she stated he travelled her to where he had been. She stated he’d constantly allude to a component of risk in their work that kept him away, constantly for a jet that is private. At one point, Fjellhoy said she was told by him he couldn’t get back to London due to threats he had been getting, “but he might get me personally to where he had been.”
She said Hayut reported become under constant risk from unknown nefarious enemies. She said she ended up being told by him it absolutely was a risk of employed in the diamond company.
Fjellhoy said Hayut surrounded himself with individuals who assisted perpetuate the misconception, also going in terms of to send pictures of himself along with his bodyguard into the medical center when they had been allegedly “attacked.”
Based on Fjellhoy, it had been not well before Hayut made a large ask, begging her to give her credit line to him to make certain that any routes, accommodations and dinners could be scheduled under her name along with his expected “enemies,” he called them, would be thrown off his trail as she said.
“One for the significant reasons why he required it absolutely was security… he required my title as being a cover, he stated,” Fjellhoy told “Nightline.” “I’m sure it seems crazy. but why would he have this giant guy he did not require the security? with him if”
Fjellhoy said she relented because Hayut promised to back pay her, but funding their jet-set lifestyle ended up being costing her. Together with money she had been being guaranteed by him was not to arrive.
“My angel My love i recently chatted to your bank and so they said that the transfer of Amex will likely be here on Monday thousand per cent,” read one text Hayut sent her.
“the quantity which he has to be in a position to simply work for the week is merely a great deal,” Fjellhoy stated. “It really is never just a couple thousand, for him it is not lots of money. for people normal people who will be a lot of income, but”
She stated he informed her he required large amounts of cash because he’d “a whole group” he necessary to book flights and resort hotels for. Fjellhoy said she assumed, as a result of their fancy clothing and life style, he previously cash and would spend her straight straight back.
“You did not also think because you were so sure that this guy and the people that you had met was part of the LLD Diamonds and that the money existed,” she said that it secret benefits was a problem when you were taking up the loans. “as he stated, ‘Everything’s likely to be fine following this week,’ after which it did not. Therefore just ‘one more week’ and then ‘one more week.’ So in the long run you very nearly you don’t even understand how much cash you really owed.”
And finally, Fjelljoy stated, she was at love with him.
“that is the hardest section of it … whenever I understood which he was not who he said he had been,” she said. “That the individual that I believed that we knew and adored, he’d simply done something within the most wicked method.”