Former Dallas Uber Driver Found Guilty Of Sexually Assaulting Drunk Passenger
DALLAS (CBSDFW.COM) - After nine hours of deliberations, jurors found Talal Chammout guilty of sexually assaulting his Uber passenger in July 2015.
The jury, made up of seven men and five women, found the former Uber driver, Chammout not guilty on a second charge of forcing himself on his accuser during their initial encounter.
The accuser was in the courtroom and when the not guilty verdict for the second charge was read, she buried her face in her hands and sobbed.
Chammout faces ten years to life in prison. The jury will continue with the punishment phase on Monday.
During the trial, the accuser who testified under the pseudonym Lindsay Kramer, spent some three hours on the witness stand Tuesday, about the attack she freely admitted she doesn't fully remember.
"As disgusting and challenging as it was, I had to call my rapist," said Kramer... noticeably pausing. "And discuss scheduling or planning another meetup." She told jurors, "I was desperate to get him to admit what he did."
Kramer testified that she had already showered by the time she called police, two days later. She also says she was embarrassed so she initially mislead detectives about how much she drank while out celebrating a friend's birthday.
Chammout has a prior felony conviction, which should have barred him from becoming an Uber driver, but he was using a fake city permit at the time of the alleged attack. If convicted, he faces a possible sentence of two years to life in prison.
