Police arrest man suspected of being 'Israeli Madoff'

Police arrested Tuesday a 34-year-old resident of central Israel suspected of cheating dozens of people out of tens of millions of shekels.

Dubbed "the Israeli Madoff" by police, the man is suspected of conning his victims by posing as a stockbroker from a European company.

According to police, the man convinced his victims that he had the information and the means to produce dividends. Among other activities, the man allegedly allocated sums of money to his victims in an attempt to get them to increase the size of their investments.

Police believe the man succeeded in embezzling a total of NIS 30m from his victims, which he put in his bank account without fulfilling his promise of investing them in securities.