Five women said the suspect catfished them by posing as a man while maintaining romantic and sexual relationships with them over several years.
Israel Police on Sunday arrested a young woman in her 20s suspected of impersonating a man and maintaining romantic and sexual relationships with five different women, from her apartment in Petah Tikva.
Police officers seized a number of digital devices, including laptop computers, a mobile phone, and several digital storage devices, and will seek to extend her detention on Monday, while requesting permission to publish her name in order to locate additional possible victims.
Four of the women contacted the police, causing investigations to begin on July 26, which led to authorities locating another suspected victim.
The suspect contacted them via phone and online communication over several years, the five women claimed.
"For months we were in a romantic and personal relationship, until I discovered that it was a woman," one of the victims stated.
Handcuffs on table. (credit: Wikimedia Commons)
Each of the five women was in a relationship with the suspect during a different period and for an extended period, while convinced that they were communicating with a man, until it became clear to them at a certain point that it was a woman behind the persona.