Netflix’s “The Tinder Swindler” has been a trending topic on social media since its release earlier this month.
The true-crime documentary is about Israeli man Shimon Hayut aka Simon Leviev who allegedly scammed women he met on the dating app out of an estimated $10 million. The women claim Simon lured them into romantic relationships with lavish dates after pretending to be the son of a billionaire Israeli diamond businessman. After reeling the women in, the conman would then ask the women for large amounts of money so he could escape his so-called enemies.
Days after the documentary became the talk of the internet, French Montana realized and then revealed he once met the scammer.
The rapper shared a throwback photo of him and Leviev on his Instagram story on February 6, captioned, “I can’t believe I met the swindler.”
Baller Alert caught up with French where he confirmed he met the swindler “at least 3-4 years ago.”
“We met in Europe,” French told Baller Alert. “He told me he was a diamonds dealer.”
Luckily, no scamming took place. The “Unforgettable” rapper confirmed Simon was just a fan asking for a photo and that Leviev told him about his “job” in the diamond business– which the world now knows is far from the truth.
Since the release of the documentary, Simon has denied defrauding the women and has never been charged with his role in scamming them. He was, however, sentenced to 15 months in prison in Israel for fraud, unrelated to the allegations the women he met on Tinder made against him. He was released after five months for “good behavior.”
Following the popularity of the Netflix doc, Simon was banned from Tinder and several other dating apps.
