Cab Driver Charged With Trying To Rape Passenger
ST. PAUL (WCCO) -- A 23-year-old taxi driver accused of kidnapping and trying to rape a passenger has been formally charged with those crimes, according to the Ramsey County Attorney's Office.
On Dec. 6, a 26-year-old woman called police and told them what had happened the day before. She said at about 3:20 a.m. she had called a cab to pick her up from the downtown Minneapolis restaurant where she tends bar.
When she walked out the door, she saw a minivan cab at the corner and got inside. She asked the driver, identified in court documents as Abdikadir Yusef Mohamed of St. Paul, if she could smoke on their way to her friend's apartment. He told her she could if she sat in the front seat.
The charges say she told police that once she moved up front, Mohamed put his hand on her leg and moved it up her skirt, groping her over her underwear despite her demands that he stop. She said when she tried to get out of the cab at an intersection, he locked the doors and said, "I know what American girls want. Let's go to a parking lot somewhere."
She told him she had a boyfriend waiting at the apartment she had asked him to take her to. Prosecutors say Mohamed told her his name is Abdi and gave her his cell phone number, which she put into her phone to later share with police.
As they neared her friend's apartment, she told him again she wanted to be let out. He said he wanted to "get her ready" for her boyfriend, drove by the apartment and stopped her when she tried to climb to the back seat, according to court documents. That's when she says she started punching him in the shoulder. He let her out about a block past the apartment, where she threw money at him and ran away.
The charges say an investigator called the cell phone number the victim had given to police and offered the man who answered, who called himself "Abdi," a fare. The investigator also identified the phone number as registered to Mohamed.
When the cab pulled up to the agreed-upon pickup, the investigator saw that the van and the driver matched the description given by the victim and arrested Mohamed, according to court documents.
Prosecutors say at the police station, the victim picked Mohamed out of a photo lineup given by a different officer than the one who arrested him, and that she did so with 100 percent certainty.
In an interview with police, Mohamed was shown a photo of the victim and he said he's never seen her before, according to the charges.
An investigator called the cab company the victim had called and spoke to an employee who remembered a call for a ride from the restaurant that morning. The employee told police a "pirate cab" listened in on a radio scanner and "scooped" the fare before their driver arrived.
Court documents show Mohamed has been charged with one count of kidnapping for the purpose of committing fourth degree criminal sexual conduct, which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison. They show he has also been charged with fourth degree criminal sexual conduct, which by itself carries a maximum sentence of 10 years.
