Uber and City of San Antonio had disputes time back.
In a shocking incident, first such in San Antonio, a Uber cab driver has been charged for raping a woman passenger who was in an inebriate state.
According to the San Antonio Police Department, the alleged incident happened in October 2016 after the Uber driver took the victim back home from a bar.
The police report says that the woman dozed off inside the bathroom of an unnamed bar after which she was carried to the Uber waiting outside by the bartenders
The cab driver, who has been identified by the police as Gabriel Vasquez, reportedly helped the woman into her apartment as she was high on alcohol. According to the police report, the Uber driver “escorted her to her bed and began to undress her” and forced himself into the victim.
The next day, after coming out of the hangover, the 22-year-old woman complained to the police and Uber about the ordeal.
Uber in a statement said that Vasquez no longer works for the transportation network and aid that the ride that he gave to the rape victim was his last official assignment.
Police have confirmed that Vasquez has no prior complaints pending or closed against him, making him a valid driver under the Uber policy.
A few residents who were shocked to hear what their neighbor had to undergo said that they had asked the cab aggregator since 2014 to utilize stringent fingerprint background checks of its drivers.
Kens5 quoted a resident saying, “I’m definitely challenged to know why Uber isn’t stepping up and doing the fingerprint.”
There existed a faceoff between Uber and City of San Antonio some time back. Uber had stopped its operations in the city for a few months in 2015 but returned in October same year after the city allowed them in by making the fingerprint background checks optional.