The household of a 16-year-old Lengthy Island woman who was allegedly raped in NYC by a person she met on Snapchat is holding Uber partly answerable for their daughter’s nightmare.
The Orthodox Jewish sufferer was taken with out query to Brooklyn, the place she met up with a person she met on Snapchat who sexually assaulted her in his automotive, and filmed it, her household claimed in a lawsuit towards the ride-share firm.
“On account of this assault, my daughter was induced extreme bodily and emotional hurt,” her mom mentioned in court docket papers.
The nightmare started March 10, when the teenager left her “tight-knit” higher center class house in Nassau County and obtained into an Uber allegedly ordered for her by the attacker, based on court docket papers.
The woman’s evening ought to have ended proper then, her household contended.
Uber bars strangers from calling for rides for passengers below 18, and kids aren’t alleged to journey alone, until they’ve a selected account meant for youngsters, based on the corporate.
“When choosing up riders, when you really feel they’re underage, you might request they supply a driver’s license or ID card for affirmation. If a rider is underage, please don’t begin the journey or enable them to journey,” based on the corporate’s website.
However as an alternative of ending the journey, the motive force introduced the sufferer to Bushwick and dropped her off with out ensuring she was secure or with a guardian, allegedly breaking one other tenet of Uber’s insurance policies relating to children.
The woman “didn’t perceive the hazard of the scenario,” based on the authorized submitting.
Authorities mentioned the sufferer then met Ralfy Figueroa — who has since been arrested and charged with first-degree rape for allegedly attacking the younger woman in his automotive that evening.
The 2 had been talking on-line since at the very least January, when Figueroa paid the sufferer $35 in trade for a “nude” {photograph}, based on a legal criticism.
The sufferer as an alternative despatched a picture she discovered on the web, authorities mentioned.
On the day of the assault, Figueroa allegedly known as the woman through Snapchat, asking to satisfy and threatening her.
“It’s a must to, I do know your tackle. Affirm your tackle, when you don’t, I’m gonna damage you and your loved ones,” prosecutors mentioned in court docket paperwork.
As soon as she was in his automotive, Figueroa allegedly supplied her $1,000 for oral intercourse and when she refused, compelled her till she vomited and threatened “to ship folks to your property,” telling her, “I’ve weapons,” based on the criticism.
When the assault was completed, Figueroa, 26, known as a second Uber to take the sufferer house, and canceled the journey as soon as she was within the car, mentioned her household’s lawyer, David Seidemann, who claimed the suspect additionally filmed the assault.
The sufferer has been traumatized and has been in psychological well being remedy at an out of state facility, her household mentioned.
“My daughter has advised me that, if the movies of the assault have been to be made public, she would kill herself,” the mother mentioned in court docket papers looking for unspecified damages towards Uber.
On the time of the alleged assault, Figueroa had simply accomplished a program known as Instances ROAR, meant as an alternative choice to incarceration for these below 27 years previous.
He was despatched to the Reframing Alternatives, Options and Resilience program as a part of a plea deal after he was arrested in July for promoting crack to an undercover officer in Bushwick. The crime was not bail eligible.
Figueroa now faces the revocation of his plea deal within the drug case and a sentence of as much as 9 years in jail, in accordance the Workplace of the Particular Narcotics Prosecutor, which dealt with that case.
“We have now requested a listening to to find out whether or not defendant Ralfy Figueroa has violated the phrases of his plea to felony and misdemeanor narcotics fees and will instantly be sentenced on these fees,” spokesperson Kati Cornell mentioned.
A lawyer for Figueroa, who has pleaded not responsible to the rape cost and was being held at Rikers Island on $100,000 bail, declined remark.
Uber mentioned it encourages drivers to cancel journeys involving unaccompanied minors who don’t have a teen account, and report it to the corporate for overview.
“The main points of this case are extremely distressing,” an Uber spokesman mentioned in a press release. “Whereas we can’t touch upon ongoing litigation, our dedication to protecting security on the forefront of every part we do stays unwavering.”
